Science

Who Invented Electricity?

Electricity was not invented by any one person, but its modern day use is the result of the work of inventors, scientists, and researchers, who toiled over the subject for millennia. In order to fully understand electricity in our modern world, we first have to understand the pioneers who dated back to as early as the ancient Greeks, and comtemplate their work to harness the natural power of electricity and turn it into something truly useful to the average person.The role of Thales of...

How a Volcano Erupts

A volcano is any opening in the Earth's surface which can allow molten rock and volcanic gases to escape from far below the Earth's surface. Although many volcanoes are mountainous in shape, a volcano can exist in nearly any form, including volcanic vents which exist on the ocean floor, ice volcanos, which have been found on a variety of other planets, and volcanoes that are simply a crater in the ground.

Despite the variances in the shape of volcanoes, they all erupt in relatively the same...

Specific Gravity

Specific gravity is a special case of relative density. In this case the density of a substance is divided by the density of water at 4 F (0 C). Since water has a density of 1 gram/cm3, and since all of the units cancel, specific gravity is the same number as density but without any units (adimensional).

Relative density is another adimensional number which measures density of any substance in relation to another. A relative density greater than one means that the substance in the numerator...

Forensic Science

The word forensic comes from Latin (forensis - meaning "before the forum") and refers to something "of, pertaining to, or used in a court of law." In today's day and age, it almost always refers to a method of obtaining criminal evidence for purposes of using in a court of law.

Forensic science is typically just referred to as "forensics" and is the practical application of numerous sciences to solve legal system-related questions, which can include either a civil or criminal action or...

Tidal Energy

Tidal energy is energy that could be obtained from the changing sea levels. In other words, tidal energy is a direct result of tide shifting from low to high.

Tidal energy is considered to be a renewable source of energy since it only uses the energy from the changing of the tides instead of burning or consuming any form of energy source. It is also considered to be inexhaustible because tides always rise and fall due to gravity.

Tidal power utilization is also considered to be a very...

How Blizzards Form

Blizzards are severe storms which are marked by extremely low temperatures, high-speed winds and substantial snowfall. They are formed when a region of high atmospheric pressure, termed as a ridge, interacts with a region of low atmospheric pressure.

As a result of this, a phenomenon known as advection takes place, in which there is a rush of air from the high pressure region to the low pressure region. The visibility is reduced to less than a quarter of a mile.Three factors necessary...

How Thunderstorms Form

There are three stages to a thunderstorm's life cycle: the cumulus stage, the mature stage, and the dissipation stage. When a thunderstorm begins to form, it does so at the cumulus stage. From there, the storm advances in severity until it reaches its peak at the mature stage and then begins to gradually die out as it enters the dissipation stage.The Cumulus Stage

The cumulus stage is the first stage of formation for any thunderstorm and is characterized by a few noticeable factors.

First...

IMAX

IMAX, which stands for Image Maximum, is a motion picture format with the capacity for greater size and clearer resolution than standard movie systems. It was developed by the Canadian IMAX Corporation. It dramatically enhances image resolution by making use of larger film stock (70mm with 15 perforations per frame - 10 times larger than standard). This results in a movie with incredible clarity, even on huge screens that are the hallmark of IMAX theaters worldwide. This, combined with a...

How Solar Panels Work

Solar panels are technically any kind of panel that uses solar thermal energy to produce electricity. There are a variety of panel types, from those used to heat water as with solar hot water panels, to those which are used to store solar energy, such as solar thermal energy panels. Furthermore, a solar panel can be described as a photovoltaic panel, which is what is used in the professional solar power industry to generate electricity from the rays of the sun. Despite the type of solar panel...

Infrared

Infrared light is a form of electromagnetic waves. Infrared can be visible light or can be in the form of microwaves. In its visible form, infrared can be seen as red or violet. Visible infrared waves are very short, measuring about 750 nm in length; longer infrared waves which are closest to microwaves are about 1mm in length, about the size of a microbial cell.

While shorter infrared waves can be seen as colors, as infrared waves get longer they give off radiation in the form of heat....