The most bizarre thing you'll see all week

[JSFolk]

This is just too cool for words...

http://chaos.ph.utexas.edu/research/vibrated_cornstarch.htm

Watch the video.

"Vibrated shear thickening fluids"

[gmanontario]

That video is typical of my reasoning that the real world is far more mysterious and fascinating than anything the woo-woo brigade can make up.

Fantastic stuff!! Thx for the link...:D

[The Bad Astronomer]

I saw that video earlier today. The last "scene" was... astonishing. My mouth literally hung open. I have never seen anything so odd in a long, long time. What could possibly cause that behavior in a viscous liquid? It is so bizarre! I hope they can figure it out soon.

[garys_2k]

It keeps timing out for me, I'd bet the server's getting pounded. :(

Oh, I got it! WOW!

[roger]

Has anyone played with cornstarch and water mixes? It's wild stuff. It behaves as both a solid and liquid. For example, scoop some up in a spoon and pour it out. It acts like a liguid. But reach out to the pour and you can snap a piece off.

Hit it, and it's a solid. Push into it slowly, and it's a liquid.

I assume that it is this property being manifested by the vibrating plate. Of course, I am probably completely wrong.

[JSFolk]

That video made it to the Fark (http://www.fark.com) home page, so no doubt the server is getting hammered. (25,000 hits as of my typing this)

The video has been mirrored here...

http://www.politicalanalyst.net/cornstarch.wmv

And, in case you have a mosquito problem, you could try this...

http://www.tompowered.com/stuff/flamethrower.mpg

[Zep]

Wow! It's so freaky it must be SATAN at work!

[Correa Neto]

A loooong time ago I was working with tectonic deformation and magma chambers. According to the papers I read in these past times, experiments showed that a mixture of solid+liquids, when the crystals managed do create a continuous network (80% crystals? I don´t remember, I´m typing from memory) was able to transmit shear stresses quite like a solid. Could this be of any help?

edited to add Oh, and viscosity and deformation rate also played a role. end edit

[uruk]

Funk-a-delic!!!!!!

[fishbob]

The word of the day is thixotropy;
The property of certain gels of becoming less viscous when shaken or subjected to shearing forces and returning to the original viscosity upon standing. (dictionary.com)

[SquishyDave]

What the fudge monkey is going on here?

The end of that video looks like........ words fail, I think what is important here is how do I do this at home? I don't think I have a machine that will vibrate at a set frequency, curse it.

And even if I can't make the writhing mass of evil, I never got the recipie for corn starch and water to do the tricky liquid/solid thing, does anyone know it?

Edited to add, someone has to market this, put it in a glass dome, and you will have the next lava lamp, just pay me some royalties OK?

[CFLarsen]

Originally posted by The Bad Astronomer
I saw that video earlier today. The last "scene" was... astonishing. My mouth literally hung open. I have never seen anything so odd in a long, long time. What could possibly cause that behavior in a viscous liquid? It is so bizarre! I hope they can figure it out soon.

I was thinking "THE BLOB!" :)

What struck me the most about the last part was: Where the heck does the energy come from, to keep the....commotion...going, and even grow? The vibrations?

I would love to hear John Edward's explanation of this. He claims spirits vibrate at a different frequency than living people...

[CFLarsen]

Originally posted by SquishyDave
What the fudge monkey is going on here?

The end of that video looks like........ words fail, I think what is important here is how do I do this at home? I don't think I have a machine that will vibrate at a set frequency, curse it.

And even if I can't make the writhing mass of evil, I never got the recipie for corn starch and water to do the tricky liquid/solid thing, does anyone know it?

Edited to add, someone has to market this, put it in a glass dome, and you will have the next lava lamp, just pay me some royalties OK?

Yes, you are absolutely right: Marketing science "toys" is what we should look into. At TAMx, Jerry Andrus were selling (reasonably priced, too) some really cool things that would make your eyes pop. I've also had much success with getting weird gel, and stuff that behaves weirdly from science fairs and science centers. It's fun, educational, fun, and it makes you want to ask questions. And, it's fun!

[Agammamon]

And to make it more interesting, this sort of material has been developed to improve the capabilities of armor vests.
The kevlar fibers are impregnated with a STF. When hit it hardens briefly helping to distribute the impact over a wider area and then it softens back up.

[Bottle or the Gun]

Originally posted by JSFolk
This is just too cool for words...

http://chaos.ph.utexas.edu/research/vibrated_cornstarch.htm

Watch the video.

"Vibrated shear thickening fluids"
Darn, the page and it's links doen't work.

[specious_reasons]

Originally posted by Bottle or the Gun

Darn, the page and it's links doen't work.

It's been slashdotted (or Farked, as it were).

[LucyR]

I trust that I am a reasonable and patient person, but this thread is really the f**king limit.

I mentioned this phenomenon in a post to a thread on viscosity many months ago, and not a single person responded. I even included a recipe for making the damn stuff.

