Science: questions and answers

[Lloyd]

ELEMENT ABUNDANCES
E = Element; C = kg E/kg Earth's crust & upper crust; W = kg E/Liter of Sea Water; S = atom moles Solar System [Si = 1]
[In Col. 1-3: Numbers are Powers of 10; e.g. E-3 = 10 to the -3rd power or 10^-3 = 1/1000 = .001] [Equal signs are used to approximate a graph of abundance magnitudes]

E A# /kg Crust E /l SeaWater E mol System E (Nuc) /10 Isotopes
H 01 E−3___==== 01 E−1_====== 01 E4___+++++ 01(1)
He 02 E−9_______ 02 E−12______ 02 E3____++++ 02(4)
Li 03 E−5_____== 03 E−7_______ 03 E−7>−5__== 03(7)9,1(6)
Be 04 E−6______= 04 E−12>−13__ 04 E−7_______ 04(9)
B 05 E−5_____== 05 E−6______= 05 E−5_____== 05(11)8,2(10)
C 06 E−4,−3==== 06 E−5_____== 06 E1______++ 06(12)x,0(13)
N 07 E−5_____== 07 E−7>−5__== 07 E0_======= 07(14)
O 08 E−1_====== 08 E−1_====== 08 E1______++ 08(16)
F 09 E−4____=== 09 E−6______= 09 E−3>−4_=== 09(19)
Ne 10 E−9_______ 10 E−10______ 10 E0_======= 10(20)9,1(22)
Na 11 E−2__===== 11 E−2__===== 11 E−2__===== 11(23)
Mg 12 E−2__===== 12 E−3___==== 12 E0_======= 12(24)8,1(25)1(26)
Al 13 E−2__===== 13 E−9_______ 13 E−2__===== 13(27)
Si 14 E−1_====== 14 E−6______= 14 E0_======= 14(28)9,0(29)0(30)
P 15 E−3,−4==== 15 E−8_______ 15 E−3>2===== 15(31)
S 16 E−4____=== 16 E−4____=== 16 E−1_====== 16(32)x,0(34)
Cl 17 E−4,−3==== 17 E−2__===== 17 E−3___==== 17(35)8,2(37)
Ar 18 E−6______= 18 E−7_______ 18 E−1_====== 18(40)
K 19 E−2__===== 19 E−4____=== 19 E−3___==== 19(39)9,1(41)
Ca 20 E−2__===== 20 E−4____=== 20 E−2__===== 20(40)x,0(44)
Sc 21 E−5,−6__== 21 E−13>−12__ 21 E−5_____== 21(45)
Ti 22 E−3___==== 22 E−9_______ 22 E−3___==== 22(48)7,1(46)1(47)1(49)1(50)
V 23 E−4,−5__== 23 E−9_______ 23 E−4____=== 23(51)
Cr 24 E−4,−5__== 24 E−10______ 24 E−2__===== 24(52)8,1(53)0(50)0(54)
Mn 25 E−3>−4_=== 25 E−10>−9___ 25 E−3___==== 25(55)
Fe 26 E−2__===== 26 E−9_______ 26 E−1_====== 26(56)9,1(54)0(57)
Co 27 E−5_____== 27 E−11>−10__ 27 E−3___==== 27(59)
Ni 28 E−5>−4_=== 28 E−10>−9___ 28 E−2__===== 28(58)7,3(60)0(62)0(61)
Cu 29 E−5_____== 29 E−10>−8___ 29 E−4____=== 29(63)7,3(65)
Zn 30 E−5_____== 30 E−9>−8____ 30 E−3___==== 30(64)5,3(66)2(68)0(67)
Ga 31 E−5_____== 31 E−11______ 31 E−5_____== 31(69)6,4(71)
Ge 32 E−6______= 32 E−11______ 32 E−5>−4_=== 32(74)4,3(72)2(70)1(73)1(76)
As 33 E−6______= 33 E−9_______ 33 E−6______= 33(75)
Se 34 E−7>−8____ 34 E−10>−11__ 34 E−5_____== 34(80)5,2(78)1(76)1(82)1(77)
Br 35 E−6______= 35 E−5_____== 35 E−5_____== 35(79)5,5(81)
Kr 36 E−10______ 36 E−10______ 36 E−5_____== 36(84)6,2(86)1(82)1(83)0(80)
Rb 37 E−5,−4_=== 37 E−7_______ 37 E−5>−6___= 37(85)7,3(87)
Sr 38 E−4____=== 38 E−6______= 38 E−5_____== 38(88)8,1(86)1(87)
Y 39 E−5_____== 39 E−11>−12__ 39 E−6_______ 39(89)
Zr 40 E−4____=== 40 E−11______ 40 E−5_____== 40(90)5,2(94)2(92)1(91)0(96)
Nb 41 E−5_____== 41 E−11______ 41 E−7_______ 41(93)
Mo 42 E−6______= 42 E−8_______ 42 E−6______= 42(98)2,2(96)2(95)1(92)1(94)1(97)1(100)
Tc 43 __________ 43 __________ 43 __________ 43(98)0[<U238]
Ru 44 E−9>−10___ 44 E−13______ 44 E−6______= 44(102)3,2(104)2(101)1(99)1(100)1(96)0(98)
Rh 45 E−9>−10___ 45 __________ 45 E−7_______ 45(103)
