Now here’s a science story you don’t hear every day. Simple scotch tape pulled off it’s reel in a vacuum makes x-rays powerful enough to image this finger.
It turns out that if you peel the popular adhesive tape off its roll in a vacuum chamber, it emits X-rays. The researchers even made an X-ray image of one of their fingers.
Who knew? Actually, more than 50 years ago, some Russian scientists reported evidence of X-rays from peeling sticky tape off glass. But the new work demonstrates that you can get a lot of X-rays, a study co-author says.
“We were very surprised,” said Juan Escobar. “The power you could get from just peeling tape was enormous.”
Escobar, a graduate student at the University of California, Los Angeles, reports the work with UCLA colleagues in Thursday’s issue of the journal Nature.
He suggests that with some refinements, the process might be harnessed for making inexpensive X-ray machines for paramedics or for places where electricity is expensive or hard to get. After all, you could peel tape or do something similar in such machines with just human power, like cranking.
more here on MSNBC
Here is how it works:
The core theory is something called “triboluminescence,” which occurs when two contacting surfaces move relative to each other. It’s the same effect that causes “sparks” to fly when you chew wintergreen-flavored Lifesavers in the dark.
As the tape peels, the sticky acrylic adhesive, on the back of the tape, becomes positively charged, while the polyethylene roll becomes negatively charged. It’s not unlike a Van de Graff generator or a thunderstorm that shoots sprites out the top, It’s basically a small linear accelerator.
At a reduced atmospheric pressure, the mechanical act of pulling apart the two surfaces causes electric fields to build up that then trigger discharges of energy.
This accelerates electrons on the adhesive to very high speeds and when they whack into the positively-charged tape roll, X-rays result. The pulses last for a billionth of a second, with an intensity of about 100 milliwatts.
But ya know, with all that dangerous radiation, I expect we’ll see this TV news tease soon: “Shocking news from the world of science tonight… an everyday household item produces radiation that could cause cancer. We’ll tell you what it is at 11.“
I’m not sure what’s new about this. Perhaps it is the first attempt at a controlled experiment. Triboluminescence is the catch-all description of photons (DC to gamma rays) being given off in response to mechanical force being applied to an object. It seems to me that the act of peeling tape adhesive results in charge separation at the delamination interface. The charge separation results in very high electric fields, with the largest fields being created at the smallest distances. The high electric field can release and accelerate charged species across the air gap. When they impact a solid surface, they will lose their acquired kinetic energy and create a cascade of photons and phonons (heat). The efficiency of the process depends on how easily the charges can accelerate across the gap. A vacuum reduces collision losses as the charges move across the gap. Xray tubes all have a hard vacuum inside, not to impede the x-rays, but to minimize electron energy loss as they stream across the accelerating gap in the tube.
Never happen. Someone will want to become filthy rich from it, thereby making it 10 times more expensive than it actually is.
Global warming committee may melt away at year’s end
By Mike Soraghan
Posted: 10/21/08 06:51 PM [ET]
The House’s special committee on global warming is winding down, just as the federal government is gearing up to legislate ways to limit humans’ effect on the climate.
The committee’s authority to hold hearings and issue reports expires at the end of October, and its funding runs out at the end of the year.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) could seek to renew the committee for next year, but insiders say no decision will be made until after the election.
And she would likely face opposition from Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman John Dingell (D-Mich.), who fought the creation of the committee and has criticized its work. She could also be opposed by House Oversight and Government Reform panel Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), who helped broker the deal that created the committee.
The letter that outlined the terms of the deal between Dingell, Waxman and Pelosi said “its authority will expire on Oct. 30.” Waxman now says it’s time to honor that commitment and end the global warming committee’s work.
http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/global-warming-committee-may-melt-away-at-years-end-2008-10-21.html
Have they tried to pull appart a strip of Velcro in vacuum? I bet that should release lots of x-rays.
Jeff,
You’re absolutely correct. Slapping a green cross on something and indicating that it is intended for medical use is a way to charge 5x the going price for the same thing.
You can increase the price premium by saying it’s certified by some obscure group, whether the certification is legitimate or not, and whether it’s appropriate or not.
….. I just went into the bathroom with a roll of tape… Unrolled meters of th’ stuff…. No blue light.
… But I have managed to stick the towels to the shower curtain…..
This should emit a sonic boom
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7685812.stm
Faster faster
Wow, this is astonishing.
Prepare for studies that remotely link brain cancer to cell phones repaired with Scotch tape.
3M is gonna make tons of $$$ with this!
