The science of resilience doesnt mean resilience in science
hmm
there is a difference isn’t there
observe it closely
however strong my wish to be a magician
throwing
fireballs all around and merely a
scientist
asking what’s this difference where does
it come from
as we shall see lighters use a special
kind of resilient materials
called piezoelectrics fortunately
they are on all my fingers but despite
this
they are still huge useful materials
from medical imaging lighters electronic
devices
bioelectrics have always taught us how
to approach
science resiliently because they are so
simple yet potent piece of knowledge we
ask
why why are there rare
more precisely why only some of them
have a
noticeable effect ladies and gentlemen
there is nothing greater really in all
this science than being
wisely flexible cambridge dictionary
defines resilience
as the quality of being able to return
quickly
their previous good condition after
problems
but does it explain enough what we mean
by
this word
it’s trash i wouldn’t be able to think
about the more vague description for a
physicist
well all the fancy names of state
variables mathematical precision
okay though we don’t need to stay them
bluntly today
we don’t have to consider resilience in
the scientific regime
so first of all if i did street
interview with
20 random physicists all of them will
reply
even regardless of the context
that a good condition is a condition
with minimal
energy humorously less energy less
burden
by the second law of thermodynamics we
know that being
in the state of minimal energy helps us
to keep a
quantity called entropy of the system
unchanged
let the increase of entropy tells how
far from equilibrium the system is
and it becomes immediately clear why
entropy plays such a huge role in
telling what’s resilient
after all resilience is just going back
to the equilibrium
for instance the rock of sizables always
rolled down because he was stubborn
in adding surplus energy to it
this increased its entropy and really
the rock had no choice
it was stubborn in finding rock and roll
second of all let us address problems
this pessimistic notion cannot be
defended
because is stretching problematic to a
spring
obviously it can break but it is an
object
it surely doesn’t care about that anyway
thanks to scissors that does not invoke
problems
rather a process of changing the good
condition we worked out
the absorption of energy in total
resilience is the ability of an elastic
material
such as rubber or animal tissue to
absorb energy
and release that energy as it springs
back
to its original shape that’s the reason
we call a spring
a resilient material but good luck
though to those who try to start a fire
with a regular spring like this
bioelectrics have something more which
makes them special
upon stretching or compression they can
generate electricity in the
pork if we go back to the lighter
now we see that the spark interacts with
the extruded gas
giving fire
think big imagine how many applications
how many new technologies
it gives rise to don’t spoil it don’t
spoil it let me make my guess about what
you have thought about
electricity harvesting shoes i
knew it your personal power plan in your
shoe sole
walk jump charge you could charge your
mobile while walking couldn’t you
well you couldn’t that said it is
important to realize how
big this effect can be a project awarded
by the international council on system
engineering
showed that one would have to make over
2 billion steps
to singly charge an average mobile
and then subsequently watch netflix for
just few hours
paradoxical we all know that binge
watching series of
netflix and working out are not meant to
be done together
in other words a single step in such
shoots would generate only a few micro
coulombs of charge
in other other worlds assuming an
average step is
78 centimeter long that would correspond
to covering the distance between the
earth
and the moon seven times
this prompts a question of how this
effect can
actually be useful but don’t you
ever forget the future of energy
harvesting applications
is plentiful for instance bios electric
airport runways
smart flooring or smart batteries
ladies and gentlemen this is up to you
to construct them
but you’ll need some hints in the
beginning won’t you biased electrics
are often used in the detection of sound
and light
signals as observed and vicious as this
innovation may sound to some
dobb invented an extreme accuracy task
ordinance bullet that can change cause
in mid flight
this is a system with movable tail fins
controlled by a piezoelectric its fierce
bullet was a target illuminated by laser
next on this variety show are the
contact microphones for percussion
instruments
they use bioelectrics to convert sound
vibrations
into electrical output but wait that’s
how
sonars work don’t they at least
partially there’s only half of the story
the signal must have been sent out first
what do we miss what doing this
perhaps inverting our thinking will help
us to crack it
further is spice electricity reversible
instead of generating electricity by
stressing it
could we plug it to a voltage and make
it dance
let’s dance the answer is yes
why let me tell you a story about a
group of
friend ions in port structure cheating
each other to dance
so there was a circle of charge friends
those who touch each other know each
other but
as you may see there are two of them are
quite alone
they could easily dance together like in
the theme game
some external observer wants to bestow
happiness on
everyone he applies the pressure of the
environment
the one we all know through our own love
affairs
this makes the ions move the ions are
getting acquainted have to leave the
comfort zone
this changes the distribution of the
charge
the positive charge appears at the top
