dangerous physics experiments

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10 Most Dangerous Scientific Experiments in History

Science is a force for good in our world, improving lives of people all across Earth in immeasurable ways. But it is also a very powerful tool that can become dangerous in some situations. Especially when it gets entangled in politics. At other times, science’s inherent ambition to push boundaries of what is known can also lead to some heart-stopping moments. 

The following list is in no way exhaustive but gives us a place to start when thinking about the serious responsibility that comes with the march of science.

1. Project MKUltra 

The infamous project MKUltra was CIA’s attempt at mastering mind control. The program started in the 1950s and lasted seemingly until 1966. Under MKUltra, often-unwilling subjects were given drugs, especially hallucinogenics like LSD. The people tested were also put through sleep and sensory deprivation, hypnosis, sexual abuse, and other kinds of psychological torture, while some tests proved lethal .

The supposed goal of the project was some combination of chemical weapons research and effort to create mind-controlling drugs to combat the Soviets. 

2. Weaponizing the Plague

The last time plague roamed around, it killed around half of Europe’s population, reducing the amount of people in the world by nearly a 100 million during the 13th and 14th century. In the late 1980s, the Soviet Union’s biological warfare research program figured out how to use the plague as a weapon, to be launched at enemies in missile warheads. What could go wrong? Besides the plague, defectors revealed that the Soviet bio-weapons program also had hundreds of tons of anthrax and tons of smallpox.

3. The Large Hadron Supercollider 

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in Switzerland, built to study particle physics, is the world’s largest machine and single most sophisticated scientific instrument. Because of this and the cutting-edge research its involved in, the LHC has prompted more than its share of fears from the general public. It has been blamed for causing earthquakes and pulling asteroids towards Earth .

A giant magnet used in the Large Hadron Collider, weighing 1920 tonnes. 28 February, 2007 at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Geneva. (Photo credit: JEAN-PIERRE CLATOT/AFP/Getty Images)

While conspiracy theories around the LHC have generally been disproven, it has also been accused of potentially creating black holes that could swallow Earth, a possibility that was curiously not completely discounted by the CERN, the organization running the collider. 

CERN claimed the LHC is not dangerous, but also acknowledged that some type of black hole could be created. 

“The LHC will not generate black holes in the cosmological sense. However, some theories suggest that the formation of tiny ‘quantum’ black holes may be possible. The observation of such an event would be thrilling in terms of our understanding of the Universe; and would be perfectly safe,“ said CERN’s statement .

A quantum black hole would be tiny. Don’t you feel better?

4. The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment

A government-funded “study” from 1932-1972 denied treatment for syphilis to 399 African American patients in rural Alabama, even as penicillin was found to be effective against the disease in 1947. The patients were actually not told they had syphilis, with doctors blaming their “bad blood” instead and given placebos.

The goal of the experiment , carried out by the U.S. Public Health Service, was to study the natural progress of syphilis if left untreated. 28 of the people in the study died directly from syphilis while 100 died from related complications. 

Doctor drawing blood from a patient as part of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study. 1932.

5. Kola Superdeep Borehole

A Soviet experiment, started in 1970, sought to drill as deeply as possible into the crust of the planet. By 1994, they bore a 12-km-deep hole into the Kola Peninsula in Russia’s far northwest. The record dig provided much scientific data, like the finding of ancient microscopic plankton fossils from 24 species.

While nothing negative happened, there were concerns at the time that drilling so deep towards the center of Earth might produce unexpected seismic effects. Like cracking the planet open.

The hole’s site is currently closed. 

6. Guatemalan STD study

This horrid experiment is another instance of the U.S. government causing harm in the pursuit of “science”. From 1945 until 1956, around 1500 Guatemalans were deliberately infected with sexually transmitted diseases, including syphilis and gonorrhoea. The subjects included orphans, prisoners, prostitutes and military conscripts. Researchers used disease-infected prostitutes, injections, and other unscrupulous methods to make their subjects sick. 

Subjects of the experiment are currently suing John Hopkins University for $1 billion for its role in the study.

7. The Aversion Project

A medical torture program was instituted in South Africa between 1971 and 1989 to “cure” homosexuality in military conscripts. The policy, carried out under apartheid, included forced “aversion therapy” treatments like electric shock therapy and chemical castration . The army also authorized as many as 900 sex change operations .

It was widely believed in the medical community at the time that homosexuality was a mental illness that could be cured. Dr. Aubrey Levin, in charge of the program as chief psychiatrist of the South African military, was eventually accused of human rights abuse by international organizations and received a prison sentence. 

8. Nazi Concentration Camp Experiments

Nazis carried out medical experiments on thousands of prisoners in concentration camps, without any regard for human life. Some of their “research” involved purposefully inducing hypothermia, infecting people with malaria, using mustard gas on people, forced sterilization, giving prisoners different poisons, infecting wounds with bacteria and filling them with wood shavings and ground glass.

The Nazi doctor Josef Mengele was the prototypical “evil scientist,” known for his concentration camp experiments, with a particular focus on twins, mostly Jewish or Roma (“Gypsy”). Supposedly in the interest of studying heredity, the SS physician Mengele was responsible for such atrocities as removing organs from people without anesthetics, injections with deadly bacteria, dismemberment and others.

Not surprisingly known as the “Angel of Death”, Mengele collected the eyes of murdered victims for heterochromia research and attempted to prove through experiments the supposed resistance of Jews and Roma to a host of diseases.

circa 1940: Joseph Mengele, before he became known as ‘The Doctor of Auschwitz’ and ‘The Angel of Death’ for his pseudo-scientific experiments on inmates in Nazi death camps. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images)

9. Unit 731

Unit 731 was a secretive R&D unit of the Japanese Army that carried out horrendous experiments on humans during World War 2. Commanded by General Shiro Ishii , the unit experimented on an estimated 250,000 men, women and children. Most of the victims were Chinese, along with some prisoners of war from Russia and the Allies.

The forced medical procedures involved vivisections – cutting open subjects usually without anesthesia, unnecessary limb amputations, and removal of body organs like parts of brain, liver, lung and others. Victims were also subjected to biological warfare, frostbite testing, forced pregnancies, and even weapons testing by grenades or flamethrowers.

Trinity Site – 0.016 second after explosion, July 16, 1945. The highest point of the cloud in this image is about 200 meters high.

10. The Trinity Test

It’s hard not to put the world’s first nuclear test on such a list. In the mad rush to develop the atomic bomb and gain a military advantage in World War 2, America instituted the secretive Manhattan Project . This resulted in the Trinity Test, a detonation of the first-ever nuclear weapon in a New Mexico desert on July 16, 1945.

While the scientists were relatively confident in their work, there were some famous doubters who wondered if the bomb would even explode or if it would perhaps cause the end of the world as we know it.

Waiting for the bomb to go off, Nobel Prize-winning physicist Enrico Fermi , wagered others whether the bomb would just destroy New Mexico or the world, potentially setting the Earth’s atmosphere ablaze . 

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13.7 Cosmos & Culture

The most dangerous ideas in science.

Some physicists are pushing back against ideas like string theory and the multiverse. Here, we see a computer-generated image of a black hole, which might, ultimately, be explained by ideas like string theory. Alain Riazuelo/IAP/UPMC/CNRS hide caption

Some physicists are pushing back against ideas like string theory and the multiverse. Here, we see a computer-generated image of a black hole, which might, ultimately, be explained by ideas like string theory.

There's a battle going on at the edge of the universe, but it's getting fought right here on Earth. With roots stretching back as far as the ancient Greeks, in the eyes of champions on either side, this fight is a contest over nothing less than the future of science. It's a conflict over the biggest cosmic questions humans can ask and the methods we use — or can use — to get answers for those questions.

Cosmology is the study of the universe as a whole: its structure, its origins and its fate. Fundamental physics is the study of reality's bedrock entities and their interactions. With these job descriptions it's no surprise that cosmology and fundamental physics share a lot of territory. You can't understand how the universe evolves after the Big Bang (a cosmology question) without understanding how matter, energy, space and time interact (a fundamental physics question). Recently, however, something remarkable has been happening in both these fields that's raising hackles with some scientists. As physicists George Ellis and Joseph Silk recently put it in Nature :

"This year, debates in physics circles took a worrying turn. Faced with difficulties in applying fundamental theories to the observed Universe, some researchers called for a change in how theoretical physics is done. They began to argue — explicitly — that if a theory is sufficiently elegant and explanatory, it need not be tested experimentally, breaking with centuries of philosophical tradition of defining scientific knowledge as empirical."

The root of the problem rests with two ideas/theories now central for some workers in cosmology (even if they remain problematic for physicists as a whole). The first is string theory, which posits that the world is made up not of point particles but of tiny vibrating strings. String theory only works if the universe has many "extra" dimensions of space other than the three we experience. The second idea is the so-called multiverse which, in its most popular form, claims more than one distinct universe emerged from the Big Bang. Instead, adherents claim, there may be an almost infinite (if not truly infinite) number of parallel "pocket universes," each with their own version of physics.

Both string theory and the multiverse are big, bold reformulations of what we mean when we say the words "physical reality." That is reason enough for them to be contentious topics in scientific circles. But in the pursuit of these ideas, something else — something new — has emerged. Rather than focusing just on questions about the nature of the cosmos, the new developments raise critical questions about the basic rules of science when applied to something like the universe as a whole.

Here is the problem: Both string theory and the multiverse posit entities that may, in principle or in practice, be unobservable. Evidence for the extra dimensions needed to make string theory work is likely to require a particle accelerator of astronomical proportions. And the other pocket universes making up the multiverse may lie permanently over our "horizon," such that we will never get direct observations of their existence. It's this specific aspect of the theories that has scientists like Ellis and Silk so concerned. As they put it:

"These unprovable hypotheses are quite different from those that relate directly to the real world and that are testable through observations — such as the standard model of particle physics and the existence of dark matter and dark energy. As we see it, theoretical physics risks becoming a no-man's-land between mathematics, physics and philosophy that does not truly meet the requirements of any."

What they, and others, find particularly worrisome is the claim that our attempts to push back frontiers in cosmology and fundamental physics have taken us into a new domain where new rules of science are needed. Some call this domain "post-empirical" science. Recently, for example, the philosopher of physics Richard Dawid has argued that in spite of the fact that no evidence for string theory exists (even after three decades of intense study), it must still be considered the best candidate for a path forward. As Dawid puts it , such arguments include "no-one has found a good alternative to string theory. Another [reason to accept string theory is] one uses the observation that theories without alternatives tended to be viable in the past."

Sean Carroll, a highly respected and philosophically astute physicist, takes a different approach from Dawid. For Carroll, it is the concept of falsifiability , which was central to Karl Popper's famous philosophy of science, that is too limited for the playing fields we now find ourselves working on. As Carroll writes :

"Whether or not we can observe [extra dimensions or other universes] directly, the entities involved in these theories are either real or they are not. Refusing to contemplate their possible existence on the grounds of some a priori principle, even though they might play a crucial role in how the world works, is as non-scientific as it gets."

Thus, for Carroll, even if a theory predicts entities that can't be directly observed, if there are indirect consequences of their existence we can confirm, then those theories (and those entities) must be included in our considerations.

Other scientists, however, are not convinced. High-energy physicist Sabine Hossenfelder called Dawid's kind of post-empirical science an "oxymoron ." More importantly, for scientists like Paul Steinhardt and collaborators, the new ideas are becoming "post-modern. " They use the term in the sense that without more definitive connections to data, the ideas will not be abandoned because a community exists that continues to support them.

This is the possibility that troubles Ellis and Silk most of all:

"In our view, the issue boils down to clarifying one question: What potential observational or experimental evidence is there that would persuade you that the theory is wrong and lead you to abandoning it? If there is none, it is not a scientific theory."

String theory and the multiverse are exciting ideas in and of themselves. If either one were true, it would have revolutionary consequences for our understanding of the cosmos. But, as debates about post-empirical science and falsifiability demonstrate, critics of these untested theories fear they may be leading the field down a difficult — and ultimately damaging — path. That's why, one way or another, they may be science's most dangerous ideas.

Adam Frank is a co-founder of the 13.7 blog, an astrophysics professor at the University of Rochester, a book author and a self-described "evangelist of science." You can keep up with more of what Adam is thinking on Facebook and Twitter: @adamfrank4 .

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7 Mad Science Experiments You Can Do At Home But Probably Shouldn't

By the time you finish reading this article, you will undoubtedly think of Theo Gray when you hear someone say "mad scientist."

Theo, a columnist for the magazine Popular Science , recently published a book titled Theo Gray's Mad Science: Experiments You Can Do At Home - But Probably Shouldn't. The book is full of experiments so outrageous (Ignite your own phosphorus sun in a globe filled with pure oxygen! Make your own shotgun ammo by pouring molten lead off the roof! Heat a hot tub with 500 pounds of quicklime!) that it sounds like a parent's nightmare. It's actually quite the opposite: there's no a better way to spark the imagination of the young minds of proto-scientists than to bring science to life with Theo's hands-on experiments. Yes, these are dangerous experiments but that's why they're so much fun!

1. Gag with a Spoon: The Melting Spoon Prank

DISAPPEARING ACT - A steaming cup of water liquefies the spoon in about 15 seconds - notice the puddle at the bottom of the cup. Photo: Jeff Sciortino.

With the right mix of metals, you can make an alloy that turns to liquid at nearly any temperature.

