Seen and heard
Weird and wonderful stories from the world of physics
Scientific Olympians
The Tokyo 2020 Olympics, which finished last month with a dazzling closing ceremony, was full of breathtaking displays of human endeavour – including some incredible efforts by physicists and mathematicians. In the swimming pool, US breast stroker Andrew Wilson – who is about to start a PhD on mathematical modelling and scientific computing at the University of Oxford – bagged gold in the 400 m medley relay. In cycling, Anna Kiesenhofer of Austria, who is doing a maths postdoc at the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, won gold in the road race. Meanwhile, in athletics, Irish runner Louise Shanahan (pictured), who is doing a PhD in atomic, mesoscopic and optical physics at the University of Cambridge, competed in the 800 m race. Shanahan had been forced to put her studies at Cambridge on hold to qualify for the Olympics, which she did by completing races in the Czech Republic and Switzerland and by winning the Irish national championships. Sadly, she was eliminated in the first heat in Tokyo, but Shanahan can now look forward to completing her PhD – a task that she describes as “much more manageable” than training while studying for her bachelor’s degree back home in Ireland.
Loving physics
Getting school students interested in physics is a perennial problem, but one student wants to convey that wonder of the subject to even younger children. Jasmine Buzby, a 14-year-old from Camden County, New Jersey, US, has self-published a book – Loving Physics – describing what she loves about physics. Written as a poem, with colourful illustrations on every page, the 24-page tome is a fun way to introduce “kids aged three and up” to what physics is and how it helps us understand the world. Despite being just 14, Buzby says she wishes she had realized earlier how cool physics is and hopes that her book can help others to discover it sooner. “I didn’t know what physics was,” Buzby told the Burlington County Times. “To me, that seemed unacceptable because I had all this time to learn about something amazing and no-one told me about it.”
Flower bubbles
The physics of the humble soap bubble has been keeping physicists occupied for centuries. But bubbles can also be a pain for industry when manufacturing or transporting liquids. An international team of researchers has now turned its attention to bubbles that have proteins embedded on their surfaces – a common occurrence in the pharmaceutical industry and in bioreactors used for cell cultures. Using high-speed cameras, the physicists discovered that when popped with a needle, the protein bubbles open like flowers (Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. 118 e2105058118). The team then created a mathematical model that can simulate the pattern seen in the experiments and could be used to understand and control bursting bubbles. “Even after all these years of research, bubble physics keeps surprising us with unexpectedly beautiful phenomena,” notes Vinny Chandran Suja from Stanford University.
Super structure
The world’s first 3D-printed steel footbridge has been unveiled in the centre of Amsterdam. Developed by Imperial College London and the Alan Turing Institute, the 12 m-long bridge took over four years to design and contains a network of sensors to monitor its performance. Data from the sensors will be used to create a computerized version, allowing researchers to analyse the bridge’s behaviour when subject to pedestrian traffic. “A 3D-printed metal structure large and strong enough to handle pedestrian traffic has never been constructed before,” says Leroy Gardner from Imperial. “We have tested and simulated the structure and its components throughout the printing process and upon its completion, and it’s fantastic to see it finally open to the public.”