Making Antibubbles in Beer from Belgium

An anonymous reader writes "About.com reports on "Antibubbles in beer from Belgium". Scientists in Belgium have studied the movement of antibubbles (the exact opposite of regular bubbles) in Flemish beer. They found that the beer was very similar, but not the same as, dishwater. You can also learn how to make antibubbles in your kitchen from soapy water."

yeah, but....

[eyegor]

Of course, some [budweiser.com] beers are more like dishwater than others [olddominion.com].

Re:yeah, but....

[Scott Wood]

Water goes down smoother than any beer; I'd expect it to still be the case if you added enough vodka to bring it up to a typical beer's strength. However, some of us want more than just alcohol, "goes down smooth", and cheapness from our beers.

And yes, I've had MGD before. I'll pass.

Re:Oldie but a Goodie

[Wolfrider]

"Whoopee canoe, and Tyler too!"

(Any History / Government buffs out there?)

Antibubbles

[Staos]

But does the beer explode?

Re:Antibubbles

[Jason1729]

Only when the Antibubbles encounter the bubbles.

Jason
ProfQuotes [profquotes.com]

Re:Antibubbles

[infinite9]

Wasn't Yahoo Serious working on this?

Re:Antibubbles

[grub]

I want to know what an anti-fart smells like and how anti-splatterbum will look in the bowl.

Re:Antibubbles

[McDutchie]

But does the beer explode?

No; it implodes.

Re:Antibubbles

[grolschie]

You mean like in Young Einstein [imdb.com] where Albert Einstein (played by Yahoo Serious) splits the beer atom and with much explosion inadvertently invents beer with bubbles?

"The beer's got bubbles."
"And it's got a good head on it too!"

Experiments == the Scientific Method

[GnrlFajita]

I'm off to the liquor store, then -- in the name of science, of course!

Re:Experiments == the Scientific Method

[amasci]

Note that it's VERY easy to blow antibubbles. The main trick is to set up a clean liquid surface with a bit of detergent in the water.

Some antibubble references:

C.L. Stong, "Curious Bubbles in Which a Gas Encloses a Liquid Instead of the Other Way Around",
Scientific American Magazine, THE AMATEUR SCIENTIST, April 1974

Project websites:

J. Thomas page
http://www.antibubble.org/

Science Hobbyist Page
http://amasci.com/amateur/antibub/antibub1.html

T. Fritz page (more advanced tricks)
http://hot-streamer.com/antibubbles/

You can make beer that tastes like dishwater?

[Pingular]

How about making dishwater that tastes like beer?

Easy!

[daeley]

Ingredients:

Dishwater
Beer

In sink, add beer to dishwater. Stir.

Re:Easy!

[Dr. Photo]

That's how they make "Lite" beer. ;)

Re:Easy!

[bigjnsa500]

Those are the ingredients of Pearl and Lone Star.

Re:Easy!

[David Gould]

No, to make "Lite" beer, you need a bucket of real beer, a thirsty horse, and an empty bucket.

Re:Easy!

[WarDancer]

Oh! so that's how budweiser beer is brewed.

Re:You can make beer that tastes like dishwater?

[Tassach]

Already been done. It's called "Budweiser".

Re:You can make beer that tastes like dishwater?

[Anonymous Coward]

i think hes talking about american beer.

No, they leave the beer out. ;)

Re:You can make beer that tastes like dishwater?

[SomeGuyFromCA]

Ah, yes, good ol copulation-in-a-canoe stuff.

Re:You can make beer that tastes like dishwater?

[SonicBurst]

I can't believe I'm the first to say that correctly: it's fucking close to water.

Re:You can make beer that tastes like dishwater?

[SonicBurst]

Damn! Leave it to me to screw up the joke. Par for the course I suppose.

I wonder...

[SargeZT]

Antimatter Beer? That's a hell of a bite.

Re:I wonder...

[eyegor]

Yeah, you have to drink to stay sober.... taxes ones bank account after a while..... sigh....

Re:I wonder...

[Pope]

Yeah, you have to drink to stay sober

Oh, what a terrible future man has wrought!

Shows what I know.

[Atario]

Here all this time I thought the reverse of a bubble would be a droplet.