Mention liquid metal, and people immediately think of mercury. After all, it is the only metal that isn't solid at room temperature. Well, not quite - it's the only pure metal, but there are many alloys (mixtures of metals) that will melt well below that point. For example, the mercury-filled fever thermometers that children were told not to play with in the 1950s and '60s have been replaced by virtually identical ones containing the far less toxic Galinstan, a patented liquid alloy of gallium, indium and tin.

Those who were kids in that era may also remember playing with another low-melting-point alloy: trick spoons that melted when you tried to stir your coffee with them. These were made with a blend that, no surprise, was highly toxic; it typically contained cadmium, lead, mercury or all three. But, as it happens, it's possible to make alloys that liquefy in a hot drink using safer components.

A few months ago I created a batch of these prank spoons as a gift for my friend and fellow element buff Oliver Sacks (author of Awakenings and Uncle Tungsten ). I cast jewelers' molding rubber around a fancy spoon to form the mold. Then I looked up the formula for an alloy that would melt at 140 °F, roughly the temperature of a cup of hot coffee, and found this one: 51 percent indium, 32.5 percent bismuth and 16.5 percent tin.

After the spoon turns to a puddle at the bottom of the cup, you can pour off the liquid and touch the metal, feeling the weird sensation of it hardening around your fingertip. When Sacks has used up all his spoons, he can easily recover the metal, melt it again over a cup of hot water, pour it into the mold, and make new ones - the trick-spoon circle of life.

So why can't you buy these nontoxic prank utensils in toy stores, as you could the toxic versions of years past? Price. Indium costs about three times as much as silver. (I get mine from a bulk supplier in China.) Using gallium, you can make alloys that melt in lukewarm water or even in your hand, but it's more expensive than indium, and it tends to stain the glass and discolor skin. Unfortunately, no alloy replicates the low cost, bright shine and nonstick fun of mercury. Too bad we know now that playing with it for too long can give you brain damage.

How To Create a Melting Spoon

2. Calling Van Helsing: How to Build Your Own Werewolf Killers

BULLET PARTS - [from left] Bullion bars and rounds, the cheapest source of pure silver; the graphite mold, opened after casting a bullet; the profile bit used to machine the mold; silver bullets as cast and polished to a mirror finish. Photo: Mike Walker.

(L) TURNING THE BIT - Using a lathe to create the milling bit that will be used to make the graphite mold. (R) LIQUID METAL - Molten silver at 1,800 °F pours into a graphite bullet mold from an electric jewelers' melting cup. Photos: Mike Walker.

Suss the myth from the reality with a hands-on investigation into the original anti-werewolf weapon.

Like darning socks, making bullets is a dying art. Used to be just about everyone with a need for ammo poured their own, using iron or even wooden molds. These days only a few diehard hobbyists still do it, and they use aluminum molds. But even fewer people still make silver bullets.

Actually, not many people ever made silver bullets. It's a difficult process, and their efficacy against werewolves has never been scientifically proven. I suppose their renown came from the perception that silver was a distinguished metal, often spoken of in connection with its higher class cousin, gold. But today silver is far more common, and it tarnishes over time, primarily because of sulfur pollution from power plants. (By and large, it didn't tarnish before the Industrial Age.)

I couldn't find any references describing real historical silver-bullet-crafting techniques. At 1,764 °F, molten silver would ruin traditional and modern bullet molds. They could have been fashioned using jewelers' methods, but that would require a new plaster mold for every bullet. Frankly, I think people spent a lot more time talking about silver bullets than they did turning them out.

I don't like legends that are all talk, so I decided to see what it takes to produce a real silver bullet: not plated, not sterling - pure silver.

To create the mold, I first had to construct a bit. I used a lathe to turn a steel rod into a bullet-like shape, then used a milling machine to cut away a quarter-circle wedge of the rod, leaving a sharp cutting edge. Basically I had built a router bit shaped like a bullet. (I've fabricated bits like this freehand with a file, which works fine; it just takes longer. Much longer.)

After using the bit to machine the graphite bullet mold, I used an electrically heated graphite crucible to pour in the 0.999 fine liquid silver at about 2,000 °F, which is 230 °F above its melting point. The mold must be preheated with a blowtorch to keep the silver from solidifying before it fills the whole cavity. One of the benefits of using graphite is that it keeps the silver from oxidizing, so bullets come out bright and shiny.

Would a silver bullet really fire? Probably. (Though, not being an experienced gunsmith, I would never be foolish enough to try my bullets in a real gun.) Bullets need to be fairly soft so that they can take on the shape of spiral grooves in the gun's barrel, and pure silver is moderately soft. It's also similar in density to lead, so it should have similar aerodynamics and muzzle velocity. I'd guess silver would make a very nice nontoxic substitute for lead in bullets. Too bad about the cost: These one-ounce, large-caliber rifle bullets use about $12 worth of silver per shot - best reserved for only the most severe werewolf infestations.

How To Build Your Own Werewolf Killers

3. Build Your Own Lightbulb

A VERY BIG BULB - The stick welder [left] provides enough juice to heat a tungsten rod to nearly 5,000 °F. The ice bucket acts as the bulb, and the helium displaces oxygen. Photo: Mike Walker.

Act as if you're smarter than Edison: Construct a lightbulb the modern way with some helium and an old welder.

Thomas Edison famously spent months trying to make a lightbulb work. He tested one material after another in an evacuated bell jar before he finally got a carbon filament to burn long enough to sell it with a straight face. When I had a free afternoon recently, I thought I'd see if I could do it too.

Edison's first mistake was living before tungsten wire was available. Tungsten is way better than carbon as a filament material, and now you can find it in any metal-supply shop. It lasts longer, is less brittle, and glows with a cleaner, whiter light. His second mistake, repeated in classroom physics demonstrations to this day, was using a vacuum to get the air out of the bulb. Clearing out the air is important because at yellow to white heat (3,500 °F to 5,000 °F), pretty much all known materials, even tungsten filament wire, react with oxygen and burn up in a few seconds. Remove the oxygen, and the wire can't burn. But a vacuum is the hard way to solve that problem. You need an expensive vacuum pump, a thick glass bell jar to withstand the pressure of the surrounding atmosphere, and several nonleaking pipe joints.

It's a whole lot easier to just displace the air with an inert gas that's at the same pressure as the surrounding air, which is how most modern bulbs work. Common household lightbulbs use a mixture of argon and nitrogen. Fancy krypton flashlights and xenon headlamps use those eponymous heavier noble gases to allow the filament to burn longer and hotter.

I used helium because it's easily available and lighter than air, allowing me to fill my bulb, an upside down glass ice bucket (wedding present, I believe), from the bottom. The helium floated up, displacing the air inside. With a steady stream flowing in, I didn't even need to seal the bucket very well - I just wrapped a sheet of tinfoil over the bottom to keep eddies of air from wafting in.

For a filament, I used a thick tungsten wire I had lying around the shop and, for the power supply, a small stick welder I got at an auction. It supplied about 50 amps at 30 volts, giving me a 1,500 watt bulb. When I powered up the filament without the bucket in place, it produced a prodigious quantity of tungsten-oxide smoke and didn't last very long. But with the bucket on and a steady flow of helium, the filament glowed brightly and cleanly.

It must have been truly thrilling for Edison when he finally got one of these things to work for the first time. I know I was thrilled, even though I slaved over mine for only about 30 minutes and it worked perfectly the first time - well, the first time I didn't forget to turn on the helium.

How To Turn a Jar Into a Lightbulb

4. Making a Deadly Sun

ONE BAD BALL - A white phosphorus 'sun'. The smoke is phosphorus pentoxide. Photo: Mike Walker.

HUNK O' BURNING SUN - White phosphorus burning in air glows with a phosphorescent beauty. Photo: Mike Walker.

(1) Suspend the white phosphorus in the center of a lobe filled with pure oxygen. (2) The burning phosphorus rapidly fills the globe with thick white smoke. (3) The chip of phosphorus burns energetically for more than a minute. (4) CLOUDY SUN - It takes about a minute for the phosphorus to burn itself up, leaving only smoke. Photo: Mike Walker.

From urine to firebombs - white phosphorus is among the nastiest of elements.

In 1669 the pompous German alchemist Hennig Brandt accidentally discovered white phosphorus while boiling urine in Hamburg. He became the talk of the town by demonstrating its amazing luminous powers to scientists and dignitaries.

In a cruel irony, 274 years later the discovery he'd hoped would turn lead into gold instead turned his city to ashes when a thousand tons of white-phosphorus incendiary bombs created one of the great firestorms of World War II; 37,000 people died when the sky burned over Hamburg. Yet even today, white phosphorus is still used as a weapon.

I've used red phosphorus to make a batch of kitchen matches. Although both red and white phosphorus contain nothing but the pure element, red is mostly harmless on its own, whereas white is near the top in every category of dangerous. It'll ignite spontaneously and burn vigorously until you deprive it of oxygen. One tenth of a gram inhaled is fatal, and smaller doses over time can make your jaw fall off (seriously - it's called phossy jaw).

The difference is that white phosphorus is a waxy paste consisting of highly strained atoms bound into tetrahedrons. The energy in their chemical bonds is bursting to get out, causing white's high reactivity. The atoms of red phosphorus are linked in relatively stable chains. Same element, very different properties.

Brandt was trying to turn lead into gold, and finding a substance that glows in the dark seemed like a big step in the right direction. Of course, it wasn't, and he died poor after spending two wives' fortunes on boiled urine. (Alchemists were obsessed with urine because it's yellow and they were trying to make gold. Transmuting lead into gold is possible, but it turns out you need a nuclear reactor, not buckets of pee.)

Still, the discovery of white phosphorus was an important one in early chemistry. These days it is used in many ways, including the phosphoric acid in nearly all colas. It's also used in a particularly beautiful classroom demonstration of its extreme flammability and brilliant yellow light. Just hope you never see that light in your neighborhood.

How To Contain a Phosphorus Sun

5. Trap Lightning in a Block

[ YouTube Clip ]

Freeze a charge screaming through solid plastic - or printer toner - to see how electricity moves.

There are many unusual things to see around Newton Falls, Ohio - the Wal-Mart with hitching posts for Amish buggies, the Army base with helicopters and tanks proudly arranged on hills - but I was here for the most unusual thing of all: the local Dynamitron. I was here to make frozen lightning.

The Kent State Neo Beam facility's Dynamitron is a four-story-tall, five-million-volt particle accelerator much like a tube TV, only bigger (Yes, tube TVs are domestic particle accelerators.) Both Dynamitrons and TVs use high voltages and magnets to slam electrons into a target. In a TV, that's the phosphor screen; in this Dynamitron, it's usually plastic plumbing components being hardened by the beam. But when I joined the team of retired electrical engineer Bert Hickman and physicists Bill Hathaway and Kim Goins, the product was Lichtenberg figures, lightning bolts permanently recorded in a block of clear acrylic.

With the Dynamitron - rented for the day - adjusted to around three million volts, it blasts electrons about halfway through half-inch-thick pieces of acrylic sheet. The plastic is a very good insulator, so it traps the electrons inside. Coming out of the machine, the blocks don't look any different, but they hold a hornet's nest of electrons desperate to get out.

Left alone, the electrons will stay trapped for hours, but a knock with a sharp point opens a path for them to make a quick escape. Electrons gather from all parts of the block, joining up to form larger and larger streams of electric current on their way toward the exit point. As the charge leaves, it heats up and damages the plastic along the branching trails it follows, leaving a permanent trace of its path. If you could see inside a thundercloud in the nanoseconds before a bolt of lightning emerged, you would see the same kind of pattern. The bolt doesn't just pop up fully formed; it has to gather charge from all over the cloud.

You can create similar, if less permanent Lichtenberg figures using toner powder from a copier or printer and any common source of static electricity. This is how German scientist Georg Christoph Lichtenberg first did it in the late 18th century (he used powdered sulfur), which at the time represented one of the great discoveries in the history of electricity. Today, the figures are a great way to learn about electrical discharge - and can make a cool souvenir from an afternoon with a very expensive machine.

How To Make Your Own Lightning Pattern

6. Nickel Growing in Trees

WASTE NUT - These nodules of chrome and nickel build up over time from the process of electroplating bumpers. Photo: Chuck Shotwell.

Electroplating uses electricity to turn dissolved ions into a thin layer of solid metal bonded to a surface. Photo: Chuck Shotwell.

Electroplating makes bumpers shiny and rustproof. It also makes these beautiful bits of industrial waste.

If there were a contest for most attractive industrial waste, these nickel-chromium nodules would win hands-down. As intricate as the veins on a leaf, brighter than a '57 Chevy in the noonday sun, they grow naturally in tanks of chemicals simmering gently in a bumper factory somewhere in the Midwest. Eventually workers whack them off with hammers and dump them in barrels for recycling.

Bumpers are stamped out of steel and elecroplated with a thousandth of an inch of nickel (for rustproofing) followed by 65 billionths of an inch of mirror-bright chromium (for shine). Everything you see is chromium, yet it represents no more than a millionth the weight of the bumper.

Electroplating uses electricity to turn dissolved ions into solid metal bonded to a surface. Bumpers sit in a vat of acid containing dissolved, positively charged nickel ions. A current is run through the solution, forcing negatively charged electrons from the bumper into each nickel ion, neutralizing it. The ions bond to the bumper, plating it with a very thin layer of solid metal. After the nickel is applied, robot cranes transfer the bumpers to tanks of chromic acid, where the same process adds a coating of chrome.

