WASHINGTON, July 11, 2023 – Inspired by the need to safeguard marine animals and promote sustainable solutions within marine environments, an interdisciplinary team of researchers from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia and Sofia University in Bulgaria are delving into the hydrodynamics of buoyant objects at the air-water interface. By studying […]
American Institute of Physics
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Penguin Propulsion: The Physics Behind the World’s Fastest Swimming Birds
WASHINGTON, June 20, 2023 – Penguins aren’t just cute: they’re also speedy. Gentoo penguins are the fastest swimming birds in the world, and that ability comes from their unique and sophisticated wings. In Physics of Fluids, by AIP Publishing, researchers from the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and King Mongkut‘s […]
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Physics Models Better Define What Makes Pasta Al Dente
WASHINGTON, April 13, 2022 – Achieving the perfect al dente texture for a pasta noodle can be tough. Noodles can take different times to fully cook, and different recipes call for different amounts of salt to be added. To boot, sometimes noodles will stick to each other or the saucepan. In Physics of Fluids, by […]
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Wash your hands for 20 seconds: Physics shows why
WASHINGTON, August 17, 2021 — Though hand-washing is proven effective in combating the spread of disease and infection, the physics behind it has rarely been studied. But in Physics of Fluids, by AIP Publishing, researchers from Hammond Consulting Limited describe a simple model that captures the key mechanics of hand-washing. By simulating hand-washing, they estimated […]
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Simply speaking while infected can potentially spread COVID-19
WASHINGTON, February 23, 2021 – COVID-19 can spread from asymptomatic but infected people through small aerosol droplets in their exhaled breath. Most studies of the flow of exhaled air have focused on coughing or sneezing, which can send aerosols flying long distances. However, speaking while near one another is also risky since the virus can […]
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Masks Not Enough to Stop COVID-19’s Spread Without Distancing
WASHINGTON, December 22, 2020 — Simply wearing a mask may not be enough to prevent the spread of COVID-19 without social distancing. In Physics of Fluids, by AIP Publishing, researchers tested how five different types of mask materials impacted the spread of droplets that carry the coronavirus when we cough or sneeze. Every material tested […]
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Photovoltaics industry can help meet Paris agreement targets
WASHINGTON, October 27, 2020 — To meet the Paris Agreement’s daunting goal of preventing Earth’s average temperature from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above its level in preindustrial times, one of the best options for the energy economy will involve a shift to 100% renewable energy using solar energy and several […]
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How COVID-19 cough clouds travel in the presence and absence of face masks in closed spaces
WASHINGTON, October 20, 2020 — As the coronavirus has affected more than 30 million people globally, researchers have increasingly focused on the extent to which airborne respiratory droplets carrying the virus travel and contaminate the air after an infected person coughs. While scientists have studied the properties of air at the mouth, such as volume, […]
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Using a public restroom? Mask up!
WASHINGTON, August 18, 2020 — Think you don’t need to worry about COVID-19 while using a public restroom? A group of researchers from Yangzhou University in China recently reported that flushing public restroom toilets can release clouds of virus-laden aerosols for you to potentially inhale. If that’s not cringeworthy enough, after running additional computer simulations, […]
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Flushing toilets create clouds of virus-containing droplets that could be breathed in by others
WASHINGTON, June 16, 2020 — Researchers used a computer simulation to show how a flushing toilet can create a cloud of virus-containing aerosol droplets that is large and widespread and lasts long enough that the droplets could be breathed in by others. With recent studies showing the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 can survive in […]