Pd 46 E−9,−10___ 46 __________ 46 E−6______= 46(106)3,3(108)2(105)1(110)1(104)0(102)
Ag 47 E−8_______ 47 E−11>−10__ 47 E−7_______ 47(107)5,5(109)
Cd 48 E−7,−8____ 48 E−10______ 48 E−6______= 48(114)3,2(112)1(110)1(111)1(113)1(116)0(106)
In 49 E−7,−8____ 49 E−8_______ 49 E−6>−7___= 49(115)x,0(113)
Sn 50 E−6______= 50 E−12>−10__ 50 E−6______= 50(120)3,2(118)1(116)1(119)1(117)1(124)0(122)
Sb 51 E−7_______ 51 E−10______ 51 E−7_______ 51(121)6,4(123)
Te 52 E−9_______ 52 __________ 52 E−6______= 52(130)3,3(128)2(126)1(125)0(124)0(122)
I 53 E−7,−6___= 53 E−8_______ 53 E−7_______ 53(127)
Xe 54 E−11______ 54 E−11______ 54 E−6______= 54(132)3,3(129)2(131)1(134)1(136)0(130)0(128)
Cs 55 E−6______= 55 E−10______ 55 E−7_______ 55(133)
Ba 56 E−4,−3==== 56 E−8_______ 56 E−6______= 56(138)7,1(137)1(136)1(135)0(134)
La 57 E−5,−6__== 57 E−12______ 57 E−7_______ 57(139)
Ce 58 E−5_____== 58 E−12______ 58 E−6______= 58(140)9,1(142)
Pr 59 E−6______= 59 E−13______ 59 E−7_______ 59(141)
Nd 60 E−5_____== 60 E−12______ 60 E−7_______ 60(142)3,2(144)2(146)1(143)1(145)1(148)1(150)
Pm 61 __________ 61 __________ 61 __________ 61(145)0
Sm 62 E−6______= 62 E−13______ 62 E−7_______ 62(152)3,2(154)2(147)1(149)1(148)1(150)0(144)
Eu 63 E−6,−7___= 63 E−13______ 63 E−8_______ 63(153)5,5(151)
Gd 64 E−6______= 64 E−13______ 64 E−7_______ 64(158)2,2(160)2(156)2(157)1(155)0(154)
Tb 65 E−6,−7___= 65 E−13>−12__ 65 E−8_______ 65(159)
Dy 66 E−6______= 66 E−13______ 66 E−7_______ 66(164)3,3(162)2(163)2(161)0(160)
Ho 67 E−6,−7___= 67 E−13______ 67 E−8_______ 67(165)
Er 68 E−6______= 68 E−13>−12__ 68 E−7_______ 68(166)3,3(168)2(167)1(170)0(164)
Tm 69 E−7_______ 69 E−13______ 69 E−8_______ 69(169)
Yb 70 E−6______= 70 E−13______ 70 E−7_______ 70(174)3,2(172)2(173)1(171)1(176)0(170)
Lu 71 E−7_______ 71 E−13______ 71 E−7>−8____ 71(175)x,0(176)
Hf 72 E−6______= 72 E−12______ 72 E−7_______ 72(180)4,3(178)2(177)1(179)1(176)
Ta 73 E−6______= 73 E−12______ 73 E−8_______ 73(181)
W 74 E−6______= 74 E−10>−12__ 74 E−7_______ 74(184)3,3(186)3(182)1(183)
Re 75 E−9>−10___ 75 E−12______ 75 E−8_______ 75(187)6,4(185)
Os 76 E−9>−10___ 76 __________ 76 E−7_______ 76(192)4,3(190)2(189)1(188)0(186)0(187)
Ir 77 E−10−11___ 77 __________ 77 E−7_______ 77(193)6,4(191)
Pt 78 E−9>−8____ 78 __________ 78 E−6______= 78(195)3,3(194)3(196)1(198)
Au 79 E−9_______ 79 E−12>−11__ 79 E−7_______ 79(197)
Hg 80 E−8_______ 80 E−11>−10__ 80 E−7_______ 80(202)3,2(200)2(199)1(201)1(198)1(204)
Tl 81 E−7_______ 81 E−11______ 81 E−7_______ 81(205)7,3(203)
Pb 82 E−5_____== 82 E−11______ 82 E−6______= 82(208)5,2(206)2(207)0(204)
Bi 83 E−8,−7____ 83 E−11______ 83 E−7_______ 83(209)
Po 84 E−16______ 84 E−20______ 84 __________ 84(209)
At 85 __________ 85 __________ 85 __________
Rn 86 E−19______ 86 E−22______ 86 __________ 86(222)
Fr 87 __________ 87 __________ 87 __________
Ra 88 E−13______ 88 E−17______ 88 __________ 88(226)
Ac 89 E−16______ 89 __________ 89 __________
Th 90 E−6,−5__== 90 E−12______ 90 E−8_______ 90(232)
Pa 91 E−12______ 91 E−17______ 91 __________
U 92 E−6______= 92 E−9_______ 92 E−8>−9____ 92(238)