Antibubbles

[stanmann]

Do the antibubbles make you antidrunk?? or just antisocial?

Re:Antibubbles

[SatanicLoveMonkey]

Many a dry-t-shirt contest was sadly fueled by the aforementioned...

Re:Antibubbles

[techno-vampire]

No, they make you knurd. So far past sober, you come out the other side.

Re:Antibubbles

[stanmann]

On slashdot we are already knurds.

Re:Antibubbles

[telekon]

I think RMS is a more likely a gnurd.

Bet the field research was fun

[Faust7]

"Not sure we saw it that time. Another round please."

New Guinness Commercial

[delcielo]

"anti-bubbles in my Guiness?... Brilliant!!!"

Re:New Guinness Commercial

[Wolfrider]

:) I like that commercial. Makes me smile every time I see it. I'm more of a Bass Ale man myself tho, altho I hardly ever drink alcohol.

Getting Tired Of All This

[tds67]

Dr Dorbolo said "We also found that when they die, or burst, they morph into a form of structure which we have nicknamed the jellyfish form because it looks very like a jellyfish swimming through water. It slowly moves and fades away until it disappears altogether."

Will the Slashdot reporting on SCO ever cease?

American Beers

[warnerve]

*Insert ignorant American beer joke here*

Re:American Beers

[carabela]

Anti-ignorant or European-ignorant?

Re:American Beers

[Abcd1234]

Damn, I hate ignorant American beer. It's bad enough it tastes like crap, but it's stupid, too!

Re:American Beers

[geeber]

Did you mean that to read

"Insert ignorant-American, beer-joke here"

or

"Insert ignorant, American-beer joke here"?

Because it seems to me there are already a lot of both in this thread...

drink less, hit google more

[Mantorp]

We've known this about Guiness [fluent.com] for years

drink less, RTFA more

[Matchstick]

An antibubble is not a bubble that floats downwards. It's a bubble whose membrane is made of air instead of fluid.

Re:drink less, RTFA more

[Mantorp]

my bad, too much blood in the alcohol stream

Re:drink less, hit google more

[Anonymous Coward]

A good karma whore NEVER reads the article.

Please excuse the poster

[cavemanf16]

They linked to an 'About.com' article, and therefore must have been drinking too much beer this afternoon.

Thank you.

I don't drink and this is why

[77Punker]

"...dishwater"

Antibubbles bursting

[hurtstotouchfire]

Dr Dorbolo said "We also found that when they die, or burst, they morph into a form of structure which we have nicknamed the jellyfish form because it looks very like a jellyfish swimming through water. It slowly moves and fades away until it disappears altogether."

For anyone who's seen a slow motion video of a bubble bursting, that sounds like it looks very similar. The whole forming and bursting of antibubbles is interesting, because from the articles it sounds like they're very similar to normal bubbles. That seems like it would imply some kind of air-counterpart to surface tension.

Re:Antibubbles bursting

[Megasphaera Elsdenii]

> That seems like it would imply some kind of air-counterpart to surface tension.

No; the general term is interface tension, and its behaviour and magnitude is a function of the media on both sides of the interface. In case one of the media is air, it's called the surface tension (of beer, in the current case), but it implicitly involves the air as well.

See them at Antibubble.org

[FreeLinux]

I didn't find a video but, this site [antibubble.org] clearly explains antibubbles and includes several [antibubble.org] good pictures [antibubble.org] of them.

D'Arcy Thompson's "On Growth and Form"

[dpbsmith]

I was disappointed not to see any pictures of these "jellyfish forms."

Indeed, the first thing I thought of when I read that passage was D'Arcy Thompson's On Growth and Form.

I just got out my copy to check and, specifically, I was thinking of Chapter V, pp. 388-398, "On Falling Drops," which is an extended essay on similarities in form between (on the one hand) various kinds of splashes, liquid jets, drops of ink falling in water, etc. and (on the other hand) jellyfish and other medusoids.

these look like bicelles

[McDrewbie]

At least looking at the picture for makign antibubbles with dishwater, these merely look like bicelles. Basically, the detergents line up so that their hydrophobic tails interact and their hydrophilic head groups form a barrier on each side, just like a lipid bilayer in a cell membrane. Air is in the tail layer, and water inside and outside.