Titanium bolts and T-shaped wing nuts attach the bumpers to titanium frames carrying about 10,000 amps at around three volts. The bolts, nuts and frames are coated with rubber-like insulation, but it's never perfect. Tiny cracks and nicks form over time, allowing electrons to escape and the metal to start depositing. Bumpers go through the line only once, but the frames and T-nuts are dipped repeatedly. Over dozens of chrome and nickel baths, these wonderful nodules build up.

In a week, the factory I visited turns tons of nickel and chrome into thousands of gleaming beauties. It also makes about 10,000 bumpers.

Official webpage: Nickel Growing in Trees

7. Shattering the Strongest Glass

SHATTERED GLASS - A piece of tempered glass shatters all over from a blow to one corner.

Explosive glass drops demonstrate why your car windshield is so strong and safe.

If you want a scientific display of the dangers of pent-up stress, Prince Rupert's drops are it. After the trauma of being dropped molten-hot into a bucket of cold water, these glass balls, named for a 17th-century amateur scientist, turn into bundles of high tension. They're impervious to even the strongest blows, until you find their hot button: Flick the tail, and they explode.

When molten glass hits cold water, its outer surface cools rapidly and shrinks as it solidifies. Since the center is still fluid, it can flow to adjust to the outer shell's smaller size. As the center eventually cools and solidifies, it also shrinks, but now the outer shell is already solid and can't change its shape to accommodate the smaller core.

The result is a great deal of internal stress, as the center pulls the outside in from all sides. Like a tightly wound spring, the glass is set to release a lot of energy. If you break the thin glass at the tail, a chain reaction travels like a shock wave through the drop. As each section breaks, it releases enough energy to break the next section, and so on, shattering the whole drop in less than a millisecond.

Paradoxically, the same tension also makes the Prince Rupert's drop stronger. Glass breaks when tiny scratches pull apart and spread into fractures. Since the surface is compressed by internal stress, scratches can't grow, and the glass is very difficult to break. I took a hammer to the thick end of some drops, which I got from a local glassmaker, and they stayed intact. Even the tail is stronger than it looks.

Tempered glass, common in cars and glass doors, works the same way. Jets of cold air are used to rapidly (but not too rapidly) cool the surface of hot sheets of glass, creating a milder internal tension that keeps the surface compressed at all times. That's why tempered glass is extremely strong but shatters into thousands of pieces when it does finally break. This shattering actually makes it safer, because there are no large pieces to act like knives or spears. The lesson here is that stress makes you stronger but inside that tough exterior lurks a potential explosion. And stay off my tail, OK?

How To Make and Break Glass

About Theo Gray

Theo Gray is the author of Popular Science magazine's "Gray Matter" column, the proprietor of periodictable.com , and the creator of the iconic photographic periodic-table poster seen in universities, schools, museums and TV shows from MythBusters to Hannah Montana . In his other life, he is co-founder of the major software company Wolfram Research, creators of the world's leading technical software system, Mathematica® . He lives in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois.

Theo Gray's Mad Science: Experiments You Can Do at Home - But Probably Shouldn't Autographed copy from the official website | Amazon

Links: Official website (Graysci.com) | Gray Matter column | Theo Gray's personal website

This article excerpts Theo Gray's Mad Science book with permission. All images and text are copyright © by Theodore Gray.

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Extreme experiments: The laboratories that are pushing science to its limits

Take a look inside some of the most extraordinary science experiments in the world, from the coldest, to the hottest, to the highest.

Kath Nightingale

Scientists go to extraordinary lengths to expand our understanding of radical phenomena in the most extreme labs on Earth.

The deepest (and cleanest)

Snolab, ontario, canada.

Even a Bond villain might consider SNOLAB too remote for an underground lair. Earth’s deepest and cleanest lab is two kilometres underground, part of a nickel and copper mine in Ontario, Canada.

The deep layer of rock between the 5,000m 2 lab and the Earth’s surface shields it from the cosmic radiation that would otherwise interfere with its sensitive experiments. The lab searches for solar neutrinos (extremely small subatomic particles produced by the Sun) and dark matter , the estimated 27 per cent of matter in the Universe which remains a mystery to us.

But situating a sparkling clean lab in a mine comes with its downsides. As well as a 1.5km walk from the lift to the lab, researchers and support staff must undergo a lengthy cleaning process involving showers, hosed-down boots and lab-laundered clothes to make sure that no mine dirt or particles make it into the facility.

The lab also contains the world’s deepest underground flushing toilet.

The loudest

Nasa reverberant acoustic test facility, ohio, usa.

Launching rockets is a noisy business, and scientists need to make sure that payloads can withstand the extremely loud sounds involved in take-off and ascent into space.

NASA’s Reverberant Acoustic Test Facility carries out part of a suite of testing that complex and sensitive hardware must undergo before being deemed clear for take-off, by submitting them to noises of up to an eardrum-bursting 163 decibels.

In order to make the necessary sounds, NASA’s Reverberant Acoustic Test Facility uses 36 huge horns, which are powered by the change in pressure as liquid nitrogen turns into gas. Each of the horns – which can produce volumes equal to thousands of home speakers – emit different frequency ranges, so the noise can be tailored to suit the necessary requirements.

The brightest

Extreme light laboratory, nebraska, usa.

Another lab that needs to keep an eye on its cleanliness is responsible for producing the brightest light ever known on Earth. The Extreme Light Laboratory at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln broke records in 2017 by generating a light a billion times brighter than the surface of the Sun.

The light is produced by focusing a laser beam extremely intensely and then using it to bombard a single electron with short, powerful laser pulses, each only a fraction of a second but with more power than a trillion light bulbs.

You might think such an extreme light would require a huge machine, but in fact the equipment is small enough to fit into an ordinary laboratory. Researchers wear safety glasses, hair nets and other protective clothing to keep the equipment safe from dust.

The highest

Pyramid lab, khumbu valley, nepal.

Nestled in Nepal’s Khumbu Valley, just over 5,000m above sea level in the Sagarmatha National Park, is the Pyramid Lab. Located 7.2km from Everest Base Camp, the 8.4m-high glass, aluminium and steel pyramid generates its own power from solar panels.

The Pyramid Lab project was the result of a scientific race between two research teams – one American and one Italian – to establish whether Mount K2 in Pakistan was in fact taller than Everest. From the Italian collaboration came the idea of a research station to house high-altitude research and replace the tents and unreliable generators upon which researchers had previously depended.

The laboratory was opened in 1990 and has been used by hundreds of scientists to conduct high-altitude environmental, geological and health research. Sadly, funding for the lab was frozen in 2015, closing it to researchers and endangering the data from its varied environmental monitoring instruments.

The coldest

Fallturm, bremen, germany.

Rising 146m above the University of Bremen, the Bremen drop tower, or Fallturm, looks a little like Rapunzel’s tower. But its appearance hides some innovative machinery, used by scientists to perform near-zero gravity experiments by dropping them inside the tower to reach weightlessness.

Some experiments focus on how equipment destined for space will perform, others use the lack of gravity to explore phenomena that are not detectable in normal gravity. One such project produces ‘Bose-Einstein condensates’, low-density clouds of gas that are cooled to near absolute zero. At such low temperatures, all the atoms coalesce and begin to act like a single atom, allowing researchers to study quantum mechanics .

In 2021, researchers producing these condensates achieved a temperature 38 trillionths of a degree warmer than absolute zero, for a total of two seconds. Previously, the coldest temperature identified anywhere in the Universe was the Boomerang Nebula , located 5,000 light-years from Earth. At -272°C, it is 1°C warmer than absolute zero.

The quietest

Orfield labs, minneapolis, usa.

It’s not unusual to long for peace and quiet, but some places can be too quiet. That’s said to be the case for the Anechoic (‘no echo’) Chamber at Orfield Labs in Minneapolis, once dubbed ‘the quietest place on Earth’.

Sealed off from the rest of the world by layers of steel and concrete, and lined with thick fibreglass shapes, the walls of the chamber absorb 99.9 per cent of sound. The chamber measures -9 decibels (around 0 decibels is the quietest sound a human can hear). It’s a great place for manufacturers to test their products – how their loudspeaker is performing, or whether a new gadget makes too much noise, for example – but it’s less great to hang out in.

We’re used to sounds reflecting off surfaces, so anyone in the chamber quickly becomes uncomfortable due to the eerie sound quality. In the absence of any other sounds, they begin to hear the functions of their own body – such as the blood pulsing in their brain – and can become disorientated without the usual auditory signals that root us in place.

The largest

Cern, france/switzerland.

The world’s biggest laboratory is probably also the most famous: CERN . Housing the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), which was used to find the theorised Higgs boson in 2012 (a detection which bagged its discoverers a Nobel Prize), CERN’s home in the countryside outside Geneva covers 550 hectares (1,360 acres) across Switzerland and France and is host to more than 12,000 scientists.

The LHC is also the biggest machine in the world. Located almost 100 metres below ground, its 27km ring of superconducting magnets works with a number of other structures to accelerate subatomic particles, colliding them into each other and monitoring the results in an attempt to recreate conditions of the Big Bang , and unlock the secrets of how the Universe was formed.

After a three-year break, during which time it was revamped to become more powerful and include more experiments, the LHC beam has started up again , and scientists are excited to see what will be discovered next.

The hottest

Relativistic heavy ion collider, new york, usa.

Sticking with colliders, researchers using the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York State have achieved the hottest temperature recorded on Earth.

The RHIC specialises in colliding larger, heavier particles such as gold ions (gold atoms which have lost electrons). By smashing gold ions into each other in the RHIC’s 3.8km collider ring at near light speed, a temperature of four trillion degrees Celsius – about 250,000 times hotter than the middle of the Sun – was produced for a fraction of a second.

The collision ‘melts’ the protons and neutrons in the gold ions, releasing their component quarks and gluons and forming a quark-gluon plasma. But it’s not just about breaking records. It is thought that this plasma filled the Universe shortly after the Big Bang, so studying it could tell us more about the Universe’s first seconds.

• This article first appeared in issue 378 of BBC Science Focus Magazine – find out how to subscribe here

Read more about extreme science:

• Nuclear fusion: Inside the construction of the world’s largest tokamak
• To boldly go: Meet the extreme robot explorers

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Dangerous World

Understanding Existential Risks

An Overview of Potential Dangers Arising From High Energy Experiments

By Justin Raizes

A Brief History

Over the past several decades, the desire to explore particle physics has motivated the construction of higher and higher energy particle accelerators. As these accelerators have been built, concerns over the safety of the experiments have arisen.

In 1999, during the construction of the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC), an article in The Scientific American titled “A Little Big Bang” spurred several entries in the Letters to the Editor section of The Scientific American about the safety of the new collider. One of the submitters, Michael Cogill, was concerned in general about “somehow [altering] the underlying nature of things such that it cannot be restored”, while the other, Walter Wagner, had more specific concerns about the possibility of creating a miniature black hole. Frank Wilczek of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J. responded to the letters with reassurance that such a disaster was very unlikely. Nevertheless, the media quickly latched onto the concept and trumpeted it with alarming titles such as “A Black Hole Ate My Planet” and “A ‘big bang’ machine”.

In response, Brookhaven National Laboratories, the commissioners of the RHIC, asked a panel of scientists to review the speculative disaster scenarios and assess the safety of the project. The panel ultimately found the project to have a high safety margin, and it proceeded.

These issues rose again in 2008 prior to the first run of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Again, media published articles with alarming titles such as “The Final Countdown”, and there was even a lawsuit filed against the project seeking a restraining order. CERN, the commissioners of the LHC, asked a panel of scientists to review the results of the 2003 study into the safety of the LHC. Again, the panel ultimately found the project to have a high safety margin, and it proceeded.

Overview of Disaster Scenarios Considered

The concerns which arose generally fell into one of three categories:

• Formation of a miniature black hole or other gravitational singularity which absorbs matter.
• Triggering of a vacuum instability.
• Formation of “strangelets” which absorb matter.

Miniature Black Holes

The black hole is a widely recognized phenomenon, even if it is not well understood by the average layman. A black hole consists of extraordinarily dense matter, to the point where space-time begins to warp and it absorbs surrounding matter.

If a miniature black hole were to form on Earth, it would begin to eat away at the surrounding matter, eventually consuming the Earth. However, as shown by Giddings and Mangano in 2008, this would occur at an extremely slow rate. In fact, the formation of a miniature black hole would not significantly reduce the lifespan of the Earth. Furthermore, other effects, such as thermal impact, would also not significantly change the condition of the Earth. With respect to direct human impact of a miniature black hole, we are reassured by Peter Fisher’s statement that “a fast moving black hole with the mass of the moon (radius of a proton) will go right through you with no damage.”

Of course, for any of this to happen, a miniature black hole would actually have to be formed on Earth. The RHIC safety panel considered both classical and quantum gravitaty. They determined that the masses and distances involved in the RHIC are much too small and large (respectively) to create any sort of black hole, and that the probability of emitting a graviton at the RHIC was on the order of 10^-34. Additionally, cosmic rays regularly collide with much more energy than that present at the RHIC, and we have observed no formation of a black hole within our solar system’s vicinity.

