Science should be fun

Don't know if I'd actually call it science, but is cool.

 

ALE (company) website

ALE Co., Ltd. ー Shooting stars. On demand. The Future of Entertainment in Space.

Perhaps they use this chemistry

Where energy comes from relative velocities not burning wood.

 

Sounds like fun, though I have to ask (and I don't know the answer, maybe it's less than I think): what's the carbon footprint of lofting this batch of tiny balls into orbit?

 

Data not readily available. This Epsilon-4 rocket has 3 'solid' stages that together can put 1.5 tons into LEO. We ought to be able to figure out how much ammonum perchlorate (and other minor ingredients) that requires. From that, fuel-manufacturing expense. Add cost of making the tubes. Whole stack weighs about 90 tons and much of that is propellant.

The 'sparkling devices' I suppose do not constitute 1.5 tons each, so divide carbon (energy) cost among however many there are.

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It seems reasonable to describe functional units as tiny balls. However I suppose details of the balls, perhaps differentiating among colors displayed, would constitute intellectual property for this company. All will hit resistive atmosphere with same velocity, but getting similar luminosities and durations should require tweaking. Cannot imagine how to nail details down without test flights.

This is intriguing fun science. Previous (what, 1000?) years of fireworks displays have been from 'bottom up'. This will begin 'top down'.

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If pyrotechnicians were consulted on colors, they might offer a rainbow like this:



Any who desire more fun from chemistry would notice that only one anion (borate) dominates emission colors. While only copper is 'tuned' by its anions.

Science is surely fun. But to get the most from it one must mentally invest.

Sorry.

Not sorry.

 

Epsilon-4 rocket is close enough to a mini-ICBM that, should any readers dig deep for details, they might bring themselves to attention of ... people whom you'd rather not have in your face.

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ALE website shows a single 'shower' from one direction. Surely this under represents how displays could be choreographed. An oppositely inclined launch (orbital insertion) allows for a second set of sparkles arriving from the other side.

 

Hmmmm....

That would be a fairly cool way to develop and test an A-SAT capability....out in the open.

 

Isn't that a spectrum from molecular oxidation? Meteor colors would be more from atomic plasmas:

Meteoroid - Wikipedia

• Orange-yellow (sodium)
• Yellow (iron)
• Blue-green (magnesium)
• Violet (calcium)
• Red (atmospheric nitrogen and oxygen)

 

I'm sticking with my list for colors of things de-orbited from on high. It is for actors there to make their color plays, and maybe they will not describe details of their work.

 

When appreciating a rainbow I can easily remember ROY G. BIV, When enjoying fireworks, I'll never remember SLSCSCCP.

 

i enjoyed memorizing the periodic table

 

Well, it's a beginning. However it does not help one to appreciate why elements in one column 'prefer' to interact with elements in particular other columns. For that, forget about electrons orbiting nuclei like planets. Embrace atomic orbitals!



Rows are s, p, d, f; terms you may have once learned also. Why electrons behave so oddly was pretty much the entirety of quantum mechanics for a long time. Most won't want to dig further than these images - the math involved gets deep in a hurry.

Hamiltonian is much more than a musical play about an early American political figure

 

Did you ever have to memorize Moh's Hardness scale?

Talc - Gypsum - Calcite - Fluorite - Apatite - Orthoclase - Quartz - Topaz - Corundum - Diamond.
We used the mnemonic: The Girls Can Flirt And Other Queer Things Can Do.

Or how about the geologic time scale:

Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Mississippian, Pennsylvanian, Permian, Triassic, Jurassic, Cretaceous, Tertiary, Quaternary
Can Ordinary Students Drink Mother's Potent Pine Tree Juice, Cooled To Quench?

People always said I have rocks in my head, but I am a geologist.

My favorite memorization? The electrical resistor color code.

Bad Boys Rape Our Young Girls, But Violet Gives Willingly (for) Gold, Silver, (or) Nothing
Black, Brown, Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Violet, Gray, White. and then the three tolerance colors, Gold, Silver or Nothing.

Sad to say these days I remember the mnemonics more than what they stand for...

 

Excuse my ignorance....

But is anyone concerned that executing a "man made" artificial meteor shower sounds like the opening gambit to a Zombie Movie?

 

I got all the way through an electrical engineering degree in a conservative, male-dominated area, decades ago, without hearing this old sexist mnemonic. Only after going to work in a more liberal area where workplace sensitivity was important (i.e. NSFW exclusions) did I first hear this, from a support staff member, the wife of a navy engineer.

 

More James Bond villain.

I'd say it has more to do with the Navy source than political leaning of the area.

 

You all will be thrilled to learn that as 2019 is 150th anniversary of periodic table of elements, 2019 has been named The Year of the Periodic Table.

https://www.nature.com/collections/daffidjhif

(edit) Science magazine also noticed:

Science

 

i failed that course. wasn't the teachers fault, as you can't really teach memorization

 

Ouch.

I never memorized entire table (first three rows are easy). What would be the point? Fits on an index card. The full range of things that ought to be appreciated about elements is unmemorizable. Except for savants. For everyone else, memorizing (like this) just squeezes joy out of thing at hand.

Contrariwise, memorizing music or poetry, I can see that. There is development, lyricism, and other appreciable aspects.

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I memorized names of rivers in European countries for a geography course. Total waste of time. How rivers interact with geology and climate; how rivers influence humanity through time? Such things seem worth knowing.

 

agree. wish i could go back and ask, but he's probably not with us anymore

my son can close his eyes and see the whole table. never bothered to memorize it. takes after mrs bisco