Proof from another direction that CO2 AGW is rubbish. By the way you must try this technique its brill. Read up on it first though please. From http://www.buteyko.co.uk/buteyko-theory.htm
“The problem faced by the evolving human organism has been the depletion of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere from the tens of percent of ancient eras to the current level (1982) of 0.03%. Human evolution has dealt with this dilemma by creating an autonomous internal air environment within the alveolar spaces of the lungs. These alveoli ideally contain around 6.5% of carbon dioxide, quite a contrast to the surrounding air. The gaseous mix in the womb is also an interesting indicator of the ideal human environment – here there exists between 7/8% carbon dioxide.In 1871 Doctor Da Costa discovered the “Hyperventilation Syndrome” whereby deep breathing in a relaxed state caused dizziness and sometimes fainting. This is often incorrectly attributed to oxygen saturation. According to the Verigo-Bohr effect, it is the ratio of carbon dioxide to oxygen which permits the release or retention of oxygen from the blood.
At the end of the last century Russian physiologist Verigo and Dutch scientist Bohr independently discovered that without carbon dioxide, oxygen is bound to the haemoglobin of the blood and simply does not work. This leads to oxygen deficiency in the tissues of the brain, heart, kidneys and other organs and a raising of blood pressure.
Strange as it may seem, oxygen deficiency is not caused by lack of oxygen but by the lack of carbon dioxide! If we breathe too much we get less oxygen. When we over breathe or hyperventilate, we lose valuable carbon dioxide. According to Professor Buteyko, “hidden hyperventilation” often goes undiagnosed. When a person is acutely hyperventilating, it’s obvious and the implications to the organism are disastrous. Chronic Hidden hyperventilation often goes unnoticed. Asthmatics overbreathe three or more times the recommended volume of air. Long term “hidden hyperventilation” is the hinge upon which Buteyko’s discovery and method are based.
SO HOW SHOULD WE BREATHE?
Physiological norms apply to pulse, blood pressure, sugar levels, temperature and breathing as well. Ideally at rest an adult should breathe lightly, superficially, and only through the nose. A healthy person can perform light exercise and still breathe lightly, whilst a sick person requires deep breaths almost all of the time.
Cheers, Ed.
I’ve been able to see the same effect using black electrical tape. It may take good eyes, a darkroom, and around 2 feet/second unrolling speed to be visible.
Once you’ve seen it, it’s quite distinctive.
This reminds me of the cell phone popcorn gag.
This is TOTALLY unrelated but… why is there a little smile at the bottom left corner of these pages?
Good Lord.
Its obvious, That global warming has caused this effect in sellotape.
The vastly increased temperatures, due to AGW, have over excited electrons causing them to smash through sub atomic particles resulting in Xrays being generated in the process.
We urgently, for the sake of our children, need to ban all sticking tape and set up a goverment enquiry into why for so long such a dangerous object was not detetected allowing billions of people to become irradiated with danegrous xrays. I myself are convinced my erectile dysnfuction is a direct result of the high levels of raidation I experienced wrapping chritsmas presents. I intend to sue
The same effect (blue light) can be seen when opening self-sealing envelopes in a darkened room. Even if you open the gummed edges quite slowly you can see the crackling blue light at the junction of the flap and the body of the envelope.
Here’s a link with everything you could ever want to know about “Scotch” tape (and then some). BTW, it’s no longer made with cellulose as it was originally.
http://www.answers.com/topic/cellophane-tape
My PhD thesis adviser is referenced 2 or 3 times in that paper. I never worked in that side of the lab but I did know were to go if I ran out of tape.
I don’t need sellotape, I just touch the fire after I’ve been at the computer for a while and pow! it shocks! And my daughter could never wear a watch because they always stopped on her wrist – and when she was in a bad mood the computer played up (mine does too). I swear, the most amazing science discoveries yet to come lie right under our noses, so common that nobody thought of checking them out….
h’mmmm….
like CO2 not being responsible for global warming….
Back to topic after that unavoidable rant, it’s only recently that Newton’s basic laws of motion have been proved from the Zero Point Field department of Quantum Mechanics. Thought they were proven did you? well you were mistaken!
I smell a clue in this Sellotape stuff… it feels like Zero Point Field stuff peeping out again. And I think that ZPF research holds a lot of potential for the future, energy-wise. You just need to peel away the scales of “impossible” from your thinking.
Sheesh, the things I’ve missed by working in an office environment with lots of light.
I noticed the emission of light in the late 50s while peeling off tape in a darkroom, to be used to attach the end of a length of 35mm film to the spool of a film cartridge. Just think, if I’d checked for X-rays I’d be the famous one!
IM
I thought this might be a useful link for any of those that happen upon this site and are interested in weather events:
http://www.theweatherprediction.com/
This Haby guy has a plethora of knowledge about weather and meteorology.
I wonder if I corrolate x-rayproducing soctchtype with lobal warming and get a government grant. It should be easy with the right math, enough assumptions and a computer model.
Adrian S (13:12:09) :
“That global warming has caused this effect in sellotape.
my erectile dysnfuction is a direct result of the high levels of raidation I experienced wrapping chritsmas presents. I intend to sue”
Your ED is more likely to be from an overdose of logical ‘phallacies’!
Lets hope the media don’t hear about this or they will be report that trouser zips might release harmful radiation.