Vacuum Instability

Contrary to how a layman thinks of empty space, empty space is actually highly structured, and can exist in various states. In quantum mechanics, a vacuum is the state of lowest possible energy. It has been theorized that our current vacuum is only a false vacuum, having a locally, but not globally,  minimal energy. If this is true, then a sufficiently violent disturbance might trigger a decay into a different state. If such a decay occurred, it would spread throughout the universe at the speed of light, and be “catastrophic”.

The 1999 panel investigating the safety of the RHIC claimed that “theory strongly suggests that  any possibility for triggering vacuum instability requires substantially larger energy densities than RHIC will provide”. However, rather than simply rely on this, they also brought up the point that cosmic ray collisions have been occurring throughout the history of the universe, and concluded that “if such a transition were possible it would have been triggered long ago.” For this point, they cited Hut and Rees’ 1983 work detailing the number of cosmic ray collisions whose effects we have observed and examining the probability of these past cosmic ray collisions triggering an observable vacuum phase transition.

Strangelets

A “strangelet” is a form of quark matter which contains many strange (s) quarks. Under either high pressure or high temperature, quarks are no longer bound to their individual hadrons. One of the primary goals of the RHIC was to provide evidence of quark-gluon plasma, the state induced by high temperature. Quark-gluon plasma can be “accurately described as a gas of nearly freely moving quarks and gluons”. On the other side of the spectrum, quark matter is the name given to such matter which is under high pressure and low temperature.

Ordinary matter is primarily composed of up ( u ) and down ( d ) quarks, the lightest varieties. As quark matter is compressed, the Pauli Exclusion Principle – that no two quarks within the same quantum system can share a state – forces quarks into higher and higher energy state. Eventually, the up and down quarks will become strange quarks in order to reduce energy. By the time equilibrium has been reached, there will be a finite density of strange quarks.

The dangerous strangelets are those that are both negatively charged and stable enough to come to a rest in ordinary matter. Once such a quark has done so, however, the results are catastrophic. It would be captured by some ordinary nucleus within the environment, quickly fall into the lowest Bohr orbit, and react with the nucleus, absorbing several neutrons to form a larger strangelet. The reaction would be exothermic, and afterwards, the strangelet would have positive charge. However, if the energetically preferred charge were negative, it would quickly return to a negative state by absorbing surrounding electrons.  This process would continue until the strangelet’s radius approached the electron Compton wavelength 4×10^-11, at which point it begins to behave differently. Its baryon number would be on the order of 10^6, and it would begin to trigger electron positron pair creation. The positrons would surround the strangelet as a Fermi gas. Any atom which approached the strangelet would be stripped of its electrons by electron-positron annihilation, and the bare nucleus would be absorbed by the strangelet core. The panel reviewing the safety of the RHIC remarked “We know of no barrier to the rapid growth of a dangerous strangelet.”

Fortunately, it was concluded that the formation of such a strangelet at the RHIC was extremely unlikely. Strangelets are cold, dense matter, and heavy ion collisions are hot. Thus, the second law of thermodynamics works against the formation of strangelets at the RHIC. Additionally, negatively charged strangelets require many strange quarks. However, it is more difficult to produce a strangelet with many strange quarks. These two reasons not only show that it is unlikely that a dangerous strangelet will be formed in the first place, but also show that a dangerous strangelet would likely be too unstable to reach ordinary matter and begin growing.

Again, rather than simply rely on theory, the RHIC safety panel also brought up experimental evidence from cosmic ray collisions.  They computed the number of heavy ion collisions taking place on our (relatively) nearby friend the Moon, and observe that the Moon is, in fact,  not made of strange matter (or cheese). They computed that over the 5 billion year lifetime of the moon, roughly 10^11 dangerous strangelets would have been formed from cosmic ray collisions. However, none of these strangelets survived contact with lunar soil. Using extremely conservative estimates, the RHIC safety panel placed a safety factor of nearly 10^22 between the values of constants which would be required to cause alarm and the actual values of said constants. In short, we are not likely to turn into strange matter anytime soon.

Bigger, Badder Colliders

It is quite possible that we will create even larger colliders in the future. Within the span of a decade, we upgraded from the RHIC to the LHC. However, the incredible safety margins placed on current colliders make it extremely unlikely that we will create an Earth-destroying collider anytime soon. Furthermore, these safety concerns are revisited each time we build a new collider. During the creation of the LHC, all the safety concerns about the RHIC were considered, and all were found to have high safety margins, mostly relying on cosmic ray data. So, you don’t have to be concerned about being eaten as a snack by a particle physics experiment gone wrong – at least for now, anyways.

F. Carus, “The final countdown?”  The Guardian , September 2008. [Online]. Available: The Guardian, http://theguardian.com [Accessed February 20, 2018].

J. Ellis, G. Guidice, M. Mangano, I. Tkachev, and U. Wiedemann, “Review of the safety of LHC collisions,”  Journal of Physics G: Nuclear and Particle Physics , vol. 35, no. 11, p. 115004, September 2008.

K. Locock, “A ‘big bang’ machine,”  ABC   Science,   July 1999. [Online]. Available: ABC Science, http://abc.net.au [Accessed February 26, 2018]

M. Tegmark and N. Bostrom, “Is a doomsday catastrophe likely?”  Nature , vol. 438, p. 754, December 2005.

R. Jaffe, W. Busza, F. Wilczek, and J. Sandweiss, “Review of speculative “disaster scenarios” at RHIC,”  Reviews of Modern Physics ,  vol 72  iss. 4, October 2000.

R. Matthews, “A black hole ate my planet,”  New Scientist , August 1999. [Online]. Available: New Scientist, http://newscientist.com [Accessed February 20, 2018]

S. Giddings and M. Mangano, “Astrophysical implications of hypothetical stable TeV-scale black holes,”  Physical Review D, vol 78, August 2008.

T. Leonard, “‘Big Bang’ machine could destroy the planet, says lawsuit,”  The Telegraph,  April 2008. [ Online] Available: The Telegraph, http://telegraph.co.uk [Accessed February 26, 2018]

W. Wagner and F. Wilczek, “Black Holes at Brookhaven,” Scientific American , p. 8,  July 14, 1999.

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Scientists share the most dangerous things they work with

By Eleanor Cummins

Posted on Jan 12, 2019 4:00 AM EST

3 minute read

You might expect scientists to encounter hazards out in the field. But laboratories aren’t safe havens either. We asked researchers about the most dangerous things they work with.

1. Liquid Helium

↑ Jenny Ardelean, graduate student in mechanical engineering at Columbia University

To study the intrinsic properties of materials like atomically thin semiconductors, we need to get rid of heat, which causes subtle vibrations and makes our data fuzzy. We use liquid helium to cool substances to minus 453°F, a bit warmer than space. Our lab pipes it through a closed system to avoid having to transfer—and risk spilling—the expensive liquid. If that happened, the helium could evaporate, burn off your skin, or displace oxygen so you’d suffocate.

2. High-powered laser

↑ Donald Umstadter, director of the Extreme Light Lab at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln

My lab develops imaging techniques using the Dio­cles Laser, which produces a beam roughly 1 billion times more intense than light on the surface of the sun. But with proper training, it’s actually very safe because we focus it in a pulse that’s less than a trillionth of a second long, in an area roughly a millionth of a square meter, and keep it all inside a closed box. Someday we even hope to supplement traditional X-rays with less-­radioactive Diocles imaging.

3. Snake Venom

↑ Jeffrey O’Brien, recent doctorate in chemistry from the University of California at Irvine

Antivenins work for specific species. Our lab ­decided to make one from nanoparticles that inhibit the toxins of many types of snakes. To test it, we ordered about 15 venoms, which we stored in a frozen box marked with a skull and crossbones. These samples come from the world’s deadliest reptiles, such as the black mamba, so they must not get into your bloodstream. Even when you’re weighing out the freeze-dried powders, you’re hyperfocused.

Related: Rising temperatures are opening new territories for venomous creatures—including your backyard

↑ Michelle Lu, junior at Pomperaug High School in Southbury Connecticut

I was one of four students to represent the United States in the International Chemistry Olympiad, competing against kids from 75 other countries. In one round, the judges tested our ability to synthesize 2-naphthoic acid and chloroform, a common anesthetic, from a food flavoring. The process also creates hypo­chlo­rous acid, which can cause serious burns and blindness. Even though this acid is dangerous (it’s very unstable and reactive), it’s pretty common in chemistry.

5. Plutonium

↑ David Meier, research scientist at Pacific Northwest National Lab

My team is creating a database that could help law enforcement trace plutonium, used in nuclear fuel and atomic bombs, back to its country, or even specific reactor, of origin. Something as seemingly ­minor as the temperature of the facility can give the material completely different colors. To under­stand these changes, we re-​create them in a lab. Naturally, we keep our plutonium samples in a lead-lined container, wear at least two pairs of rubber gloves, and track radiation levels in real time.

As told to Eleanor Cummins

This article was originally published in the Winter 2018 Danger issue of Popular Science.

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The most DANGEROUS experiments in physics

• When? 21 April 2020 - 21 April 2020 , 18:30
• Where? University of Wolverhampton in Stafford, Staffordshire Pl, Stafford, UK

As every other enterprise of exploration, Science can be a quite fiskybusiness. Some of the most dangerous experiments ever performed, like the Trinity test, or with controlled fusion, or with the LHC close to creating black holes, or at the Extreme Light Infrastructure on the verge of tearing-out spacetime - are within the realm of Physics.

In this final lecture of the series, Dr Khechara, Associate Professor with the University of Wolverhampton, takes a look at some of the most dangerously mad experiments ever performed. 

These 18 Accidental And Unintended Scientific Discoveries Changed The World

Some scientific discoveries come about after painstaking, goal-oriented lab work finally yields the result that a researcher is trying to find.

But many of the most incredible discoveries in world came about when someone found something they weren't looking for.

In some cases, these are the result of a true accident. Lucky accidents have allowed people to discover unexpected but useful side effects from drugs, which is what happened with Viagra .

Saccharine - the artificial sweetener in "Sweet'N Low" - was found by a Russian chemist who forgot to wash his hands after a days work.

Perhaps more often, world-changing discoveries are the result of a creative mind realising that a material or invention could be repurposed into something incredible.

In many of these cases, the researchers behind the discovery wouldn't call their finding a true "accident," since it took a prepared mind to follow through and turn that discovery into something useful. But what was found wasn't what was being looked for in the first place.

Desperation or the need to figure out a new use for a product can always help too, as it did for the inventor of a dough intended to clean soot from people's homes. A switch away from coal to gas removed the need for such a cleaning clay.

But it turns out that shapeable clay makes a great and profitable toy: Play-doh.

None of these "accidents" would been the world-changing discoveries they are without the right person there to recognise their value. But they show that the best innovations can come from the unexpected.

1. The microwave

In 1946 Percy Spencer , an engineer for the Raytheon Corporation, was working on a radar-related project. While testing a new vacuum tube, he discovered that a chocolate bar he had in his pocket melted more quickly than he would have expected.

He became intrigued and started experimenting by aiming the tube at other items, such as eggs and popcorn kernels. Spencer concluded that the heat the objects experienced was from the microwave energy.

Soon after, on October 8, 1945, Raytheon filed a patent for the first microwave.

The first microwave weighed 750 pounds (340 kg) and stood 5′ 6″ (168 cm) tall. The first countertop microwave was introduced in 1965 and cost US$500.

Quinine is an anti-malarial compound that originally comes from tree bark. Now we usually find it in tonic water, though it's still used in drugs that treat malaria as well.

Jesuit missionaries in South America used quinine to treat malaria as early as 1600, but legend has it that they heard that it could be used to treat the illness from the native Andean population - and that the original discoverer found these properties with a stroke of luck.

The original tale involved a feverish Andean man lost in the jungle and suffering from malaria. Parched, he drank from a pool of water at the base of a quina-quina tree.

The water's bitter taste made him fear that he'd drank something that would make him sicker, but the opposite happened. His fever abated, and he was able to find his way home and share the story of the curative tree.

This story isn't as well documented as some others, and other accounts for the discovery of quinine's medicinal properties exist, but it's at least an interesting legend of an accidental world-changing finding.

In 1895, a German physicist named Wilhelm Roentgen was working with a cathode ray tube.

Despite the fact that the tube was covered, he saw that a nearby fluorescent screen would glow when the tube was on and the room was dark. The rays were somehow illuminating the screen.

Roentgen tried to block the rays, but most things that he placed in front of them didn't seem to make a difference.

When he placed his hand in front of the tube, he noticed he could see his bones in the image that was projected on the screen.

He replaced the tube with a photographic plate to capture the images, creating the first X-rays.

The technology was soon adopted by medical institutions and research departments - though unfortunately, it'd be some time before the risks of X-ray radiation were understood.

4. Radioactivity

In 1896, intrigued by the discovery of X-rays, Henri Becquerel decided to investigate the connection between them and phosphorescence, a natural property of certain substances that makes them give off light.

Becquerel tried to expose photographic plates using uranium salts that he hoped would absorb "x-ray" energy from the sun. He thought he needed sunlight to complete his experiment, but the sky was overcast.

Yet even though the experiment couldn't be completed, he developed the plates and found that the images showed up clear anyway – the uranium had emitted radioactive rays . He theorised and later showed that the rays came from the radioactive uranium salts.

5. The fastening system that we know by the brand name "Velcro"

In 1941, Swiss engineer George de Mestral went for a hike in the Alps with his dog. Upon returning home, he took a look at the small burdock burrs that stuck to his clothes, and noticed that the little seeds were covered in small hooks, which is how they became attached to fabric and fur.

