A New Spin On Physical Phenomena 249
f00Dave writes "Researchers have discovered "a new physical phenomenon, electrostatic rotation, that, in the absence of friction, leads to spin". I'm a bit skeptical about the implied relationship between physical "spin" (as in rotation) and quantum "spin", however. Still, this is the sort of scientific advance that renews my faith in the system. Go nerds! =]"
You forget... (Score:2, Insightful)
No more friction? (Score:4, Insightful)
At last my dream of building a perpetual motion machine can be realized. Take that thermodynamics!
Cool, but what is the practical application? (Score:2, Insightful)
Renewed faith? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm a bit skeptical about the implied relationship between physical "spin" (as in rotation) and quantum "spin", however. Still, this is the sort of scientific advance that renews my faith in the system.
What system are we talking about? Why does faith need to be renewed in it? What, have you lost faith in physics because it doesn't discover new laws every day?
What's this supposed ' lack of friction?' (Score:3, Insightful)
Now if they want to measure political spin, we have to wait to see what research grants they apply for next...(sorry, couldn't help it.) Seriously- how do they do this without friction?
Call me a skeptic... (Score:2, Insightful)
i dont get it (Score:2, Insightful)
Also, a drawing of the setup would have been nice.
Third, how do they get from spinning metal thingies to quantum spin? Sounds strange...
Re:Output? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Output? (Score:3, Insightful)
Silly Scientists (Score:1, Insightful)
They applied an electrical charge to a object, while inside the Earth's magnetic field, and they were surprised that the object experienced a rotational force?
They didn't consider the magnetic field. They didn't consider that the magnetic field is constantly changing, due to the spin of the Earth and Solar wind. They didn't consider that having three charged spheres near to each other would cause the charge of those spheres to develop a pole.
No. They jumped right to the conclusion that they had discovered something new about the spin of atomic particles.
Spare me.
ObSimpsons (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Renewed faith? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Why only frictionless? (Score:1, Insightful)
Just a random guess, but perhaps they're saying "frictionless" because this is what their experiment involves. It's very likely true also, given other physical laws, that the same force would work against friction too, but their experiment hasn't shown that. Their experiment has only shown that it happens in (near-) frictionless environment, so that's what they have reported.
With regard to energy, I assume there is some flow of current somewhere. The article does say a DC voltage was applied to the spheres. It's not as if it's all that different from some familiar experiments. Two objects both with positive charges have a force between them and this force can do work, but it doesn't mean energy is coming from nowhere. On the other hand, it is unclear exactly what the process is, so it's hard to say for sure.
Re:Cool, but what is the practical application? (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe that's the cool thing about scientific curiosity - the things you discover don't have to have commercial value in order to be discovered.
Consider this: when it was determined that a current flowing in a wire produces a magnetic field, or when Faraday discovered that moving a magnet near a wire or coil of wire can produce a voltage, I'm sure a lot of people said, "but seriously, what would this be used for?" And they probably said the same thing about countless other things that were discovered in situations where the effect was so small that they had no apparent use.
Of course now we look back and say, "what a dumb question! How could they now know these things could be useful?" And maybe 200 years from now somebody will look at this archived announcement on Slashdot and say the same.
Then again, maybe this will turn out to be a misinterpretation of the experimental observation. Time will tell...
Faith (Score:2, Insightful)
Faith is belief in something which you know to be false -- Arthur Clarke.
Anybody cross-check this? (Score:3, Insightful)
I've RTFA (or press release, in this case). Interesting stuff.
I do have one initial concern, and that's the temporal juxtaposition of this announcement with April 1. Is three days of separation sufficient to assure that we're not seeing some kind of delayed effect here?
Okay, then please explain. (Score:3, Insightful)
Now stabilize it rotationally. Now stick two or three metal brushes lightly against it, and hit it with some charge. Will it spin? Will it spin continuously faster?
If so, how?
Or alternatively, we can have 3 metalized ping pong balls on three jets of air [that is, infinitely thing strings, you might say] and each brushing against three metalic brushes. Will these spin and accelerate continuously faster?
Suppose, instead of balancing them on air jets, we used strong magnetism and magneticized balls. Will it work then?
Why, or why not?
There is one mistake in the article... (Score:2, Insightful)
More seriously though: both the articles in Applied Physics Letters and in Europhysics letters are followed by errata (see publication list [ucr.edu]. So they were at least partially wrong which is not a good start for dethroning a century-old theory.
When are they going to learn... (Score:2, Insightful)
The article is very confusing, and makes several leaps that even the researchers don't promulgate.
Basically, what seems to be going on here is that one charges up metal spheres to see how they interact. This is a way of testing EM theory. Now, as is commonly known, charging a metal sphere will eventually have the charge distributed uniformly on the surface, and eventually static. However, it takes a non-zero amount of time to reach these static states. What these boys have done is charge 3 spheres (presumably) simultaneously, and then observe physical spin (rotation) in the spheres.
Well, inhomogenities in the surfaces can have slightly non-uniform charge currents during the charging process. All it would take is a slight asymmetry, and the charge on two spheres (let alone three) could and would provide a torque to the other(s) via the usual Coulomb interaction.
no pratical use (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Cool, but what is the practical application? (Score:3, Insightful)
Having said that, this is purely a proof-of-concept thingy. What they did was just say, "Look, we can use this simple setup to create rotation". It's like they stuck a magnet near another magnet dangling on a string ang made it rotate. That's a long way from an electromagnetic motor, but it is a first step...