Furthermore, I started a thread a couple of weeks ago about a very interesting toy called the “rattleback”, which received only two replies. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if one of the “cool” people starts a thread on this very subject, and if they do I’ll bet my gun and dog that it receives a damn sight more replies than just two.

[JSFolk]

Yes, but did your pathetic post have a VIDEO?!?!


NO

So there.

:D

[CFLarsen]

Originally posted by LucyR
I trust that I am a reasonable and patient person, but this thread is really the f**king limit.

I mentioned this phenomenon in a post to a thread on viscosity many months ago, and not a single person responded. I even included a recipe for making the damn stuff.

Furthermore, I started a thread a couple of weeks ago about a very interesting toy called the “rattleback”, which received only two replies. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if one of the “cool” people starts a thread on this very subject, and if they do I’ll bet my gun and dog that it receives a damn sight more replies than just two.

No need to be angry. If I hadn't seen the video, I would not have believed a description of it.

[Soapy Sam]

Hmm. What's so surprising?

I guess I really AM the only drilling fluid engineer on this forum.

[SquishyDave]

Originally posted by LucyR
I trust that I am a reasonable and patient person, but this thread is really the f**king limit.

I mentioned this phenomenon in a post to a thread on viscosity many months ago, and not a single person responded. I even included a recipe for making the damn stuff.

Furthermore, I started a thread a couple of weeks ago about a very interesting toy called the “rattleback”, which received only two replies. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if one of the “cool” people starts a thread on this very subject, and if they do I’ll bet my gun and dog that it receives a damn sight more replies than just two. :rub: There there. Is there any chance of you reposting the recipe here? I would just look up your old thread, but it's clear more people will see it in this, more popular, thread :D

[BlackBetta]

bump

The video is back on the original site. Very interesting.

[sorgoth]

That's so cool! :D

Especially with the 'finger' structure spreading across the surface...wow.

[Uh_Clem]

Thanks for bumping this,

Amazing.......

The holes he made that stayed were pretty wild, but the weird, flailing alien-looking stuff at the end was just.....I've never seen anything like that.

WAY cooler than the Hutchison videos.

[Soapy Sam]

Roger said
"Has anyone played with cornstarch and water mixes? It's wild stuff. It behaves as both a solid and liquid. For example, scoop some up in a spoon and pour it out. It acts like a liguid. But reach out to the pour and you can snap a piece off.

Hit it, and it's a solid. Push into it slowly, and it's a liquid."
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Roger- what you said applies to most things. Get the appropriate strain rate and almost anything will deform like a hot plastic. Take a look at folding in mountains for example. Or Lord Kelvin's Pitch Glacier at Glasgow university. Window glass measurably flows downhill. The starch mix is the other end of the strain rate scale. The thixotropic properties of non- Newtonian fluids have lots of industrial applications. (Drilling mud being one of the less exciting.)

http://www.ilanahalperin.com/new/nomadic_landmass.html

[Martin]

Originally posted by Soapy Sam
Window glass measurably flows downhillNo, it doesn't.

[JSFolk]

You know, I had heard the glass flowing thing forever too.

Hmm. Too bad.

http://www.glassnotes.com/WindowPanes.html

[baggie]

Originally posted by fishbob
The word of the day is thixotropy;
The property of certain gels of becoming less viscous when shaken or subjected to shearing forces and returning to the original viscosity upon standing. (dictionary.com)

sorry, that was yesterdays word. Todays word is actually "dilatency", which is what a cornstarch-water mixture is (and is the opposite of thixatropy).

see http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/mar98/889944863.Ch.r.html

[Hand Bent Spoon]

I thought you didn't like being in petri dishes anymore, Constable?

[MRC_Hans]

Mmm, we have a vibration table in our lab. I suppose those videos were made using a stroboscopic light? No problem we have that, too. For the home esperimenter, I suppose a loudspeaker, an amplifier, a disco strobe light, and a tone generator would do the trick-.

Hans

[richardm]

Originally posted by MRC_Hans
Mmm, we have a vibration table in our lab. I suppose those videos were made using a stroboscopic light? No problem we have that, too. For the home esperimenter, I suppose a loudspeaker, an amplifier, a disco strobe light, and a tone generator would do the trick-.

Hans

I'm not sure you even need the strobe, Hans.

[MRC_Hans]

Well, at least to avoid blur I think I would. I notice the frequencies are not very high, so presumably the amplitude is considerable, enough to give a blurred image, even when viewing directly.

Hans

[Smike]

I think I looked at something like this in a physics lesson. What was it now... ah, yes.

They used to think that light travelled through stuff like this, when they thought it was a wave. Clearly a wave needs stuff to travel through, and it must be very compact so it can travel fast. On the other hand, people could go through it without any obstruction. The solution is stuff like this!

If you're really interested in this theory, I think they called the stuff 'ether'.

P.S. Four uses of 'stuff' in a post. Not a good explanation.