He hadn't set out to create a fastening system, but after noting how firmly those little burrs attached to fabric, he decided to create the material that we now know  by the brand name Velcro .

It became popular after it was later  adopted by NASA , and became commonly used on sneakers, jackets, and so much more.

6. Sweet'N Low

Saccharin, the artificial sweetener in " Sweet'N Low ", is around 400 times sweeter than sugar. It was discovered in 1878 by Constantine Fahlberg , who was actually working an analysis of coal tar at the Johns Hopkins University lab of Ira Remsen.

After a long day in the lab, he forgot to wash his hands before eating dinner. He picked up a roll, and noticed that it seemed sweet - as did everything else he touched.

He went back to the lab and started tasting compounds until he found the results of an experiment combining o-sulfobenzoic acid with phosphorus chloride and ammonia (tasting random chemicals is not generally considered a safe lab practice).

Fahlberg patented saccharin in 1884 (leaving Remsen's name off the patent, despite the fact that they co-published the first paper on the material) and began mass production. The artificial sweetener became widespread when sugar was rationed during World War I.

Tests showed that body couldn't metabolize it, so people didn't get any calories when eating saccharin.

In 1907 diabetics started using the sweetner as a replacement for sugar and it was soon labelled as a noncaloric sweetener (for dieters).

7. The Pacemaker

In 1956, Wilson Greatbatch was building a heart rhythm recording device. He reached into a box for a resistor to complete the circuitry, but pulled out the wrong one - it wasn't quite the right size.

He installed the ill-fitting resistor and noticed that the circuit emitted electrical pulses. It made him think of the timing of the heartbeat.

Greatbatch had previously thought that electrical stimulation might be able to stimulate the circuitry of the heart if there was some kind of breakdown there - this new device made him think it might be possible to create a version small enough to actually provide this stimulation.

He began to shrink his device and on May 7, 1958, a version of his pacemaker was successfully inserted into a dog.

Albert Hofmann studied Lysergic acid, a powerful chemical that was first isolated from a fungus that grows on rye, which he first synthesized in 1938. These chemicals he studied were going to be used as pharmaceuticals, and many derivatives of them are still used today.

In 1943, he accidentally tasted his creation.

While working with this chemical, Hoffmann reported feeling restless and dizzy.

He went home to lay down and "sank into a kind of drunkenness which was not unpleasant and which was characterised by extreme activity of the imagination," according to his own notes.

"As I lay in a dazed condition with my eyes closed (I experienced daylight as disagreeably bright) there surged upon me an uninterrupted stream of fantastic images of extraordinary plasticity and vividness and accompanied by an intense, kaleidoscope-like play of colours," he continued .

Intrigued, he intentionally dosed himself with the drug on April 19, 1943 to find out its effects, and then rode his bicycle home.

It was the first planned experiment with LSD - but not the last.

Like many other inventors, he didn't characterise his discovery as an accident - it started with one, but he's the one who decided to follow through with his findings.

9. Play-doh

The clay that kids play with has been around since the 1930s, but when invented, it wasn't supposed to be a toy.

The clay was first designed by Noah McVicker , who worked with his brother Cleo at a soap company. But they didn't make a kids toy. Instead, they had created a wallpaper cleaner.

One of the byproducts of the coal fires that people used to keep their homes warm was soot, which coated the walls. Rolling the clay over the soot removed it.

However, after the introduction of vinyl wallpaper, which could be cleaned with water, wallpaper cleaner was no longer as necessary, since a wet sponge could do the job.

But before the McVickers went out of business, a nursery school teacher named Kay Zufall came up with another use for the product. She had heard that kids could make decorations out of the wallpaper cleaner, so she tried it in class, and her students loved it.

She told her brother-in-law Joe McVicker, who worked with his uncle Noah.

The McVickers decided to remove the detergent and add colouring, and after Kay suggested the name "Play-doh" instead of "Kutol's Rainbow Modelling Compound" - their original suggestion - the clay that we know and love was created.

10. Penicillin

In 1928 Sir Alexander Fleming , a professor of bacteriology, noticed mould had started to grow on his petri dishes of Staphylococcus bacteria colonies.

While looking for the colonies he could salvage from those infected with the mould, he noticed something intriguing. Bacteria wasn't growing around the mould. The mould actually turned out to be a rare strain of Penicillin notatum that secreted a substance that inhibited bacterial growth.

Penicillin was introduced in the 1940's, helping open up the era of antibiotics.

Viagra was the first treatment for erectile dysfunction , but that isn't what it was originally tested for.

Pfizer introduced the chemical Sildenafil , the active drug in Viagra, as a heart medication.

During clinical trials the drug proved ineffective for heart conditions. But men noted that the medication seemed to cause another effect – stronger and longer-lasting erections.

Even if they hadn't been able to maintain an erection before, the ability returned while they were on Viagra.

Pfizer conducted clinical trials on 4,000 men with erectile dysfunction, and saw the same results.

Enter the age of the little blue pill.

12. Insulin

The discovery that later allowed researchers to find insulin was an accident.

In 1889, two doctors at the University of Strasbourg, Oscar Minkowski and Josef von Mering, were trying to understand how the pancreas affected digestion , so they removed the organ from a healthy dog.

A few days later, they noticed that flies were swarming around the dog's urine - something abnormal, and unexpected.

They tested the urine, and found sugar in it. They realised that by removing the pancreas, they had given the dog diabetes .

Those two never figured out what the pancreas produced that regulated blood sugar. But during a series of experiments that occurred between 1920 and 1922, researchers at the University of Toronto were able to isolate a pancreatic secretion that they called insulin.

Their team was awarded the Nobel prize , and within a year, the pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly was making and selling insulin.

13. Vulcanized Rubber

After years of trying to turn rubber into something useful that wouldn't freeze rock hard or melt in the hot sun, Charles Goodyear was struggling.

He'd been experimenting for years and invested everything he owned in rubber research, but hadn't been able to create a commercially viable product, and his family was starving .

But things started to turn around.

First, he poured some nitric acid onto some rubber that had been coloured gold to remove the colour. It turned black, so he threw it out, but removed it from the trash when he realised that it had become hard on the outside, and was smoother and drier than any previous rubber. But it still melted in high heat.

He started using sulphur in his experiments, and here's where things get a little murky. As the story goes, in a fit of excitement, he tossed some rubber that had been treated with sulphur up in the air, and it landed on a stove. But instead of melting, it charred, creating an almost leathery, heat-resistant waterproof substance.

After further experimentation, he realised he could get the most effective results by using steam to heat up the mixture of rubber and sulphur he'd created. Finally, he found success.

Goodyear vehemently disagreed with those who label this finding an accident, since he's the one who followed through with it all. But (if the story is true), the discovery still depended on one lucky accident.

14. Corn Flakes

The recipe for Corn Flakes came out of a botched attempt to cook wheat in 1894.

At that time, John Kellogg was the medical superintendent at Battle Creek Sanitarium, a health facility based on Seventh Day Adventist principles. John and his brother William, who also worked at the sanitarium, were trying to come up with a diet for the patients there.

One day, the brothers put some wheat on to boil, but they accidentally left it cooking too long. When they finally took it off the stove and tried to roll it out into dough, the wheat instead separated into flakes. The brothers discovered they could bake these into a crispy snack.

After some experimentation, they found that the same effect could be achieved using corn instead of wheat, and the recipe for Corn Flakes was born.

We can thank chemist Roy Plunkett for the invention of Teflon.

Plunkett was an employee of the Dupont Company's Jackson Laboratory in 1938 when he started researching new refrigerants. One substance Plunkett experimented with was tetrafluoroethylene (TFE) gas.

When he returned to open a cylinder he'd stored this gas in, he was surprised that the TFE had polymerized to form a mysterious white powder inside the container.

Curious, Plunkett conducted some experiments and found that the powder was not only heat resistant, but it also had low surface friction and was inert to corrosive acids – ideal for cooking ware.

16. Super Glue

When Harry Coover, Jr. first discovered the substance that would become Super Glue, he was actually experimenting with clear plastic gun sights for use in World War II.

He'd been playing around with a class of chemicals called acrylates, but found that the formula he came up with was too sticky and abandoned the substance.

Years later, in 1951, Coover was again looking at acrylates , this time for use in a heat-resistant coating for jet cockpits. One day, his colleague Fred Joyner spread one of the acrylate compounds between two lenses to examine it with a refractometer.

To his dismay, he found that the two lenses stuck together and could not be separated, a waste of expensive lab equipment - or so he thought.

This time around, Coover saw the potential in the sticky substance, and several years later it finally went on the market as an adhesive we know today as Super Glue.

17. Safety glass used in windsheilds

In 1903 Edouard Benedictus, a French scientist, dropped a glass flask that had been filled with a solution of cellulose nitrate, a sort of liquid plastic. It broke, and the liquid evaporated.

But it didn't shatter.

The pieces of glass were broken, but they stayed in place and maintained the shape of the container. Upon investigation Benedictus realised that somehow, the plastic coating had helped the glass stay together.

This was the first type of safety glass developed - a product which is now frequently used in car windshields, safety goggles, and much more.

18. Vaseline

In 1859, 22-year-old chemist Robert Chesebrough was investigating an oil well in Pennsylvania when he caught wind of a strange rumour among the oil rig workers: a jelly-like substance known as "rod wax" that constantly got into the machines and caused them to malfunction.

But the substance had a good side, too. Chesebrough noticed that the workers used rod wax to soothe cuts and burns on their skin, and he took some home to experiment with.

The product of his experimentation was what we know today as petroleum jelly, or Vaseline.

This article was originally published by Business Insider .

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10 Outrageous Experiments Conducted on Humans

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Prisoners, the disabled, the physically and mentally sick, the poor -- these are all groups once considered fair game to use as subjects in your research experiments. And if you didn't want to get permission, you didn't have to, and many doctors and researchers conducted their experiments on people who were unwilling to participate or who were unknowingly participating.

Forty years ago the U.S. Congress changed the rules; informed consent is now required for any government-funded medical study involving human subjects. But before 1974 the ethics involved in using humans in research experiments was a little, let's say, loose. And the exploitation and abuse of human subjects was often alarming. We begin our list with one of the most famous instances of exploitation, a study that eventually helped change the public view about the lack of consent in the name of scientific advancements.

• Tuskegee Syphilis Study
• The Nazi Medical Experiments
• Watson's 'Little Albert' Experiment
• The Monster Study of 1939
• Stateville Penitentiary Malaria Study
• The Aversion Project in South Africa
• Milgram Shock Experiments
• CIA Mind-Control Experiments (Project MK-Ultra)
• The Human Vivisections of Herophilus

10: Tuskegee Syphilis Study

Syphilis was a major public health problem in the 1920s, and in 1928 the Julius Rosenwald Fund, a charity organization, launched a public healthcare project for blacks in the American rural south. Sounds good, right? It was, until the Great Depression rocked the U.S. in 1929 and the project lost its funding. Changes were made to the program; instead of treating health problems in underserved areas, in 1932 poor black men living in Macon County, Alabama, were instead enrolled in a program to treat what they were told was their "bad blood" (a term that, at the time, was used in reference to everything from anemia to fatigue to syphilis). They were given free medical care, as well as food and other amenities such as burial insurance, for participating in the study. But they didn't know it was all a sham. The men in the study weren't told that they were recruited for the program because they were actually suffering from the sexually transmitted disease syphilis, nor were they told they were taking part in a government experiment studying untreated syphilis, the "Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male." That's right: untreated.

Despite thinking they were receiving medical care, subjects were never actually properly treated for the disease. This went on even after penicillin hit the scene and became the go-to treatment for the infection in 1945, and after Rapid Treatment Centers were established in 1947. Despite concerns raised about the ethics of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study as early as 1936, the study didn't actually end until 1972 after the media reported on the multi-decade experiment and there was subsequent public outrage.

9: The Nazi Medical Experiments

During WWII, the Nazis performed medical experiments on adults and children imprisoned in the Dachau, Auschwitz, Buchenwald and Sachsenhausen concentration camps. The accounts of abuse, mutilation, starvation, and torture reads like a grisly compilation of all nine circles of hell. Prisoners in these death camps were subjected to heinous crimes under the guise of military advancement, medical and pharmaceutical advancement, and racial and population advancement.

Jews were subjected to experiments intended to benefit the military, including hypothermia studies where prisoners were immersed in ice water in an effort to ascertain how long a downed pilot could survive in similar conditions. Some victims were only allowed sea water, a study of how long pilots could survive at sea; these subjects, not surprisingly, died of dehydration. Victims were also exposed to high altitude in decompression chambers -- often followed with brain dissection on the living -- to study high-altitude sickness and how pilots would be affected by atmospheric pressure changes.

Effectively treating war injuries was also a concern for the Nazis, and pharmaceutical testing went on in these camps. Sulfanilamide was tested as a new treatment for war wounds. Victims were inflicted with wounds that were then intentionally infected. Infections and poisonings were also studied on human subjects. Tuberculosis (TB) was injected into prisoners in an effort to better understand how to immunize against the infection. Experiments with poison, to determine how fast subjects would die, were also on the agenda.

The Nazis also performed genetic and racially-motivated sterilizations, artificial inseminations, and also conducted experiments on twins and people of short stature.