Re:these look like bicelles

[Dr.Enormous]

The name "antibubbles" is a little dramatic--considering that this should be an expected result of mixing a bunch of air and a detergent. What is surprising--to me, anyway--is that beer would have anything in it capable of doing that.

scientists and beer

[joeldg]

sort of makes you wonder what the relationship is between science and beer with the amount of research that has gone into beer.

I mean.. how many articles have been on slashdot about "scientists discover why bubbles in beer go up/down/sideways in space/a vacuum/on the moon" etc etc.. Seems like hundreds over the years..

I am not complaining.. I mean, I sit there and look into my beer and wonder about the bubbles sometimes.. just wondering who is paying for this research?

Re:scientists and beer

[pclminion]

I am not complaining.. I mean, I sit there and look into my beer and wonder about the bubbles sometimes.. just wondering who is paying for this research?

Wise people who understand that the applications of a theory or effect may go far beyond the scope of the original experiment?

Re:scientists and beer

[illuminata]

You mean it wasn't from the Dean Martin Foundation for Scientific Research?

Antibeer...

[iluvgfx]

... Antibeer in beer!!!

When

[Unoti]

I read that article, and was thinking: "Huh?" A lot of the time. I feel better after reading everyone's comments here... it doesn't look like I was alone.

Flemish beer

[CharAznable]

Hmm, I've never heard anyone claim that Flemish beer is like dishwater... If dishwater was anything like Flemish beer, I'd drink dishwater all day! Of course, Westvleteren 12 is the greatest beer in the world.

Re:Flemish beer

[Pflipp]

Westvleteren 12 is the greatest beer in the world.

That's a darn mean comment considering you will have to go to the Westvleteren monastery yourself to get this beer, and you are only limited to taking a few dozen beers with you at one single time.

(Hey, I just happen to know because my brother works in a Trappisten cafe in Delft. They'll have to take the ride all the way to Westvleteren every now and then. But for our American readers, this is just a mean comment.)

I wonder if

[jptechnical]

O'Douls [odouls.com]can produce antibubbles? And if so would it then be an Antibeer Antibubble? Or is it still just gross.

B/AB reactions?

[Phoenix]

But what happens if a bubble and an Anti-bubble collide? Does the resulting reaction result in the total annihilation of your beer?

Could the chain reaction cascade into other beers?

The results would be just too horrific to contemplate.

Phoenix

Anti-Bubbles

[lordvdr]

So presumably they had to split the beer atom [imdb.com] right?

Re:Anti-Bubbles

[JoeCommodore]

So does this lead to "Beer Fusion?" (Wait a minute, Ice Cold Beer Fusion!) or is it just some Star Trekish bubble-antibubble reaction process?

what does

[theMerovingian]

an antiburp sound like?

Re:what does

[NegativeK]

You know, when you burp, air comes out.. So, since anti-bubbles have beer, when you antiburp.. Well, let's just say that people who drink too much antiburp a lot.

Re:what does

[petabyte]

A burp is generally too much air (or some sort of gas. Lets not think about that) in the stomach which burps out. A hiccup is what happens when your stomach is low on presure.

Or so I've been told ...

Re:what does

[makohund]

"Gulp"

Re:what does

[TeknoHog]

This [homeunix.net].

antibubbles and decomposition

[photoblur]

An antibubble is a droplet of fluid surrounded by an gasseous membrane, as opposed to a fluid membrane around air. Of course, creating a gasseous membrane is a much more difficult proposition than creating a fluid membrane, which is why this is such an interesting discovery. (well, that and because it relates science and beer...)

When discussing the death of the antibubble, Dr. Dorbolo states:

We also found that when they die, or burst, they morph into a form of structure which we have nicknamed the jellyfish form because it looks very like a jellyfish swimming through water. It slowly moves and fades away until it disappears altogether.

Wouldn't an antibubble just decompose to form a regular bubble of gas within the liquid? Or is he saying that the gas is re-dissolved into the beer?