[Lloyd]

- I listed the above data, because I was working on trying to figure out where the iridium layer near the K-T [Cretaceous-Tertiary] sedimentary rock boundary may have come from, such as perhaps via transmutation. I thought it might be worthwhile to have the list available on the forum. I read that iridium and osmium, which are called something like platinum family elements, make up about 5% of our brains by weight and seem to be important somehow for intelligence maybe. One website said iridium was the manna from heaven, described in the bible as what fed the Israelites after the Exodus. It's hard to imagine being able to live on iridium, but maybe it was talking about spiritual sustenance.
- Anyway, I made the list above to show me what elements and isotopes are most abundant on Earth and on the Sun, hoping to find clues about iridium's origins. I don't know what percentage of the iridium layer is iridium by weight, but that info may help. Also, it would likely help to know what else is in the iridium layer. This site http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Microbes+complicate+the+K-T+mystery-a08170265 says "microorganisms can both enhance and erase the iridium in rock". The author/s probably assume that the microorganisms move the iridium from one place to another, but Kervran cited a lot of studies that suggest that microorganisms can transmute elements.
- The article also says, "Dyer's group now reports results suggesting microbes could have severely altered the "original" iridium layer. In one experiment, the researchers compared pieces of a nickel-iron meteorite immersed in a bacteria-containing solution with pieces in a sterile solution. The bacteria caused more iridium to leave the meteorite and enter solution, they found. This suggests that microbes could have erased part of the original iridium layer or spread it into deeper sediments, Dyer says. In another trial, fungi and bacteria actually concentrated iridium that was dissolved in water. This indicates microbes could have enhanced the iridium layer, she says." And "At Gubbio [in Italy], for instance, researchers last year discovered high levels of iridium both above and below the main layer. Some say this indicates the iridium accumulated over a period of tens of thousands of years".
- Naturally, they assume that a few inches or feet of rock takes tens of thousands of years to deposit.

[Lloyd]

Here's some info on composition of the layer: http://www.science-frontiers.com/sf060/sf060p11.htm
- "The composition of the hydrocarbons in the sediments points to the earth's biomass (mainly surface vegetation) as the source of the soot. The total quantity of K-T soot is equivalent to that which would be produced by burning 10% of all present terrestrial plant material." Quoted from (Wolbach, Wendy S., et al; "Global Fire at the Cretaceous-Tertiary Boundary," Nature, 334:665, 1988.)
- "Comment. Unmentioned in the above article is the possibility that extensive wildfires might have been generated by volcanic eruptions, perhaps accompanied by great electrical storms. The 1988 fires in Yellowstone needed no meteoric impact." Quoted from the site.
- A graph there shows carbon at 10,000 parts per million and iridium at about 1,000 ppm
- This site http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/Issues/2005/May/dino_spherules.asp says, "iridium layer is actually quite diffuse and the boundary is best marked by a layer of molten droplets known as spherules. ... Spherules are abundant components of the K-T boundary that encircles the Earth. They are less than 0.5mm in diameter and consist mostly of Ni-bearing magnesioferrite spinel crystals. Spinels are a group of oxide minerals with the general formula F2+R23+O4, where F is usually magnesium or iron and R is usually aluminium, iron or chromium. ... They discovered that by assuming a sulfate-rich impact site and an impact angle of 60°, their models predicted the formation of spinels in a similar abundance and with similar chemical composition to those actually found at the K-T boundary. According to their models, iron-rich spinels condensed first, as the cloud [impact plume] cooled to below 2400K, followed by spinels with steadily higher concentrations of aluminium and magnesium, as the cloud temperature dropped below 2000K."
- So after the layer of spherules settled, the iridium continued to be deposited through several inches or feet of sediment.

