newscripts
NanoTechnology
Silica sol!
'SUPER' MINERAL; SCIENCE: IN THE CINEMA, IN THE BAR
S Colloidal Silica dispersed in organic solvent. 1 Type
SlU2%
MT-ST MA-ST-M MA-ST-S IPA-ST IPA-ST-S EG-ST NPC-ST-30
30 40 25 30 25 20 30
MEK-ST MIBK-ST
30 30
DMAC-ST 20
Dispersant Methanol Methanol Methanol Isopropanol Isopropanol Ethyleneglycol Ethyleneglycolmono-n-propylether Methyl ethylketone Methyl isobutyl ketone N, N-Dimethyl acetamide
Particle 1 Dia.(nm)
12 22 9 12 9 12 12 12 12 12
M a n y m o r e ρ r o d u c t s are availa ble.
Type ST-UP MA-ST-UP
Si02% Dispersant Water 20 Methanol 20 chain molecules of silica. 10-20nm in width 40-100nm in length
ST-PS Pearl necklace shaped colloidal silica IVPe ST-PS-S ST-PS-M Properties Spherical DLS Method
biu2% 19 20 PS-S 10-18 80-120
Dispersant Water Water PS-M 18-25 80-150
For prompt reply, please contact directly by fax now.
NISSAN CHEMICAL INDUSTRIES, LTD. Inorganic Materials Division Tokyo Head Office: Phone: +81-3-3296-8065 Telefax: +81-3-3296-8360 Houston Office: Phone: 713-532-4745 Telefax: 713-532-0363
http://www.snowtex.com
upervillain Lex Luthor no longer needs to steal KRYPTONITE from museums to fight Superman. Thanks to geologists at Rio Tinto, a Lon don-based mining company, Luthor can get it free in Serbia. All he'll need is a shovel. The museum heist scene in last year's "Superman Returns" revealed kryptonite's composition to movie fans: sodium lithium boron silicate hydroxide with fluorine. Around the same time, far from theaters and beneath the surface of Serbia's Jadar Basin, Rio Tinto geologists stumbled upon an unknown mineral. They sent a sample to London's Natural History Museum (NHM) for identification. Museum mineralogists knew they had a new mineral on their hands, but they had to prove it. This mineral "was somewhat unusual, in that there was lots of material available, but the crystals were less than 5 μΐη in size—too small for conventional singlecrystal analysis," says Pamela Whitfield, a researcher with Canada's National Research Council. By combining specialty X-ray powder diffraction techniques and computational methods, Whitfield's team determined the crystal's structure as well as its composition, LiNaSiB30y(OH) (Acta Cryst. 2007, B63, 396)—like the cinematic kryptonite sans fluorine. It was a near match that Whitfield failed to notice but that was not lost on Chris Stanley, a miner alogist at NHM. The International Mineralogical Associa tion has since recognized the Jadar Basin mineral as new, but to the disappointment of Superman fans, named it "jadarite." Is it green? Does it glow? Is it radioac tive? "No, no, no," says Whitfield. Most likely, jadarite does not have the power to hurt a fly, let alone a flying superhero.
W
7 ho would have guessed that particular combination of elements would show up in a real compound?" says Sidney Perkowitz of jadarite. Perkowitz, a physics professor at Emory University, discusses how movies get science right and wrong in his new book "HOLLYWOOD SCIENCE." Perkowitz pointed out that sometimes science fiction "predicts science before the science happens." And sometimes Hollywood's science fiction is just fiction. Newscripts readers can probably rattle off 10 movies in which the science is less than factual. For example, visit our online feature Reel Science (www.cen-online.
ÉÉ
WWW.CEN-ONLINE.ORG
J.ft
AUGUST 6, 2007
org/reelscience). "Even when the science is wrong, the power of these films is so immense that you can use it to teach science," Perkowitz says. Along with film studies lecturer Eddy Von Mueller, Perkowitz teaches "Science in Film" to packed classrooms. Two movies, one a big-budget action flick, the other a documentary, are among Perkowitz' favorites as teaching tools. "Our course came along when global warming really hit the news," recalls Perkow"Hollywood Science": Science fiction? itz. The professors were set to use "The Day After Tomorrow" to address this issue. "Then AI Gore's documentary came out," Perkowitz says. Both films were used to talk about what's science, what's hype, and what's "Hollywood." Good or bad, notes Perkowitz, the movies will keep coming. "We should think of it as a teaching tool." Newscripts is excited to finally have a good excuse to skip work and head to the cinema.
J
ames Bond: scientific visionary? "I read somewhere scientists found that shaking a gin martini releases more antioxidants than the stirred version," says Eben Klemm, a former benchtop molecular biologist at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Sciences and current director of cocktail development for B.R. Guest Restaurants. Newscripts has confirmed the existence of the Hollywood-inspired "shaken not stirred" research (BMJ1999, 319,1600), research that Klemm dismisses as a matter of taste. "I prefer a stirred martini," he says. "Only then do you get the great complexity and stillness that is a martini." For just about every other cocktail, Klemm recommends following Bond's edict. "Only proper shaking generates the supreme emulsion that makes a great drink," Klemm says. He exchanged biology for MIXOLOGY and brought the scientific method to the bar. "Believe me," he says. "The experiments are very rewarding."
This week's column was written by RAYCHELLE BURKS. Please send comments and suggestions
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