8: Watson's 'Little Albert' Experiment

In 1920 John Watson, along with graduate student Rosalie Rayner, conducted an emotional-conditioning experiment on a nine-month-old baby -- whom they nicknamed "Albert B" -- at Johns Hopkins University in an effort to prove their theory that we're all born as blank slates that can be shaped. The child's mother, a wet nurse who worked at the hospital, was paid one dollar for allowing her son to take part.

The "Little Albert" experiment went like this: Researchers first introduced the baby to a small, furry white rat, of which he initially had no fear . (According to reports, he didn't really show much interest at all). Then they re-introduced him to the rat while a loud sound rang out. Over and over, "Albert" was exposed to the rat and startling noises until he became frightened any time he saw any small, furry animal (rats, for sure, but also dogs and monkeys) regardless of noise.

Who exactly "Albert" was remained unknown until 2010, when his identity was revealed to be Douglas Merritte. Merritte, it turns out, wasn't a healthy subject: He showed signs of behavioral and neurological impairment, never learned to talk or walk, and only lived to age six, dying from hydrocephalus (water on the brain). He also suffered from a bacterial meningitis infection he may have acquired accidentally during treatments for his hydrocephalus, or, as some theorize, may have been -- horrifyingly -- intentionally infected as part of another experiment.

In the end, Merritte was never deconditioned, and because he died at such a young age no one knows if he continued to fear small furry things post-experiment.

7: The Monster Study of 1939

Today we understand that stuttering has many possible causes. It may run in some families, an inherited genetic quirk of the language center of the brain. It may also occur because of a brain injury, including stroke or other trauma. Some young children stutter when they're learning to talk, but outgrow the problem. In some rare instances, it may be a side effect of emotional trauma. But you know what it's not caused by? Criticism.

In 1939 Mary Tudor, a graduate student at the University of Iowa, and her faculty advisor, speech expert Wendell Johnson, set out to prove stuttering could be taught through negative reinforcement -- that it's learned behavior. Over four months, 22 orphaned children were told they would be receiving speech therapy, but in reality they became subjects in a stuttering experiment; only about half were actually stutterers, and none received speech therapy.

During the experiment the children were split into four groups:

• Half of the stutterers were given negative feedback.
• The other half of stutterers were given positive feedback.
• Half of the non-stuttering group were all told they were beginning to stutterer and were criticized.
• The other half of non-stutterers were praised.

The only significant impact the experiment had was on that third group; these kids, despite never actually developing a stutter, began to change their behavior, exhibiting low self-esteem and adopting the self-conscious behaviors associated with stutterers. And those who did stutter didn't cease doing so regardless of the feedback they received.

6: Stateville Penitentiary Malaria Study

It's estimated that between 60 to 65 percent of American soldiers stationed in the South Pacific during WWII suffered from a malarial infection at some point during their service. For some units the infection proved to be more deadly than the enemy forces were, so finding an effective treatment was a high priority [source: Army Heritage Center Foundation]. Safe anti-malarial drugs were seen as essential to winning the war.

Beginning in 1944 and spanning over the course of two years, more than 400 prisoners at the Stateville Penitentiary in Illinois were subjects in an experiment aimed at finding an effective drug against malaria . Prisoners taking part in the experiment were infected with malaria, and then treated with experimental anti-malarial treatments. The experiment didn't have a hidden agenda, and its unethical methodology didn't seem to bother the American public, who were united in winning WWII and eager to bring the troops home — safe and healthy. The intent of the experiments wasn't hidden from the subjects, who were at the time praised for their patriotism and in many instances given shorter prison sentences in return for their participation.

5: The Aversion Project in South Africa

If you were living during the apartheid era in South Africa, you lived under state-regulated racial segregation. If that itself wasn't difficult enough, the state also controlled your sexuality.

The South African government upheld strict anti-homosexual laws. If you were gay you were considered a deviant — and your homosexuality was also considered a disease that could be treated. Even after homosexuality ceased to be considered a mental illness and aversion therapy as a way to cure it debunked, psychiatrists and Army medical professionals in the South African Defense Force (SADF) continued to believe the outdated theories and treatments. In particular, aversion therapy techniques were used on prisoners and on South Africans who were forced to join the military under the conscription laws of the time.

At Ward 22 at 1 Military hospital in Voortrekkerhoogte, Pretoria, between 1969 and 1987 attempts were made to "cure" perceived deviants. Homosexuals, gay men and lesbians were drugged and subjected to electroconvulsive behavior therapy while shown aversion stimuli (same-sex erotic photos), followed by erotic photos of the opposite sex after the electric shock. When the technique didn't work (and it absolutely didn't), victims were then treated with hormone therapy, which in some cases included chemical castration. In addition, an estimated 900 men and women also underwent gender reassignment surgery when subsequent efforts to "reorient" them failed — most without consent, and some left unfinished [source: Kaplan ].

4: Milgram Shock Experiments

Ghostbuster Peter Venkman, who is seen in the fictional film conducting ESP/electro-shock experiments on college students, was likely inspired by social psychologist Stanley Milgram's famous series of shock experiments conducted in the early 1960s. During Milgram's experiments "teachers" — Americans recruited for a Yale study they thought was about memory and learning — were told to read lists of words to "learners" (actors, although the teachers didn't know that). Each person in the teacher role was instructed to press a lever that would deliver a shock to their "learner" every time he made a mistake on word-matching quizzes. Teachers believed the voltage of shocks increased with each mistake, and ranged from 15 to 450 possible volts; roughly two-thirds of teachers shocked learners to the highest voltage , continuing to deliver jolts at the instruction of the experimenter.

In reality, this wasn't an experiment about memory and learning; rather, it was about how obedient we are to authority. No shocks were actually given.

Today, Milgram's shock experiments continue to be controversial; while they're criticized for their lack of realism, others point to the results as important to how humans behave when under duress. In 2010 the results of Milgram's study were repeated — with about 70 percent of teachers obediently administering what they believed to be the highest voltage shocks to their learners.

3: CIA Mind-Control Experiments (Project MK-Ultra)

If you're familiar with "Men Who Stare at Goats" or "The Manchurian Candidate" then you know: There was a period in the CIA's history when they performed covert mind-control experiments. If you thought it was fiction, it wasn't.

During the Cold War the CIA started researching ways they could turn Americans into CIA-controlled "superagents," people who could carry out assassinations and who wouldn't be affected by enemy interrogations. Under what was known as the MK-ULTRA project, CIA researchers experimented on unsuspecting American (and Canadian) citizens by slipping them psychedelic drugs, including LSD , PCP and barbiturates, as well as additional — and additionally illegal — methods such as hypnosis, and, possibly, chemical, biological, and radiological agents. Universities participated, mostly as a delivery system, also without their knowledge. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs estimates 7,000 soldiers were also involved in the research, without their consent.

The project endured for more than 20 years, during which the agency spent about $20 million. There was one death tied to the project, although more were suspected; tin 1973 the CIA destroyed what records were kept.

2: Unit 731

Using biological warfare was banned by the Geneva Protocol in 1925, but Japan rejected the ban. If germ warfare was effective enough to be banned, it must work, military leaders believed. Unit 731 , a secret unit in a secret facility — publicly known as the Epidemic Prevention and Water Supply Unit — was established in Japanese-controlled Manchuria, where by the mid-1930s Japan began experimenting with pathogenic and chemical warfare and testing on human subjects. There, military physicians and officers intentionally exposed victims to infectious diseases including anthrax , bubonic plague, cholera, syphilis, typhus and other pathogens, in an effort to understand how they affected the body and how they could be used in bombs and attacks in WWII.

In addition to working with pathogens, Unit 731 conducted experiments on people, including — but certainly not limited to — dissections and vivisections on living humans, all without anesthesia (the experimenters believed using it would skew the results of the research).

Many of the subjects were Chinese civilians and prisoners of war, but also included Russian and American victims among others — basically, anyone who wasn't Japanese was a potential subject. Today it's estimated that about 100,000 people were victims within the facility, but when you include the germ warfare field experiments (such as reports of Japanese planes dropping plague-infected fleas over Chinese villages and poisoning wells with cholera) the death toll climbs to estimates closer to 250,000, maybe more.

Believe it or not, after WWII the U.S. granted immunity to those involved in these war crimes committed at Unit 731 as part of an information exchange agreement — and until the 1980s, the Japanese government refused to admit any of this even happened.

1: The Human Vivisections of Herophilus

Ancient physician Herophilus is considered the father of anatomy. And while he made significant discoveries during his practice, it's how he learned about internal workings of the human body that lands him on this list.

Herophilus practiced medicine in Alexandria, Egypt, and during the reign of the first two Ptolemaio Pharoahs was allowed, at least for about 30 to 40 years, to dissect human bodies, which he did, publicly, along with contemporary Greek physician and anatomist Erasistratus. Under Ptolemy I and Ptolemy II, criminals could be sentenced to dissection and vivisection as punishment, and it's said the father of anatomy not only dissected the dead but also performed vivisection on an estimated 600 living prisoners [source: Elhadi ].

Herophilus made great strides in the study of human anatomy — especially the brain , eyes, liver, circulatory system, nervous system and reproductive system, during a time in history when dissecting human cadavers was considered an act of desecration of the body (there were no autopsies conducted on the dead, although mummification was popular in Egypt at the time). And, like today, performing vivisection on living bodies was considered butchery.

Frequently Asked Questions

How have these experiments influenced current ethical standards in research, what protections are in place today to prevent similar unethical research on humans, lots more information, author's note.

There is no denying that involving living, breathing humans in medical studies have produced some invaluable results, but there's that one medical saying most of us know, even if we're not in a medical field: first do no harm (or, if you're fancy, primum non nocere).

Related Articles

• What will medicine consider unethical in 100 years?
• How Human Experimentation Works
• Top 5 Crazy Government Experiments
• 10 Cover-ups That Just Made Things Worse
• 10 Really Smart People Who Did Really Dumb Things
• How Scientific Peer Review Works

More Great Links

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• Stanley Milgram: "Behavioral Study of Obedience"
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• Mayo Clinic. "Syphilis." Jan. 2, 2014. (Aug. 20, 2014) http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/syphilis/basics/definition/con-20021862
• McCurry, Justin. "Japan unearths site linked to human experiments." The Guardian. Feb. 21, 2011. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/feb/21/japan-excavates-site-human-experiments
• McGreal, Chris. "Gays tell of mutilation by apartheid army." The Guardian. July 28, 2000. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.theguardian.com/world/2000/jul/29/chrismcgreal
• Milgram, Stanley. "Behavioral Study of Obedience." Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology. No. 67. Pages 371-378. 1963. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://wadsworth.cengage.com/psychology_d/templates/student_resources/0155060678_rathus/ps/ps01.html
• NPR. "Taking A Closer Look At Milgram's Shocking Obedience Study." Aug. 28, 2013. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.npr.org/2013/08/28/209559002/taking-a-closer-look-at-milgrams-shocking-obedience-study
• Rawlings, Nate. "Top 10 Weird Government Secrets: CIA Mind-Control Experiments." Time. Aug. 6, 2010. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2008962_2008964_2008992,00.html
• Reynolds, Gretchen. "The Stuttering Doctor's 'Monster Study'." The New York Times. March 16, 2003. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/16/magazine/the-stuttering-doctor-s-monster-study.html
• Ryall, Julian. "Human bones could reveal truth of Japan's 'Unit 731' experiments." The Telegraph. Feb. 15, 2010. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/japan/7236099/Human-bones-could-reveal-truth-of-Japans-Unit-731-experiments.html
• Science Channel - Dark Matters. "Project MKULTRA." (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.sciencechannel.com/tv-shows/dark-matters-twisted-but-true/documents/project-mkultra.htm
• Shea, Christopher. "Stanley Milgram and the uncertainty of evil." The Boston Globe. Sept. 29, 2013. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2013/09/28/stanley-milgram-and-uncertainty-evil/qUjame9xApiKc6evtgQRqN/story.html
• Shermer, Michael. "What Milgram's Shock Experiments Really Mean." Scientific American. Oct. 16, 2012. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-milgrams-shock-experiments-really-mean/
• Si-Yang Bay, Noel. "Green anatomist herohilus: the father of anatomy." Anatomy & Cell Biology. Vol. 43, No. 4. Pages 280-283. December 2010. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3026179/
• Stobbe, Mike. "Ugly past of U.S. human experiments uncovered." NBC News. Feb. 27, 2011. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.nbcnews.com/id/41811750/ns/health-health_care/t/ugly-past-us-human-experiments-uncovered
• Tuskegee University. "About the USPHS Syphilis Study." (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.tuskegee.edu/about_us/centers_of_excellence/bioethics_center/about_the_usphs_syphilis_study.aspx
• Tyson, Peter. "Holocaust on Trial: The Experiments." PBS. October 2000. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/holocaust/experiside.html
• United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. "Nazi Medical Experiments." June 20, 2014. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005168
• Van Zul, Mikki. "The Aversion Project." South African medical Research Council. October 1999. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.mrc.ac.za/healthsystems/aversion.pdf
• Watson, John B.; and Rosalie Rayner. "Conditioned Emotional Reactions." Journal of Experimental Psychology. Vol. 3, No. 1. Pages 1-14. 1920. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Watson/emotion.htm
• Wiltse, LL. "Herophilus of Alexandria (325-255 B.C.). The father of anatomy." Spine. Vol. 23, no. 7. Pages 1904-1914. Sept. 1, 1998. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9762750
• Working, Russell. "The trial of Unit 731." June 2001. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2001/06/05/commentary/world-commentary/the-trial-of-unit-731/
• Zetter, Kim. "April 13, 1953: CIA OKs MK-ULTRA Mind-Control Tests." Wired. April 13, 2010. (Aug. 10, 2014) http://www.wired.com/2010/04/0413mk-ultra-authorized/

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Top 12 Explosive Science Experiments: Ignite Your Curiosity

There’s something thrilling about science experiments that pop, sizzle, and explode. While they must always be conducted with utmost safety, these explosive experiments offer an exhilarating way to explore fundamental principles of chemistry and physics.