[Lloyd]

http://www.science-frontiers.com/sf075/sf075g09.htm
- the KTB is characterized by an iridium anomaly and a thin layer of "impact clay" consisting of tiny bits of shocked minerals. At Beloc, on Haiti, though, geologists find a 55-centimeter-thick layer of glassy debris. Approximately 25% of this stra tum consists of 1-6-millimeter particles of tektite-like glass. Most of the glass particles are spherical, but a few have the splash-forms and dumbbell shapes of bona fide tektites. The thickness of the Haitian deposit and the large sizes of the particles suggest that the smoking gun must be nearby. Ironically, the Haiti stratum was originally classified as of volcanic origin;
http://www.livingcosmos.com/earth.htm#Huge
- In most situations the iridium and other noble metals are associated with organic compounds (kerogen and organic carbon or coal) from dead biomass, which is likely to be the source of the metals.
- The huge dust and water vapor cloud should have caused plant extinctions the most, but it did not, and equatorial species should have been hit the worst, but it was mid-latitude species that were affected the most, and most mass extinctions were animals.
- Photosynthetic nannoplankton survived into the Tertiary, and Cretaceous and Tertiary species even coexist in land-based marine sections of the Tertiary.
- Tropical insects should have become extinct, but persist into the Tertiary.
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1994Metic..29Q.501M
- anomalously high Sr-87/Sr-86 ratios occur at the time of the KT boundary
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/282/5390/841p
- the isotopic ratio of chromium [was] ... similar to that measured in carbonaceous chondrites.
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/reprint/101/11/3753.pdf
- A glauconitic [phyllosilicate (mica group) mineral or iron silicate] clay (16) above this 50-cm-thick interval [of limestone] can be identified as the K-T boundary based on the presence of early Danian microfossils in the overlying strata.
- The K-T boundary is ... characterized by a 2- to 3-cm-thick dark gray-green marly limestone with a 3- to 4-mm-thick green glauconitic clay (17) that marks an erosional disconformity. The 50-cm interval below the K-T boundary is in reversed polarity C29r. It is clear that 7 cm above the K-T boundary the core is normally magnetized (in chron 29n). The change appears to occur more than 4 cm above the K-T boundary, although only one data point occurs.
- Iridium concentrations ... only reach 0.29 ng/g at the K-T boundary (Fig. 2). The absence of an Ir anomaly and the short interval of C29r above the K-T boundary suggest a hiatus, as also indicated by biostratigraphy.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1200/is_n23_v135/ai_7679451
- With high-performance liquid chromatography and gas chromatography/mass spectrometry, Bada and student Meixun Zhao found that the Denmark section contained significant amounts of the two ... most common meteoritic amino acids, isovaline and alpha-aminoisobutyric acid. These forms are extremely rare on Earth.

[MrAmsterdam]

http://news.discovery.com/tech/water-freezes-when-heated.html

Usually water freezes at 32 degrees Fahrenheit and temperatures below that. But now scientists - reporting today in the journal Science -- have found a way to keep water in a liquid form at -40 degrees F. What's more, the scientists have found another way to make the water freeze when it's heated. It's a curious phenomenon to say the least, but the results could have implications for computer climate modeling.
----
But the implications of the role of dust in water should be considered in climate modeling, Franz Geiger, a physical chemist at Northwestern University in Illinois, told NPR. Ice in the atmosphere forms on dust particles and dust particles can have different electrical charges. That could influence temperatures, so it's a variable that could be taken into consideration in computer models of climate.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/327/5966/672

Water Freezes Differently on Positively and Negatively Charged Surfaces of Pyroelectric Materials