Re:antibubbles and decomposition

[hurtstotouchfire]

I'd expect that in a pure liquid (They initially felt that it would be impossible to form antibubbles - it is impossible to form antibubbles (or bubbles) using pure water, alcohol or oil - a surfactant is needed.) any potential antibubbles would indeed decompose into regular bubbles. (see previous comment)

From what I can gather, the difference is the way air reacts in a liquid containing surfactants: Definition: a linear molecule with a hydrophilic (attracted to water) head and a hydrophobic (repelled by

Re:antibubbles and decomposition

[gnalle]

I agree with much of your comment, but if you wish to argue that an antibubble is stable then I you also have to explain why the system is stable with respect to fluctuations in the thickness of the layer of air.

If the system was not stable with respect to this kind of fluctuations then the air would flow together to form a bubble within the membrane. In other words you have to call upon a negative surface tension of the hydrophobic ends. Happily the hydrophobic ends are slightly electronegative, so every

Re:antibubbles and decomposition

[Da w00t]

The most common place I've seen "antibubbles" (a globe of liquid floating ontop of other liquid, separated by air) has been in puddles of rain water when it's raining, and sometimes inside my 2lt bottle of coke. These "antibubbles" are really just small balls of liquid, that float and roll around ontop of another liquid, until surface tension gives way.

Raindrops

[mooingyak]

I think the 'exact opposite' of bubbles would actually be raindrops.

Re:Raindrops

[Anonymous Coward]

The exact opposite of a bubble within a liquid, yes. But a bubble is actually a gas, trapped within a thin membrane of liquid, in gas. So the exact opposite is like they said, a liquid, trapped within a thin membrane of gas, in liquid.

come on folks

[circletimessquare]

all of this talk of drunken beer revelry studying bubbles in the guise of science is just irresponsible

you see, it's almost new years eve, so we should be talking about drunken champagne revelry studying bubbles in the guise of science

Water-air-water

[manganese4]

Just as a bubble is a spherical liquid membrane separating two gases (One gas being inside the spherical membrane), another definition for anti-bubble is a hollow, spherical extent of gas separting two liquids (One liquid being inside the spherical extent of gas).

Misnomer

[Angostura]

"Scientists in Belgium have studied the movement of antibubbles (the exact opposite of regular bubbles)"

I always get a bit annoyed when I see this type of thing. Calling them 'antibubbles' makes them sound exciting, saying they are 'the exact opposite of bubbles' makes them sound intriguing.

The exact opposite of a bubble would be an airborn droplet.

These are 'hollow bubbles' if anything

Re:Misnomer

[Anonymous Coward]

"The exact opposite of a bubble would be an airborn droplet."

I dunno, I've never heard of a rainbubble before.

A bubbling effect is created by a liquid membrane forming between two gaseous environments, so how is an airborne droplet the exact opposite if it's just a drop of fluid in the air?

Re:Misnomer

[Angostura]

You have opened my eyes, I think. I was thinking of a beer bubble as a pocket of gas within the liquid; you are talking about a bubble in terms of the free-floating entity.

Damn English and its ambiguous words :-)

Re:Misnomer

[telekon]

Isn't it more like a bubble is hollow in the first place, as antibubbles are full of liquid?

In line with your proposal of airborne droplets as antibubbles, that's what's more or less being described, except that the droplets are airborn in a liquid... sort of. It's a droplet -borne in the air- inside of a bubble. An "enbubbled droplet," if you like.

But within the medium in question, I think antibubble describes it ok.

Re:Misnomer

[TeknoHog]

The problem here is that 'bubble' means two different things. A 'soap bubble' usually means a spherical layer of liquid, hanging in air, with air inside it. They have two liquid-gas surfaces. Another kind of bubble is simply a blob of gas inside a liquid; it has only one surface.

The article refers to the first kind of bubble. That way their definition of antibubble works perfectly, reversing the liquid and the gas in a (soap) bubble.

Re:Misnomer

[TeknoHog]

I'd like to add that the foamy head on the beer is made of bubbles(1) that have come as bubbles(2) from the beer below. The formation of antibubbles, as explained in the article, is again the exact opposite: you need to shoot airborne blobs of liquid (one surface) into the liquid, where it gets another piece of surface, forming an antibubble(2) of two surfaces.

