All posts by Tomas Martin

Writer and particle physics student from Bristol, England. My story 'A Shogun's Welcome' featured in Aberrant Dreams #7 and 'The Shogun and The Scientist' will be published in the anthology 'The Awakening' in January 2008. I review at SFCrowsnest and wrote the fictional blog miawithoutoil for the world without oil project.
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A new king of the Rubbish

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This refuse isn’t going awayIt’s that classic pub quiz question that fools everyone: what is the biggest man made thing on the planet? Of course, nine times out of ten we’ll say with great confidence “The Great Wall Of China”. After all, it can be seen from space, right? However the smug quizmaster (or a contestant that had this question in trivial pursuit years ago) will inform you that the real answer is rubbish: the giant landfill of rubbish on Staten Island, Fresh Kills. The remains of the World Trade Centre is there.

However, if you get this question in a quiz, you can now happily outsmug the quizmaster, albeit tinged with a bit of self-loathing for the impact of your species. The largest man-made object is now an even bigger collection of human waste. It’s not a landfill, at least not intentially. It’s the size of Africa, some ten million square miles. It’s at the centre of the Pacific ocean and it’s full of plastic refuse. The circular atmospheric currents form a ring of current, inside which there is a still region of ocean where anything drifting into the Pacific accumulates. Non-biodegradable plastics that reach this point will never leave, being broken down by the sun into ever smaller pieces to make their way into the entire marine food chain.

[via Daily Kos, image by countrygirlathome]

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supercomputers that fit in your hand

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Harvard image of tiny nanowireResearchers at a university in Scotland believe that thanks to ever-expanding research into ultra thin nanowires, supercomputers the size of matchboxes might not be more than a decade away. Nanowires, some 1000 times smaller than a human hair, have exhibited strange behaviour due to their small size but the scientists at the University of Edinburgh think they have worked out how to minimise it, leading to their bold prediction.

The department of Physics where I study in Bristol has a massive new nanoscience building nearing completion. The field is full of promising breakthroughs for micro-sized (and so less energy intensive) devices, especially in computing. Anyone hoping to build a palm held supercomputer may well use devices like the holographic nanoassembler coupled with high speed atomic force microscopy to put together such tiny machines. The holographic nanoassembler is especially fascinating research as it never touches the tiny particles, using lasers to manipulate the smallest of objects. Nanowires are also incredibly useful for solar panels, where current efficiency is limited by the large metal substrates that carry electric charge, which obscure some of the sun-collecting surface.

[Photo by Harvard University via IEEE Spectrum]

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Ancient Amazonian soil enrichment technique may provide ‘carbon negative’ fuel

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dark earth - a way to cut down our carbon?A lot of money has been pumped into Carbon Sequestration recently, to try and put some of the CO2 we produce back into the earth in the underground aquifers where we got the oil and gas that caused it in the first place. However, another way of storing carbon is in the soil, which benefits agriculture as well. Indigenous tribes in the Amazon basin have been using a technique of introducing charcoal to soil to produce darker ‘terra preta‘ soil for millenia. The low temperature charring of plants and trees introduces more carbon to the soil and encourages worms to break down the charcoal and soil to make a nutrient-rich loam.

A study into the method by MIT professor Amy Smith found that using agricultural char methods could be a great way of producing low-cost fuel for developing nation. You can view a speech on the subject she made at TED 2006 here. By burning waste materials in a gasifier, the methane, hydrogen and other burnable gases it produces can be used as fuels, leaving behind a charred solid that can be mixed into the soil as fertiliser, building back the soil content. Because the organic content has charred, it doesn’t decompose to be released into the atmosphere. WorldChanging has a great analysis that the process could actually provide power whilst potentially reducing the amount of carbon in the atmosphere.

[via WorldChanging, image via Papa Goiaba]

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Quids – the new spaceproof currency

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QUIDS: the new currencyWith Virgin planning its first space tourists over the next few years and industry wanting to branch outside of the atmosphere, a little thought of problem has been solved by the industrialisation of space: money. Coins have sharp, metal edges that can cause great damage in zero-g and credit cards would be completely wiped by cosmic radiation.

Currency exchange company Travelex has come up with a new form of currency that is completely spaceproof. Made of a similar material to non-stick frying pans, the QUID is heatproof at a high temperatures, has no sharp edges or toxic materials that could cause problems for the astronauts using them. Maybe in the future we’ll all be walking round space malls spending our tubes of QUIDS.

[image from the QUIDS press release]

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TED talks continue with Hod Lipson’s intelligent robots

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Jane Goodall at TED 2003Ever since finding a superb Spore video by Will Wright on TED.com, I’ve been keeping an eye on the website for new videos which are released on a regular basis. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design and is an annual conference in which respected thinkers from all aspects of the world come to give fascinating speeches about their pet subjects. Only recently has the website started giving access to these speeches to anyone who didn’t attend the conference.

As well as Will Wright’s speech (and if you haven’t watched at least one presentation about the forthcoming groundbreaking game, you should), there’s a recent video by bioengineer Hod Lipson about his work on small robots which can learn and self-replicate. The website and video player is cleverly designed with an ingenious overlay on the bottom of the video telling you about the subsections of the talk, how long they go on for and what the subtopics are. Other enjoyable talks include speakers like Al Gore on global warming, Carolyn Porco on flying to Saturn with Cassini, James Kunstler’s engaging criticism of the tragedy of suburbia and Aubrey de Grey’s controversial belief that we can defeat ageing. That’s barely scratching the surface – I could spend weeks watching nothing but TED talks and not get bored. Have a browse and find the ones that engage you.