Although ice melts and water freezes under equilibrium conditions at 0°C, water can be supercooled under homogeneous conditions in a clean environment down to –40°C without freezing. The influence of the electric field on the freezing temperature of supercooled water (electrofreezing) is of topical importance in the living and inanimate worlds. We report that positively charged surfaces of pyroelectric LiTaO3 crystals and SrTiO3 thin films promote ice nucleation, whereas the same surfaces when negatively charged reduce the freezing temperature. Accordingly, droplets of water cooled down on a negatively charged LiTaO3 surface and remaining liquid at –11°C freeze immediately when this surface is heated to –8°C, as a result of the replacement of the negative surface charge by a positive one. Furthermore, powder x-ray diffraction studies demonstrated that the freezing on the positively charged surface starts at the solid/water interface, whereas on a negatively charged surface, ice nucleation starts at the air/water interface.

Whoops. Add up the lack of modelling of Flux transfer events, the "electric" properties of oceans and you model is incomplete

[mharratsc]

So tell me again- lakes and oceans freeze on the surface due to atmospheric convective cooling... or is it maybe because the Earth is a negative surface on which the water rests relative to the positive potential of the Sun in our solar circuit?

Most likely it's both- but you can't help but throw that out there when you get the chance, now can you?

[MGmirkin]

It appears that the direction of the electric field has a direct bearing (at least in these experiments) on the direction in which the water freezes (from the bottom up or the top down). The specific mechanism is still up for debate, of course.

Keeping min mind that, if I recall correctly, water is a weak electric dipole and thus may preferentially align with the local electric field... How this influences its freezing process I'm not sure.

Best,
~Michael

[junglelord]

Clearly a modification based on the gyroscopic motion of atomic units and the change in geometry from the varying position hydrogen takes with the oxygen as charge is applied, which directly modifes its freezing point. The negitive charge effecting the oxygen atom in repulsion and the hydrogen atom in attraction.

[nick c]

much to the chagrin of the AGW crowd. lacking any incorporation of the electrical framework though, could these findings be open to further interpretation?

In 1972, the late, world famous astronomer Carl Sagan and his colleague George Mullen formulated "The faint early sun paradox. " The paradox consisted in that the earth's climate has been fairly constant during almost four of the four and a half billion years that the planet has been in existence, and this despite the fact that radiation from the sun has increased by 25-30 percent.

The paradoxical question that arose for scientists in this connection was why the earth's surface at its fragile beginning was not covered by ice, seeing that the sun's rays were much fainter than they are today. Science found one probable answer in 1993, which was proffered by the American atmospheric scientist, Jim Kasting. He performed theoretical calculations that showed that 30% of the earth's atmosphere four billion years ago consisted of CO2. This in turn entailed that the large amount of greenhouse gases layered themselves as a protective greenhouse around the planet, thereby preventing the oceans from freezing over.

Mystery solved

Now, however, Professor Minik Rosing, from the Natural History Museum of Denmark, and Christian Bjerrum, from the Department of Geography and Geology at University of Copenhagen, together with American colleagues from Stanford University in California have discovered the reason for "the missing ice age" back then, thereby solving the sun paradox, which has haunted scientific circles for more than forty years.

Professor Minik Rosing explains, "What prevented an ice age back then was not high CO2 concentration in the atmosphere, but the fact that the cloud layer was much thinner than it is today. In addition to this, the earth's surface was covered by water. This meant that the sun's rays could warm the oceans unobstructed, which in turn could layer the heat, thereby preventing the earth's watery surface from freezing into ice. The reason for the lack of clouds back in earth's childhood can be explained by the process by which clouds form. This process requires chemical substances that are produced by algae and plants, which did not exist at the time. These chemical processes would have been able to form a dense layer of clouds, which in turn would have reflected the sun's rays, throwing them back into the cosmos and thereby preventing the warming of earth's oceans. Scientists have formerly used the relationship between the radiation from the sun and earth's surface temperature to calculate that earth ought to have been in a deep freeze during three billion of its four and a half billion years of existence. Sagan and Mullen brought attention to the paradox between these theoretical calculations and geological reality by the fact that the oceans had not frozen. This paradox of having a faint sun and ice-free oceans has now been solved."

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-03/uoc-ruo032910.php

[nick c]

much to the chagrin of the AGW crowd. lacking any incorporation of the electrical framework though, could these findings be open to further interpretation?

