Today was another explorative day at CNSI. One of the lectures I found interesting was the one on light and how there were different perceptions on it as the study began to grow. The lecture then shifted to a more art related matter involving paintings and the substances used to create and preserve them. This however put me to sleep. The use of silver in one painting did catch my attention as it later aged and turned black.
After the lectures we then toured some more labs of CNSI, the first being an introduction to solar cells and trying to harness the sun’s energy to power the nation. I find this to be a very interesting matter to touch up on considering most solar panels can only capture 30% of the sun’s energy and put it to use. One idea came to me that I would try to do for my presentation and it would be finding some way to reduce molecular pressure from atomic collision in order to allow the system to function with less stress allowing better performance. After learning about solar panels, we went down stairs to experiment with one of the Scanning Electron Microscopes. A small thing that caught my attention was that they kept hydrogen at 4 degrees Kelvin, considering the lowest possible is o and I still think of some possibilities of reaching such a temperature although it I supposedly impossible.
Lastly, we went to another lab that involved multiple projects involving sol-gel and hydrophobia. I enjoyed the sol-gel the most as it was a very efficient and convenient way to produce glass and preserver our other resources.
http://www.microscopy.ethz.ch/history.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scanning_electron_microscope
http://ioannis.virtualcomposer2000.com/spectroscope/
http://projecteuclid.org/DPubS?verb=Display&version=1.0&service=UI&handle=euclid.ss/1009212817&page=record
http://www.isgs.org/