Welcome to our list of the top 12, hand-picked exploding science experiments, curated especially for students like you. Brace yourself for mind-blowing chemical reactions, thrilling explosions, and awe-inspiring demonstrations.

These experiments offer an exhilarating blend of entertainment and education, providing an unique opportunity to witness the powerful forces of chemistry in action.

Gear up, embrace the excitement, and let these exploding experiments ignite a lifelong passion for scientific discovery!

Remember, safety is of utmost importance during any scientific experiment.

1. Watermelon Explosion

Beyond the sheer excitement and thrill, this experiment provides a hands-on lesson in pressure, energy transfer, and the scientific principle of potential energy.

So, grab a watermelon, strap on those rubber bands, and get ready for a blast of scientific discovery!

2. Exploding Baggie Burst

With the simple combination of vinegar and baking soda inside a sealed baggie, students can witness the exhilarating moment when the baggie bursts with a loud pop and releases a cloud of gas.

3. Exploding Sidewalk Chalk

Make colorful explosions with the Exploding Sidewalk Chalk experiment! By combining common household materials like sidewalk chalk and vinegar, they can create a fascinating chemical reaction that results in vibrant bursts of color.

4. Water Bottle Popper

Get ready for a popping sensation with the Water Bottle Popper experiment! By combining the forces of air pressure and a quick release mechanism, they can create an exciting burst of energy that launches the cap off a water bottle with a satisfying pop.

Learn more: Water Bottle Popper

5. Colorful Bubble Bombs

Get ready for a burst of colorful and bubbly fun with the Colorful Bubble Bombs experiment! Students should definitely try this engaging and visually delightful activity.

Learn more: Colorful Bubble Bombs

6. Big Toothpaste Eruption

Get ready for a massive eruption of fun with the Big Toothpaste Eruption experiment! Students should absolutely try this engaging and visually stunning experiment.

It’s a fantastic way to foster a love for science, spark curiosity, and learn about the wonders of chemical reactions in a playful and memorable way.

7. Multi-Colored Volcano

Get ready to unleash a vibrant explosion of colors with the Multi-Colored Volcano experiment! By combining baking soda, vinegar, and a variety of colorful substances like food coloring or powdered paint, they can create an extraordinary eruption that paints the volcano in a mesmerizing array of hues.

Learn more: Multi-Colored Volcano

8. Water Bottle Rockets

Prepare for a thrilling blast-off with the Water Bottle Rockets experiment! Students should absolutely try this exhilarating and hands-on activity. By constructing their own rockets using simple materials like plastic bottles, fins, and a pressurized air source, they can witness their creations soar into the sky.

9. Milk Color Explosion Science

Get ready for a mesmerizing explosion of colors with the Milk Color Explosion experiment! Students should definitely try this captivating and visually stunning activity.

By combining milk, food coloring, and dish soap, they can witness an extraordinary display of swirling, vibrant colors bursting to life right before their eyes.

10. Microwave Ivory Soap

Get ready for a foamy explosion with the Microwave Ivory Soap experiment! Students should definitely try this exciting and hands-on activity.

By placing a bar of Ivory soap in the microwave, they can witness an astonishing transformation as the soap rapidly expands into a fluffy cloud of foam.

11. Exploding Lava Science Bottle

Get ready for an explosive and mesmerizing adventure with the Exploding Lava Science Bottle experiment! Students should absolutely try this captivating and hands-on activity.

Learn more: Exploding Lava Science Bottle

12. Exploding Rainbow Easter Egg

Students can experiment with different colors and proportions to create their own unique bubble bombs. It’s a hands-on and interactive way to learn about the wonders of chemistry while enjoying a playful and colorful experience.

Learn more: Exploding Rainbow Easter Egg

12. Exploding Pumpkin

Get ready for an explosion of colors with the Exploding Rainbow Easter Egg experiment! Students should definitely try this exciting and visually captivating activity.

Learn more: Exploding Pumpkin

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Sir Martin Rees says a physics experiment could swallow up the entire universe

Sir Martin Rees, Britain’s dapper astronomer royal, issues a dark warning in his new book, "On the Future." While assessing various threats facing our species, he turns his attention to particle-accelerator experiments designed to probe the laws of nature . “Some physicists raised the possibility that these experiments might do something far worse — destroy the Earth or even the entire universe,” he writes.

In one current or future scenario that Rees describes, the particles crashing about inside an accelerator could unleash bits of “strange matter” that shrink Earth into a ball 300 feet across. In another, the experiments could create a microscopic black hole that would inexorably gnaw away at our planet from the inside. In the most extreme scenario Rees describes, a physics mishap could cause space itself to decay into a new form that wipes out everything from here to the farthest star .

These doomsday events are unlikely, Rees concedes, but "given the stakes, they should not be ignored.” Is he right to sound the alarm? How serious are the risks, really? With help from leading scientists, NBC News MACH examines the evidence.

A long tradition of worry

Rees follows in a long tradition of experts cautioning that modern technology could lead us to disaster. During the 1945 test of the first atomic bomb , physicist Arthur Compton worried that the blast might ignite Earth’s atmosphere. When the Apollo 11 astronauts returned from the moon in 1969, NASA placed them in quarantine in case they were carrying a deadly space disease.

More relevant to Rees’ thesis, a retired nuclear safety officer named Walter Wagner filed a lawsuit in 2008 to block operations of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the particle accelerator on the Swiss-French border. He cited concerns similar to those listed by Rees. The U.S. 9th Circuit Court threw out the case, ruling that “speculative fear of future harm does not constitute an injury.”

A team of physicists had already evaluated the possibility of a disastrous mishap in 2003, and they returned to the issue in 2008. Both times they found the risks inconsequential . “The LHC is safe, for sure,” says Arnaud Marsollier, a spokesman for CERN, the consortium that runs the collider. “There are, every day, cosmic rays [subatomic particles from outer space] with energies far higher than what we will ever be able to produce with a collider. We just do in the lab something that happens in nature all the time, including above our heads in the atmosphere.”

A strange way to go

Marsollier means that as a reassurance, but it leads to a related fear: If we humans are incapable of destroying ourselves, could a natural physics disaster do the job instead?

In 1984 two physicists inadvertently stoked such anxieties when they published a theory that ordinary matter could turn into a new substance they dubbed "strange matter," if subjected to enough energy and pressure. Depending on its properties, strange matter might transform everything it touched, eliminating the world as we know it.

Andreas Bauswein, a physicist at the Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies in Germany, is sufficiently intrigued by the idea of strange matter that he is actively hunting for it . Even if he finds convincing evidence, though, he doesn’t think strange matter would pose much of a threat. “Earth has existed for billions of years being exposed to highly energetic particles from cosmic rays,” he says.

Bauswein thinks the most likely place to find strange matter isn’t on this world but on ultra-dense stellar corpses known as neutron stars . Conditions on such objects might be extreme enough to turn them into “strange stars.” If two strange stars then happened to collide, Bauswein says, the resulting explosion would have a distinctive appearance.

Science Why some scientists say physics has gone off the rails

The Einstein Telescope, a gravitational wave observatory that might be built in the 2020s, could reveal whether there’s any basis for the strange theory. “It would precisely provide the sensitivity to say whether a merger involved strange matter or not,” Bauswein says. Fortunately, there are no potential strange stars anywhere close to Earth, so we should be nicely out of harm’s way.

Verdict: Strange matter is not going to kill us, but it might elucidate the essential nature of matter.

The big suck

Death by black hole seems more likely than death by strange matter, since it’s well established that black holes are real. The nearest known black hole lies less than 3,000 light-years from Earth, hardly farther than some of the stars you see at night. Microscopic black holes of the sort Rees describes are another matter. For now, they’re only a matter of conjecture.

Starting in 2001, Brown University physicist Greg Landsberg theorized that the LHC might create such micro-black holes . Perverse as it sounds, he was actually hoping for that to happen. “The original thought was that such a black hole will very quickly evaporate,” he says. The result would be a distinctive blast of particles that could provide unique information about gravity and how it relates to the other natural forces.

To Landsberg’s disappointment, the LHC has found no signs of micro-black holes . “Most likely, the models that predicted them being within the LHC reach are simply not realized in nature,” he says. But then he adds a caveat: It’s also conceivable that the micro-black holes are there, but we don’t understand how to detect them.

The idea that unseen micro-black holes could be floating around may seem unsettling, but Landsberg, too, brushes aside any concerns. “If there was a chance that such a collision would create a black hole that lives long enough to accrete matter around it, we would see an abundance of black holes in the universe far exceeding what we observe,” he says.

Verdict: The only way you’d ever get swallowed up by a black hole would be if you made a long trip on an interstellar spacecraft.

Caught in a cosmic breakdown

Strange matter and black holes are nothing compared to a collapse of the vacuum, which would destroy not only our planet but the laws of physics as we know them — the ultimate doomsday. Katie Mack, a physicist at North Carolina State University, has described it as “a quick, clean and efficient way of wiping out the universe.”

The idea goes like this: Empty space isn’t truly empty but is full of energy associated with the fields and particles that define the universe. If this energy exists in an unstable state (known as a “false vacuum”), Mack explains, then it could abruptly change into a different form.

Vacuum collapse would be like a lake icing over on a winter night. The transformation would begin in one spot and spread until everything was frozen — only in the case of the false vacuum, the thing spreading would not be ice but a new type of space embodying new laws of physics. Once the vacuum began to collapse at some location, the theory goes, the disturbance would travel outward in all directions, destroying everything it touches.

As with strange stars and black holes, any breakdown in the vacuum is probably out of human control. “There's no mechanism we're aware of by which a particle experiment could reach the extreme energies where anything like that could happen,” Mack says, since cosmic rays a billion times as powerful as anything at the LHC clearly haven't shredded the universe. Offering some further vague comfort, she notes that “vacuum decay is highly uncertain, as in, we don't know yet if it’s even possible.”

Rees raises the same idea in his book, citing such uncertainties as reason to proceed with caution in our physics experiments. But if the primary risks come from nature itself — as the physics insiders almost uniformly conclude — then the only way to size them up is by studying them.

In that vein, Mack hopes research at the LHC and its successors will lead to important insights about how the vacuum works and whether it truly could collapse."To me vacuum decay is the most interesting way to go," she says.

One thing for certain: If it does happen, you won't have time to fret about it. Vacuum decay would move at the speed of light, so it would arrive without warning. The moment you see it is also the moment you die.

Verdict: Vacuum decay could strike at any moment. But it hasn’t happened in the past 13.7 billion years, so it’s unlikely to happen in your lifetime.

Want more stories about physics?

• The 7 biggest unanswered questions in physics
• How particle physics is shining a new light on ancient secrets
• What Einstein and Bill Gates teach us about time travel

FOLLOW NBC NEWS MACH ON TWITTER , FACEBOOK , AND INSTAGRAM .

Don't Try This at Home: Totally Dangerous Experiments

By miss cellania | aug 8, 2007.

Learning about science and the experimental method is a lot of fun. Mix this with that and see what you get! Sometimes the result can be, well, hazardous to your health. But if you survive such an encounter, you have to tell all your friends. With the internet, you can tell everyone, and even show the video. But seeing it done doesn't make these experiments any safer. Remember, the ones who survived to tell their tales are the lucky ones. Most of the experiments detailed here were done by professionals.

Theodore Grey has an index of Fun/Dangerous Experiments . He includes a special note for teenagers about mortality and how it will mean something in a few years. And about safety glasses.

Why are glasses so important? Because having your cheeks ripped off by shrapnel, your hair burned to the roots, and your nose split open and folded up over your forehead is nothing, nothing compared to being blind for the rest of your life. Not even close.

He then documents quite a few experiments with the elements, including this fascinating account of his Sodium Party . Besides the explosive combination of sodium and water, I found out there are butterflies who collect sodium, and how to protect fish from exploding sodium.

More dangerous experiments after the jump.

Thermite is a combination of materials that will produce a large amount of heat. The process is used to weld railroad ties. From Wikipedia:

Although the reactants are stable at room temperature, they burn with an extremely intense exothermic reaction when they are heated to ignition temperature. The products emerge as liquids due to the high temperatures reached (up to 2500 °C (4500 °F) with iron(III) oxide)—although the actual temperature reached depends on how quickly heat can escape to the surrounding environment. Thermite contains its own supply of oxygen and does not require any external source of air. Consequently, it cannot be smothered and may ignite in any environment, given sufficient initial heat. It will burn well while wet and cannot be extinguished with water.

Of course, with a reaction like that, people are going to use it for entertainment. Thermite is not difficult to make . The danger of igniting the stuff should be apparant in this video.

Other dangerous links: Dangerous Laboratories Mad Coiler's High Voltage Page Fun Things to Do with Microwave Ovens The Dangerous Experiments Flickr pool.