Why bother? They keep coming up with this stuff and the popular press gobbles it up. They resolved a paradox that never even existed in the first place.
The whole line of thinking here is specious, a formulation of a hypothesis based on the assumptions of other hypothesis'. The assumption of a 4+ billion year age for the Earth is derived from radiometric dating and slow deposition as the means of the formation of the geologic column; and the assertions about the past output of the Sun from the standard model of the thermonuclear engine at the core of the Sun.
From the perspective of the EU, this has no bearing, either way- for or against, any arguments concerning global warming, as it is basically a moot point.

Nick

[jjohnson]

I agree with you, Nick. Where is the evidence that the Sun was 25% - 30% less radiant than today? With no life forms present, fossil records are unlikely to be available with indicators. Ice cores are not 3-4 billion years old. They haven't discovered a CO2 record chiseled in the stone on top of Mauna Kea. Steve Smith advised me that the ol' Nebular Hypothesis is the foundation of the "faint Sun" idea, so your idea of hypotheses built upon hypotheses is likely right, and modus operandi for mainstream explanations that fail to consider EU ideas.

Fainter? How do they explain that in light of their core fusion theory? What makes that process emit less radiation at any given time? It's working on the same type and availability of fuel, under the same hypothesized conditions of temperature and heat, using the same silly processes of radiative heat transfer and a boiling kettle to get the radiant energy to the surface, so a brown-out seems unlikely from that similarly-unlikely perspective.

If there were incontrovertible evidence that the Sun were cooler billions of years ago, I'd have to conclude that its drift current energy supply was suppling fewer electrons (an area of current density) as the sun or the current moved relative to one another in space, or as somewhere upstream something was reducing the current flow, like building a star or something.

If the Sun radiates approximately like a black body, as do nearly all stars to my knowledge, and it cooled down for whatever reason, what happens to its spectral peak output is that overall its energy output is decreased, but more of that peak output is shifted down into infrared. With little cloud cover and atmospheric water vapor, more warming infrared energy would be arriving than previously, and less "bluer" light energy. What effect would that have on the Earth's average temperature. Plus, the cosmic ray connection seems to be a plausible link, as conceived by the Danish researchers, and if there were fewer cosmic rays, that has certain implications for the Sun's activity and power output and space weather severity or lack thereof, that the rest of science isn't thinking too seriously about, as well.

We need better-rounded scientific thinking - people or teams who can integrate a variety of viewpoints and science specialties different from their own - in order to get better balanced, better integrated ideas as to what the answers are to mysteries here on Earth, as well as those far, far away or long, long ago. It's always a mystery to me why they don't try such a variegated team approach to some of this stuff. Even in the EU we have people from many walks of life and a variety of interests and specializations [weather; planetary machining and geologically catastrophic events, star formation, galactic formation and structure, human mythology and their foundations, energy sources and flows, etc. etc.] who think broadly about how many of those interests are so well unified by the encompassing ideas of an electric universe.

Jim

[Asgard]

Hey, thanks guys. i could sense that there was alot of assumptive suppositioning going on there but wasn't sure where to draw any boundaries. even being aware of the utter fallaciousness of the mainstreamist position there still can be a tendency to think that at least some small aspect of their view holds merit but this logic does not hold up under scrutiny.

[MattEU]

hello, can any one help with suggestions of how to measure local electric fields and other electromagnetic properties in rocks or flowing through or around them? basically i want to measure "stuff" in/around the strange limestone formations found on malta. also interesting to do the same around the "temples" and other natural formations of malta

i have spoken to a couple of electrical engineers and they say that due to the background and how many waves we now pump into the environment it can not really be done by the man in the street.

any one can think of all the things you could measure or want to measure? can you test for very local magnetic field strength?

cheers for any help or ideas

[solrey]

I wonder if simple, low tech, low cost apparatus would do the trick? Enough to compare the results between different areas maybe?

Aluminum foil electroscope.

Ridiculously sensitive electric charge detector.

3D magnetic field viewer.

Another magnetic field viewer with an electric field viewer at the bottom of the page.

cheers

[Osmosis]

Hi solrey,

A proton magnetometer, which measures the local earth field can be built. This unit will indicate the field strength, usually calibrated in nanoTesla. The total field will vary over a day, by some dozens of nT, usually. The sensor is usually two soleniod coils of around 500-1000 turns, each. The sensor can be in a plastic jar, filled with charcoal lighter. Water could be used, but the water can cause electrical leakage problems, unless the coils are very well insulated. There should be project plans on-line and one of your electrical engineer friends can be valuable, in building such a unit.
You might even find an old, serviceable "maggie" on E.Bay--

Good luck!
Osmosis