Re:Misnomer, and more antibub info

[amasci]

The exact opposite of a bubble would be an airborn droplet.

Yes and no. True, the opposite of an UNDERWATER bubble is an airborne droplet.

However, the opposite of a soap bubble in air drifting on the breeze is an antibubble drifting around underwater.

The part about beer is interesting because it's analogous to blowing soap bubbles on an extremely humid day: the bubbles last longer, or possibly last forever if the air is slightly supersaturated.

An antibubble in beer would collect more and mo

Re:Misnomer, and more antibub info

[Angostura]

Interesting stuff - thanks

Link to real article

[gnalle]

[arxiv.org]
Here is a link to an article . I looks like they produce a cell membrane with air in the middle.
This membrane is stable because the hydrophobic chains of the surfactant molecules are slightly electronegative.

The biggest advancement...

[JasonMaggini]

...since famed Australian scientist Albert Einstein first split the beer atom!

The end of the world or warp drive?

[thepuma]

I believe if the Bubble and Anti-Bubbles were to mix, they would annihialte each other, producing a massive headache!

- or -

You could produce some sort of beer warp field from the reaction. I am sure commander Scott would approve...just pour some Guiness into the Warp Core! Saves us from having to pay for all those expensive di-lithium crystals!

- Captain Kirk

Re:The end of the world or warp drive?

[TeknoHog]

You could produce some sort of beer warp field from the reaction. I am sure commander Scott would approve...just pour some Guiness into the Warp Core!

I think you mean Romulan Ale.

Re:The end of the world or warp drive?

[red floyd]

Maybe that's how they make liquid Schwartz [imdb.com]?

HHGTTG?

[bkw]

So the Sirius Cybernetic Corporation has moved to Belgium? That would explain why they have this liquid there that is almost, but not quite, entirely unlike dishwater. Or real (german) beer.

Coolest bubbles...

[simetra]

The coolest bubbles I've seen in my kitchen are bubbles in hot cocoa that contain an island of dry powder.

Well...

[Bob Vila's Hammer]

I for one do not approve of their research methods, they did not provide proof that no beer was hurt during their experiment.

If they tampered with beer's magical formula for the sake of "antibubbles", then I consider them unethical.

"Fluid" Troll

[CrazyWingman]

Dammit people, get your nomenclature right. Both air and water are fluids! Air is a gas (well several, but...), and water is a liquid (at room temperature, when it's called "water"...), but both of these are fluids. So, the whole "bubble of fluid inside of air, inside of fluid" doesn't really make sense.

Question

[serutan]

Being from Belgium makes you Belgian, but does drinking Belgian beer make you Belch?

Hmmm... what about getting head?

[cr@ckwhore]

As a guy that generally likes beer, I just want to say that it's hard to get head when your glass is full of antibubbles.

Re:Hmmm... what about getting head?

[radja]

all depends on size of wallet and cheapness of the ho, innit..

Uh, no.

[blair1q]

The exact opposite of a bubble is called a drop.

easy anti-bubble observation

[Mr. Dop]

The easy way to observe anti-bubbles is to view freshly pored pint of Guinness [guinness.com]. You will notice that the head seems to 'sink' or dissolve from the bottom of the rim of the glass down into the glass. This is also known as the 'chocolate milk' affect due to its resemblance to this sweater drink.

No need to go down to your local pub, you can get this fresh taste by getting a can of Guinness from you local super market. It is charged with nitrogen when you open the can. The process for the 'nitrogen cakes' in

And then what happened?

[Anonymous Coward]

Did she fart in the tub and make antibubbles?

Re:Bubbles and antibubbles

[hurtstotouchfire]

It'd be difficult because bubbles by their definition are suspended in air, and antibubbles by their definition are suspended in water. But If they were large enough they might meet somewhere around the surface of the water, or if we just call bubbles air pockets in water, then they could meet.

If they met, it looks like they'd probably end up forming a larger bubble or antibubble depending on which of the two was more stable.

Picture: Large glob of air suspended in water touches hollow sphere of air (an

Re:flemish, or walloon?

[Pflipp]

The French can keep Liege, long as we get Luik!

(this from a Dutchee :-)