whereas the negative one accumulates at
the bottom
the observer thinks he has done his job
thus he removes this stress
but as opposed to the computer game ions
have a certain kind of free will
apparently the previous distribution
gave more space to all party-goers
world hesitation they returned to it the
bottom dancer is like
i finally managed to get rid of this
nasty additional electrical charge i’ve
been carrying
i’m ecstatic but the flirting was
enjoyable wasn’t it
to continue the urgent question of this
molecular world
is would the observation we’ve made
differ
if the lonely dancers initiated the
dance themselves
i mean situation where overcoming
entropy and electrostatic interaction
they
moved spontaneously as in the described
example
but this time without any external
observer
no no one would dare to move elsewhere
this example shows that piezoelectricity
is completely reversible
because the charge distribution will
change in the same way
as always when gossiping i haven’t been
telling you the whole story
in truth if there is a center of
inversion
in the molecule there can’t be any
electrical dipole
only if the mold lacks this kind of
symmetry
the dipole can be created and modified
by the applied pressure
we’ll see this later
in general subtle it’s so tangible is
the presence of this dancing mechanism
around us
for example toothbrushes they have some
linear piezoelectric
actuators implemented to vibrate the
bristles
the same principle applies to
transducers
generating ultrasounds in medical
imaging
when a voltage is applied to a crystal
the molecules rotate and the crystal is
deformed
producing high frequency vibrations
having spoken of all those fascinating
features
it may be suspicious to you that i still
haven’t explained why my fingers
shamefully aren’t isoelectric this is
because they don’t meet
two crucial requirements that you may
have spotted while gossiping about
quartz structure firstly
there are few polar bonds in my skin
this prevents charge from being
asymmetrically shifted upon squeezing
keratin though being the building block
of the outer layers of my skin
is in fact piezoelectric the effect is
just
way smaller because it is built up of
different
elements than quartz secondly
symmetry is an issue quite fortunately
keratin
doesn’t have the point symmetry that
prevents spicer electricity
if it did the comfort zone would have
been non-existent
look if i rotate the setting now nothing
changes so where is the problem you
might ask
the helical chains of keratin are mixed
like spaghetti
there is way less arrangement related
order
but it doesn’t mean that polymeric
substances can’t be piezoelectric
just some feather restrictions apply
these two requirements are of crucial
importance
they limit the number of materials whose
properties
may include bioelectricity there are 74
substances
used industrially but extensive research
is being
undertaken in this field and only in
2020
eight thousand papers were published on
pizza electricity
so once again what’s the importance of
this
numbers they show the consequences of
the
selection rules that we worked out
the bad news is that these rules are
destructive
they can tell what is not bioelectric
but as the example of my fingers shows
it’s not a recipe but there is
one very good news who wants to do some
freaking piles of electric
at home mix some solder ash and cream of
tartar
as always add a bit of love then cool it
and you can grow the rochelle salt you
can even plug it to a v-meter
and see how the voltage changes when you
top it
this crystal was one of the very first
isoelectric materials to have been
discovered
making use of this bug let’s finish off
with
two lessons on scientific progress
learned during the research
on bioelectric materials there are
profound
parallels between it and the current
pandemic
one walls pandemics and all other sorts
of just run away catastrophes
may be the only way to accelerate your
research
even if it’s groundbreaking by
researching quartz the
brothers had inferred one of the most
basic laws of physics
which was later called the northern
theorem however
at titanic not sang and had the need for
sonas
not been at hands the world probably
wouldn’t have heard about these
materials for a lot longer
likewise many epidemiologists would have
not been appreciated had the cover 19
pandemic not happened
- even if a wider audience does hear
about your research
a share amount of luck and good
patenting law
is needed the development of
piezoelectric devices
in the usa in the 1950s was kept within
the companies doing the research
mostly due to the wartime beginnings of
the field
which suppressed the market by contrast
japanese manufacturers shared the
information
readily overcoming technical
difficulties and creating new markets
for example let zircon a tetenate
binary systems were protected by
cleveland’s u.s patent
the japanese manufacturers thus
investigated
intensively the furnace systems they
turned out to have
more designing flexibility performing
better than the binary systems
cleviates and other u.s companies did
not approach the situation
resiliently enough
that may be a reason why scientists from
across the world
signed a statement on collaboration on
covet 19 vaccine development
this includes people from the university
of oxford
to whom we owe one of the vaccines
thus remember even scientists
researching resilience
struggle with being resilient but so far
everyone who has better cancer science
lost his money
because of the very resilience of the
inventors
that’s how science works how it brings
about revolutions
how it goes through every challenge a
bit stronger and a bit better
and even the slightest physical effect
imaginable should
motivate you to stay resilient
science is not a magical trick stay
bioelectric