Chemistry

Common chemical reactions accelerate Brownian diffusion by sending long-range ripples into the surrounding solvent, which would mean that molecular diffusion and chemical reaction are related. Yet that would violate a central dogma of chemistry; that molecular diffusion and chemical reaction are decoupled.  The ripples generated by chemical reactions, especially when catalyzed - accelerated by substances not themselves consumed - propagate long-range. This challenges the view that molecular motion and chemical reaction reactions affect only the nearby vicinity.   Screening 15…

In Australia, native people have long contended that  native stingless bee honey had special health properties. Like the well-known Apis mellifera honeybees, stingless bees live in permanent colonies made up of a single queen and workers, who collect pollen and nectar to feed larvae within the colony. And a new paper does find that nearly 85 percent of its sugar is trehalulose, not maltose, and trehalulose has a lower glycemic index, but claims that makes it healthier are going to deceive the public. Sugar is still sugar. Claims that native peoples who eat a lot of it have lower diabetes…

After centuries of converging on balanced, smooth beers, the industry suddenly lurched sideways in the 21st century. While large brands now have to fear for their existence, men in beards are making a fortune selling pronounced, bitter craft brews. The business segment may have been with us all along, according to a new analysis. The survey of 109 beer consumers in a blind experiment found that greater perceived bitterness increased the appeal of beers. This is the opposite of most foods. But is that jumping on the IPA bandwagon or are they really different from everyone else? Their survey…

As a semi-retired epidemiologist, in a higher risk age group and with attendant co-morbidities, I have followed the Covid-19 pandemic with scientific curiosity mixed with a tinge of personal anxiety.  Much of the data being reported is of abysmal quality, and it’s a major professional disappointment to me that, after more than four months, the situation hasn’t improved much. Family members and friends, some of whom I haven’t heard from in years, continue to pepper me with their well-intentioned questions, fueled by the latest reports in the mainstream and social media.  Like many…

It is a sad commentary on the times we live in that “alternative truth” is a concept with governmental sanction, and that formerly accurate science has been politicized beyond recognition. Today, many politicians and ideologues on either side of virtually every issue are fond of claiming that “science” supports their own ideas, even though these same people often cannot tell the difference between a fact and a fortune cookie. In a democracy, everyone is entitled to their own beliefs, but everyone is definitely not entitled to their own facts. This would not be a problem if the general…

The Scream is not one work of art but several; two paintings, two pastels, several lithographic prints and a few drawings and sketches. Edvard Munch  was a practical artist so if the check cleared he would make another. His original Tempera on Cardboard is the most well-known version and can be found in Oslo’s National Gallery (Nasjonalmuseet) while his least liked version is crayon on cardboard. After the first was sold he made another two years later, in pastel on cardboard, and it is a lot less gloomy than the original. Probably because of the money he was getting. He then…

During the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, when disease epidemiologists want to be taken seriously by the public, they face an uphill battle. Blocking their progress are epidemiologists who casually link everything to diseases, often using food frequency questionnaires which have no scientific legitimacy. Environmental Research is one of the go-to journals for these kinds of shoddy correlation papers (they also claim WiFi is killing you, look for them to blame COVID-19 on 5G cellular service soon) and a new one not only linked frying pans to celiac disease, it took its shot to get into the Washington…

Environmental Working Group recently rolled out its annual Dirty Dozen list of foods that ... wait, did they? This year, no one seems to know or care if a group of lawyers paid an intern to go through USDA pesticide data and did simple arithmetic to declare how 'toxic' fruit was unless the pesticides on it were made by their clients. Instead of being paralyzed by irrational fear, the way organic industry groups make money, people are paralyzed by something real; SARS-CoV-2, the 2019 coronavirus that set off a microbiological bomb in Wuhan, China and causes the COVID-19 disease that has…

A U.C. Riverside environmentalist is sounding the alarm about your commute.  Professor David Volz and colleagues hand-picked 90 commuter students who were given silicone wristbands to wear for five days. The goal was to find organophosphate esters on the wristbands, because some papers link those to harm in zebrafish and some epidemiologists will link anything to anything in humans.  They found one, TDCIPP - chlorinated tris - at higher levels and speculate that it is oozing out of car seat foam and into our bodies. Just correlation, no testing They didn't actually test any of that…

Sometimes bees die off in large groups. Since the first beekeeping recorded in history, in the 10th century, there have been documented cases where entire hives perished. Some blamed bad bee husbandry, some blamed weather, and then in recent cases some tried to blame pesticides. Though blaming science failed to catch on, science may provide a solution to the real cause of colony collapse disorder, Varroa mites and deformed wing virus. That solution is genetically engineered bacteria. A new study shows the engineered bacteria are easy to grow and they live in the guts of honey bees and…