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Scientists Levitate Mice for NASA
sterlingda writes to tell us that scientists have built a mouse-levitating superconducting magnet, working on behalf of NASA to study variable levels of gravity. The group hopes to ascertain what physiological impacts prolonged exposure to microgravity might have. "Repeated levitation tests showed the mice, even when not sedated, could quickly acclimate to levitation inside the cage. After three or four hours, the mice acted normally, including eating and drinking. The strong magnetic fields did not seem to have any negative impacts on the mice in the short term, and past studies have shown that rats did not suffer from adverse effects after 10 weeks of strong, non-levitating magnetic fields."
Look for The Flying DutchFrog to see electromagnet experiments in levitation on other vertebrates.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
...using a 3-man slingshot and dead squirrels.
The dead squirrels did not seem to suffer adverse effects while they were levitating, though it must be said they were in this state only for a few moments and there were adverse effects after they struck their respective targets.
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No, it works on the water in the animal. Red blood cells aren't ferromagnetic; all the iron is in haemoglobin, not little metallic bits.
# cat
Damn, my RAM is full of llamas.
I was going to mod you down, then I decided to respond instead.
Slashdot has always been behind the "news" cycle.
This is fine. Most people don't come here for breaking news, they come here for (sometimes) informative, enlightened, or humorous discussion of the article and related topics.
I'll just add that your griping is none of those things. If what you care about is being the first to read about something, then please feel free to go elsewhere. And feel free to not bother with the discussion on Slashdot when the same item is up a day or two later... you won't be missed if what you post is similar to the post I'm responding to.
Oh, and one last thing... Slashdot is a news aggregator. There is very, very little original content in the items posted to the main page. However, it is a community-driven site. If you're unhappy that items come through later here than elsewhere, one thing YOU can do to improve it is to submit articles yourself in a timely manner.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Why does everyone think it's normal for mice, to eat partially digested and rotten (with the help of bacteria) cow milk? What do you think they do without humans? Suck on tits of dead cows? ^^
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
Ok... I know I should be more attentive but when I first read that headline I thought;
Scientists Levitate Miss USA
I personally believe that U.S. scientists are unable to do so because, um, some scientists out there in our nation don't have magnets and, uh, I believe that our, uh, research like such as, uh, Caltech and, uh, the Harvard and everywhere like such as, and I believe that they should, uh, our research over here in the U.S. should help the U.S., uh, should help Caltech and should help the Harvard and the Asian countries, so we will be able to build up our future.
You look beautiful! Incidentally, my favorite artist is Picasso.
From the other perspective, could this technology be used to add "gravity" (or a downward force equal to the Earth's gavity at the crust) in space? ...an alternative to centripetal force?
Wait? Wha? Highschool physics much? How was this post modded 5+ informative when it's so wrong?
With 16T, you can levitate an object of any size so long as it predominantly consists of water. It's not like a 1g frog will float, but a 2g frog will fall in the same magnetic field. The reason why the things floated are small is because its easier to make small magnetic fields. If you have a current going around a loop, and you double the radius of that loop, your peak magnetic field drops by a factor of 4. You do not need 150kT to levitate a human. You just need a magnet that is physically larger with the same field strength and geometry.
One more thing. It's not just the magnitude of the magnetic field that controls whether something will levitate or not. The key is that the magnetic field gets weaker as you move up. Wikipedia tells me that levitation power is proportional to B*dB/dZ. (the magnitude of the field times how quickly it diminishes as you move upward) That is to say, if you had a 150kT magnetic field, and it was constant everywhere, you wouldn't float in it.