Wednesday, January 30, 2008


The photo here (courtesy of Virginia L.Shuford Freire) shows a “glass frog,” a type of frog that inhabits tropical regions. Its skin is so transparent that you can clearly see the internal organs. Why can we see through the skin? Why aren’t you and I transparent? That is the "spotlight story" for February at http://www.flyingcircusofphysics.com/. The other stories for February are
1. Geoffrey Pyke's World War II plan to convert an iceberg into an aircraft carrier.
2. Throwing very hot water into very cold air --- how the water freezes before it hits the ground --- lots of videos of people with little more to do in life than to throw hot water into the air.
3. The next in the series of bar (pub) tricks, with the underlying physics explained.
4. The terribly frightening video showing Scott Macarney crashing in his final jump in the downhill ski race at Kitzbuehel last month. What went wrong?
As always, the archives at the web site contain all the stories posted since the site began, with hundreds of links to videos and photos. And if you are really interested in pursuing the stories, the pdf files contain thousands of links and over 10,000 references to the scientific literature. So, if you want something more interesting than sitting around waiting for your skin to become transparent, come to the web site. And if you want to see me on videos from television, read the next blog item here.

Thursday, January 24, 2008

Television
As mentioned in the last FCP email newsletter, I recently made several appearances on "The Daily Planet" on the Discovery Channel in Canada with my longtime friend and host of the show Jay Ingram. The first episode is about the electric-pickle Christmas tree and the second is about the common bathtub vortex. Go to
http://www.gumfrog.com/dailyplanet and use Username: previewguest
Password: d1sc0very (use the number "1" and the number zero "0" instead of letters)
Video 1 (electric pickle): choose Dec 2007.
Scroll down to Dec 20 / 07
Click on "Fact of the Matter"

Video 2 (bathtub vortex): choose Jan 2008
Scroll down to Jan 22 / 08
Click on "Fact of the Matter"

Video 3 (snapping sound of cereal, and the Cheerios effect): Choose Jan 2008
Scroll down to Jan 30 / 08
Click on "Fact of the Matter - Cereal"

Video 4 (the physics of wadding and folding paper): Choose Feb 2008
Scroll down to Feb 05 / 08
Click on "Fact of the Matter"

Video 5 (the toy putt-putt boat: Choose Feb 2008
Scroll down to Feb 12 / 08
Click on "Fact of the Matter"

Vidoe 6 (the spaghetti effect): Choose Mar 2008
Scroll down to Mar 04 / 08
Click on "Fact of the Matter"

Video 7 (bubbles go down in freshly poured Guinness beer): Choose Mar 2008
Scroll down to Mar 18 / 08
Choose "Guinness Bubbles"

Video 8 (the teapot effect): Choose Apr 2008
Scroll down to Apr 01 / 08
Choose Fact of the Matter

Video 9 (tumbling toast): Choose Apr 2008
Scroll down to Apr 08 / 08
Choose Fact of the Matter