Latest news with #Raykh
Yahoo
10-04-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
This Bizarre Shape-Shifting Liquid Bends The Laws of Thermodynamics
A container of oil and water separated by a thin skin of magnetized particles has intrigued a team of chemical engineers by taking on an unexpected 'Grecian urn' shape upon agitation. "I thought 'what is this thing?'," graduate student Anthony Raykh from the University of Massachusetts Amherst recalled, after doing what all chemistry students love to do, mixing materials with intriguing properties just to see what would happen. "So, I walked up and down the halls of the Polymer Science and Engineering Department, knocking on my professors' doors, asking them if they knew what was going on." An analysis of the materials revealed that interactions between the tiny magnetic beads worked alongside the surface tension between the immiscible liquids, tugging the mixture in directions that thermodynamics would normally forbid if not for a touch of magnetism. While the discovery has no obvious applications, at least currently, the unusual shape of the mixture and its responses to an external magnetic field could provide future researchers and engineers with a new trick to tweak the structural properties of their emulsions. Oil and water aren't the best of friends. You can combine and shake all you like – sooner or later, the two will go their separate ways and reform into distinct layers as dictated by the thermodynamic flow of energy versus the attraction and repulsion of molecular bonds. As any budding master chef knows, there are ways to keep fat-soluble and water-soluble fluids blended a little longer. Emulsifiers, such as the lecithin in egg yolk, can serve as a chemical diplomat to bind the materials into a mixture as satisfyingly smooth and consistent as your favorite salad dressing. Pickering emulsions follow a method of stabilizing mixtures by inserting a thin skin between the two phases, breaking at least one of the fluids into tiny bubbles that can disperse more consistently through the other. Technically, Raykh's laboratory salad dressing followed the rules of being a Pickering emulsion, containing tap water and a slightly polar organic solvent as well as a dash of magnetized nickel particles, roughly 5 to 15 micrometers and 20 nanometers in size. Dispersed through the water, the nickel particles rose to the surface to connect as a two-dimensional 'skin' just below the organic solvent's interface, much as a Pickering emulsifier ought to do between an aqueous liquid and oil. Giving the mix a shake should result in a suspension of the three materials as homogenous as mayonnaise. Only that's not what occurred. The magnetic particles pulled into a branching web under tension dictated by the thermodynamics of the liquids, tugging the entire mixture into a lopsided hourglass-like formation at equilibrium. A look under the microscope and a computer simulation, which modeled the forces involved, provided a clear picture of the complex mix of magnetic interactions involved in creating the unusual shape, which prevented emulsification from occurring. Using a magnet, the researchers could deform the boundary and modify the urn shape. "When you look very closely at the individual nanoparticles of magnetized nickel that form the boundary between the water and oil, you can get extremely detailed information on how different forms assemble," says polymer scientist David Hoagland. "In this case, the particles are magnetized strongly enough that their assembly interferes with the process of emulsification, which the laws of thermodynamics describe." This research was published in Nature Physics. New Quark Discovery Reveals a Critical Clue About The Birth of The Universe Matter vs. Antimatter: LHC Discovery Could Explain How Universe Avoided Obliteration New 'Half-Ice, Half-Fire' Phase of Matter Found Lurking in a Magnet
Yahoo
08-04-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
A College Student Accidentally Broke the Laws of Thermodynamics
"Hearst Magazines and Yahoo may earn commission or revenue on some items through these links." The Laws of Thermodynamics explain interactions among components in a system, including emulsification of liquids. A new surprising finding is that two immiscible liquids, when influenced by magnetized particles, will flout these established laws. The authors of this finding admit that this discovery has no practical use (as of right now) but is a never-before-seen state in soft-matter physics. As Homer Simpson once famously phrased, 'in this house we obey the laws of thermodynamics,' but a new and completely unexpected discovery by a student at the University of Massachusetts Amherst runs afoul of Homer's rule. The Laws of Thermodynamics describe the relationship of temperature, energy, and entropy in a system as well as how components of a system interact. Take emulsification for instance. This process describes how two otherwise unmixable (or immiscible) substances can combine into a homogeneous mixture. The oil in peanut butter, for example, naturally separates, forming a top layer that needs to be mixed in. However, some companies add substances known as 'emulsifiers' to keep this separation from occurring. The interaction of these components in a system can all be described by the Laws of Thermodynamics. 'Imagine your favorite Italian salad dressing,' UMass Amherst's Thomas Russell, senior author of a new paper published in the journal Nature Physics, said in a press statement. 'It's made up of oil, water and spices, and before you pour it onto your salad, you shake it up so that all the ingredients mix.' This is emulsification in action. That very same process got strange, though, when in a Amherst laboratory, Anthony Raykh, a graduate student, mixed a batch of immiscible liquids along with magnetized nickel particles. Instead of mixing together as expected (shown below), the mixture formed what the authors of a new paper in the journal Nature Physics describe as a Grecian urn shape. After turning to professors for answers as well as collaborating with scientists at nearby Syracuse University and Tufts University, Raykh discovered thanks to detailed simulations that when magnetism influencing the two liquids is strong, it can bend the boundary of the liquids into a curve and disrupt the emulsification as described by the laws of thermodynamics. No matter how hard you shook the magnetized mixture, the liquids eventually formed this same shape. 'When you look very closely at the individual nanoparticles of magnetized nickel that form the boundary between the water and oil,' says Hoagland, 'you can get extremely detailed information on how different forms assemble. In this case, the particles are magnetized strongly enough that their assembly interferes with the process of emulsification, which the laws of thermodynamics describe.' Raykh admits that this discovery doesn't immediately have any practical applications, but it is a never-before-seen state that could expand the field of soft-matter physics. You Might Also Like The Do's and Don'ts of Using Painter's Tape The Best Portable BBQ Grills for Cooking Anywhere Can a Smart Watch Prolong Your Life?
