Today is World Water Day 2011 and the theme for this year is ‘Water for Cities’. The theme for this weeks blogs posts will therefore be all about water.
Water, dihydrogen monoxide, oxy-dihydride – what ever you call it, it means the same thing – water (H2O). Water is special to us for all sorts of reasons …
Below is a good video from the BBC TV series ‘Horizon’.
I would recommend using it in a TOK lesson as it links in some good arguments and deals with the use of the scientific method.
This week has been ‘National Science and Engineering’ week in the UK.
The BBC has come up with this quiz (click here)to see how much you know about science fact or fiction – I scored 5/8 and was pleasantly surprised to find my rating as being ‘Graduate Student’ – not quite ‘Professor Standard’ but a least I wasn’t a ‘lab rat’ ! 
You will have heard of the saying ‘like trying to find a needle in a haystack’ , well how about this one, ‘trying to find a single atom in a crystal’.
This phenomena has now been successfully carried out by a research team. Individual atoms of lanthanum have been observed in crystals of calcium titanate.
Those of you who have been reading this blog for a while may remember a few posts about twelve months ago that were linked in with a BBC TV series called ‘Wonders of The Solar System’. It was hosted by professor Brian Cox.
Well, the prof is back with a new four part series. Episode 2, Stardust aired Sunday evening in the UK.
Boric Acid is an element that has made its way into the limelight this weekend.
Image kindly reproduced according to the licence at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Boric-acid-2D.png
Is going to church dangerous for your health?
The atmosphere in churches are sometimes laden with smoke from candles and incense. This smoke however can contain particulate material in concentrations of PM10 (or less than 10 micrometres).
In the 1930′s, the New Zealand government declared to farmers that they had discovered the best ragwort killer. Ragwort, is a weed and the scourge of farmers.
Image kindly reporduced according to the licence at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Illustration_Senecio_vulgaris0.jpg
There is a great article on the BBC website – it was published back in 2009 but shows some lovely images of atoms found in carbon nanotubes. You can read more and view the articles by clicking here.
Image kindly reproduced according to the licence at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kohlenstoffnanoroehre_Animation.gif
I promise you – no more after this one!!
Quadratic acid – also known as squaric acid! Has the formula C4H4O2
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