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20 Awesome Science Experiments You Can Do Right Now At Home

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We can all agree that science is awesome. And you can bring that awesomeness into your very own home with these 20 safe DIY experiments you can do right now with ordinary household items.

1. Make Objects Seemingly Disappear Refraction is when light changes direction and speed as it passes from one object to another. Only visible objects reflect light. When two materials with similar reflective properties come into contact, light will pass through both materials at the same speed, rendering the other material invisible. Check out this video from BritLab  on how to turn glass invisible using vegetable oil and pyrex glass.

2. Freeze Water Instantly When purified water is cooled to just below freezing point, a quick nudge or an icecube placed in it is all it takes for the water to instantly freeze. You can finally have the power of Frozone from The Incredibles on a very small scale! Check out the video on this "cool" experiment. 

3. Create Oobleck And Make It Dance To The Music Named after a sticky substance in a children’s book by Dr Seuss , Oobleck is a non-Newtonian fluid, which means it can behave as both a solid and a liquid. And when placed on a sound source, the vibrations causes the mixture to gloopily dance. Check out these instructions from Housing A Forest  on how to make this groovy fluid funk out in every way.

4. Create Your Own Hybrid Rocket Engine With a combination of a solid fuel source and a liquid oxidizer, hybrid rocket engines can propel themselves. And on a small scale, you can create your own hybrid rocket engine, using pasta, mouthwash and yeast. Sadly, it won’t propel much, but who said rocket science ain’t easy? Check out this video from NightHawkInLight on how to make this mini engine.

5. Create "Magic Mud" Another non-Newtonian fluid here, this time from the humble potato. "Magic Mud" is actually starch found in potatoes. It’ll remain hard when handled but leave it alone and it turns into a liquid. Make your own “Magic Mud” with this video.

6. Command The Skies And Create A Cloud In A Bottle Not quite a storm in a teacup, but it is a cloud in a bottle. Clouds up in the sky are formed when water vapor cools and condenses into visible water droplets. Create your own cloud in a bottle using a few household items with these wikiHow instructions .

7. Create An Underwater Magical World First synthesized by Adolf van Baeyer in 1871, fluorescein is a non-toxic powder found in highlighter pens, and used by NASA to find shuttles that land in the sea. Create an underwater magical world with this video from NightHawkInLight .

9. Make Your Own Lava Lamp Inside a lava lamp are colored bubbles of wax suspended in a clear or colorless liquid, which changes density when warmed by a heating element at the base, allowing them to rise and fall hypnotically. Create your own lava lamp with these video instructions.

10. Create Magnetic Fluid A ferrofluid is a liquid that contains nanoscale particles of metal, which can become magnetized. And with oil, toner and a magnet , you can create your own ferrofluid and harness the power of magnetism! 

12. Make Waterproof Sand A hydrophobic substance is one that repels water. When sand is combined with a water-resistant chemical, it becomes hydrophobic. So when it comes into contact with water, the sand will remain dry and reusable. Make your own waterproof sand with this video .

13. Make Elephant's Toothpaste Elephant’s toothpaste is a steaming foamy substance created by the rapid decomposition of hydrogen peroxide, which sort of resembles giant-sized toothpaste. Make your own elephant’s toothpaste with these instructions.

14. Make Crystal Bubbles When the temperature falls below 0 o C (32 o F), it’s possible to freeze bubbles into crystals. No instructions needed here, just some bubble mix and chilly weather.

15. Make Moving Liquid Art Mixing dish soap and milk together causes the surface tension of the milk to break down. Throw in different food colorings and create this trippy chemical reaction.

16. Create Colourful Carnations Flowers absorb water through their stems, and if that water has food coloring in it, the flowers will also absorb that color. Create some wonderfully colored flowers with these wikiHow instructions .

17. "Magically" Turn Water Into Wine Turn water into wine with this  video  by experimenter Dave Hax . Because water has a higher density than wine, they can switch places. Amaze your friends with this fun science trick.

18. Release The Energy In Candy (Without Eating It) Dropping a gummy bear into a test tube with potassium chlorate releases the chemical energy inside in an intense chemical reaction. That’s exactly what's happening when you eat candy, kids.

19. Make Water "Mysteriously" Disappear Sodium polyacrylate is a super-absorbent polymer, capable of absorbing up to 300 times its own weight in water. Found in disposable diapers, you can make water disappear in seconds with this video .

20. Create A Rainbow In A Jar Different liquids have different masses and different densities. For example, oil is less dense than water and will float on top of its surface. By combining liquids of different densities and adding food coloring, you can make an entire rainbow in a jar with this video .

There you have it – 20 experiments for you to explore the incredible world of science!

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10 Most Dangerous Science and Human Experiments Ever Done in History

When science is better known to cure diseases, it is also used to torture and abuse….

While science has the major impact on our lives, it has the power to cure diseases, it can also be used to murder, brainwash and to persecute. The progress achieved in last 100 years in the field of science, biomedicine and in different fields is actually an achievement we are reminded of daily. When it comes to science we always think of unusual experiments done by the scientist that ordinary people wouldn’t be allowed to deal with.

Here’s is the list of the dangerous science experiments which are no way useful and will make you think about the responsibility that comes along with the tag of science.

1. The Large Hadron Supercollider (LHC)

The LHC in Switzerland was specially built to study the particle physics. It is the world’s largest machine and scientific instrument ever built. The LHC was first started on 10th September 2008 and the latest addition to CERN’s accelerator’s complex. It comprises of the 27 km ring of superconducting magnets with different accelerating structures to boost the energy of the particles on the way. Because of this and cutting edge research, it was added that, The Large Hadron Supercollider has prompted more than its share of fears from the public.

The LHC has been blamed for pulling asteroids towards Earth and for happening earthquakes. ( 8.1 )

While these theories have been proven wrong the LHC has also been accused of creating black holes that may swallow the earth. ( 8.2 )

2. Pig Powder to Grow Human Limbs

This pig powder created is literally unsafe. The regenerative powder is another dangerous science experiment ever done and performed on human beings.

The University of Pittsburgh’s McGowan Institute of Regenerative Medicine invented regenerative powder from the cells scraped from the pig’s bladder. The tissue was decellularized and then dried. After that, they managed to regrow a finger. Well, the idea of using dried pig organs to regrow human limbs is totally unfair.

3. Unit 731

Have you ever heard about Unit 731? It was a secretive R$D unit of the Japanese army that performed dangerous experiments in humans during WWII. Ordered by General Shiro Ishii, the whole unit experimented different things on 2,50,000 victims which included Chinese and some prisoners of war from the Allies and Russia.

The forced procedures included vivisections, unnecessary limb amputations, removal of lungs, brain and other body organs. They were also subjected to forced pregnancies and frostbite testing.

4. Testing of Chemical Weapon on People

It was in 1951 when dermatologist Albert Kligman was reported to work at Pennsylvania’s Holmesburg prison to study different aspects of medicine.

Forgetting about all the medical ethics he learned and expanded his research into pathogen testing and drug trials. Over the experience of 23 years, he obtained grants from Dow Chemical, US army, and Johnson & Johnson to research the effects of dangerous chemicals in his arsenal on people under the terms of informed consent. Unfortunately, by the time he finished his experiments a number of patients were known to be infected with dioxin, herpes and athlete’s foot. He continued to torture people for over two decades. ( 8.3 )

5. Medical Experiments Carried out by Nazis

Nazis performed medical experiments on a number of prisoners in concentration camp without thinking of human life. Their research involved inducing hypothermia, using mustard gas on people, infecting wounds with bacteria, forced pregnancies and others.

Josef Mengele was the evil scientist known for his camp experiments with a focus on twins Roma and Jewish. He was responsible for removing organs without anesthetics. To his dangerous science experiments, Mengele was referred to as ‘Angel of Death’.

6. The Sex Change Operations

A medical torture program was commenced in South Africa to cure homosexuality in military conscripts. They carried aversion therapy treatments like electric shock therapy and even chemical castration. Not only this, the army also did 900 sex change operations. Earlier, it was believed that the homosexuality was an illness and can be cured. The incharge of the program Dr. Aubrey Levin was found guilty and received a prison sentence. ( 8.4 )

7. Spider Goat

It was Nexia technologies who developed a transgenic goat, whose milk was rich in proteins that was extracted from the spider’s silk thread.

The milk then strained into superstrong biosteel polymers. They crossed spiders with goats without acknowledging how it could affect the ecosystem. And to the surprise, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency funded it.

8. Dog Head Transplantation

Source = "lizzym3"

Soviet scientist Vladimir Petrovich Demikhov, did some weirdest science experiments with dog heads, keeping them alive, the head is separated from the body and then it was transplanted to other dog bodies. He attached heads to other dogs resulting in weird hybrids that could only survive for days or months. He even performed the experiments with rhesus monkeys.

PS – watch the video at your own risk

9. Implantable Identity Code

It was in 1998, when the first RFID implant was done in human since then it became an easy option for people who wanted to be a little bit cyborg . Now, many companies have FDA approval, to implant them into people to track where they are going. Very few people know that a Mexican attorney general did this implant on many of his staff members who had the control to access the private documents, but forcing its employees to get the implant done is really creepy.

10. Science Experiments by Nazi’s

Dr. Josef Mengele is again on the list, now you can think of how evil he was. He did the dangerous science experiment on the innocent children. Mengele injected dye into the eyes of the children just to check if it could permanently change their color. Not only this, he also tried to create conjoined twins by stitching the patients together.

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Interview with an CERN scientist

Additional resources, bibliography.

CERN is the European laboratory for particle physics located near Geneva in Switzerland. If you see a news headline about exotic new subatomic particles, the chances are the discovery was made at CERN. A recent example occurred in January 2022, when CERN scientists announced "evidence of X particles in the quark-gluon plasma produced in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC)", according to MIT News . 

Hiding behind that technobabble is the eye-popping fact that CERN had succeeded in re-creating a situation that hasn’t occurred naturally since a few microseconds after the Big Bang. That particular study drew on pre-existing data from the LHC.

The atom smasher

The LHC is a particle accelerator — a device that boosts subatomic particles to enormous energies in a controlled way, so that scientists can study the resulting interactions, according to CERN . 

The “large” that the L stands for is an understatement; the LHC is by far the biggest accelerator in the world, occupying a circular tunnel around 16.7 miles (27 kilometres) in circumference. 

The middle letter, H, stands for "hadron" — the generic name for composite particles such as protons that are made up of smaller particles called quarks. Finally, the C stands for “collider” – because the LHC accelerates two particle beams in opposite directions, and all the action takes place when the beams collide.

Like all physics experiments, the LHC’s aim is to test theoretical predictions – in this case, the so-called Standard Model of particle physics — and see if there are any holes in them, as Live Science has previously reported . Strange as it sounds, physicists are itching to find a few holes in the Standard Model, because there are some things, such as dark matter and dark energy, that can’t be explained until they do.

– What is the Compact Muon Solenoid experiment?

– What is the Higgs boson?

– The four fundamental forces of nature

The LHC opened in 2009, but CERN’s history goes back much further than that. The foundation stone was laid in 1955, following a recommendation by the European Council for Nuclear Research — or "Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire" in French, from which it gets its name, according to CERN.

Between its creation and the opening of the LHC, CERN was responsible for a series of groundbreaking discoveries, including weak neutral currents, light neutrinos and the W and Z bosons. As soon as the LHC is back up and running, we can expect those discoveries to continue, according to CERN.

CERN's experiments

One of the key mysteries of the universe is why it seemingly contains so much more matter than antimatter. According to the Big Bang theory , the universe must have started out with equal amounts of both. 

Yet very early on, probably within the first second of the universe's existence, virtually all the antimatter had disappeared, and only the normal matter we see today remained. This asymmetry has been given the technical name CP violation, and studying it is one of the main aims of the Large Hadron Collider’s LHCb experiment. 

All hadrons are made up of quarks, but LHCb is designed to detect particles that include a particularly rare type of quark known as beauty. Studying CP violation in  particles containing beauty is one of the most promising ways to shed light on the emergence of matter-antimatter asymmetry in the early universe, according to CERN.

Climate Science 

Away from the LHC, there are other facilities at CERN that are conducting important research. One experiment at CERN’s Proton Synchrotron is linking particle physics to climate science. This is a smaller and less sophisticated accelerator than the LHC, but it’s still capable of doing useful work. 

The climate experiment is called CLOUD, which stands for "Cosmics Leaving Outdoor Droplets". It’s been theorized that cosmic rays play a role in cloud formation by seeding tiny water droplets around the Earth.

This isn’t an easy process to study in the real atmosphere, with real cosmic rays, so CERN is using the accelerator to create its own cosmic rays. These are then fired into an artificial atmosphere, where their effects can be studied much more closely.

Hunting exotic particles

Sharing the same underground cavern as LHCb is a smaller instrument called MoEDAL, which stands for Monopole and Exotics Detector at the LHC. While most CERN experiments are designed to study known particles, this one is aimed at discovering undiscovered particles that lie outside the present Standard Model. 

A monopole, for example, would be a magnetized particle consisting only of a north pole without a south one, or vice versa. Such particles have long been hypothesized, but never observed. The purpose of MoEDAL is to look out for any monopoles that might be created in collisions inside the LHC, according to CERN. 

This experiment could also potentially detect certain stable massive particles that are predicted by theories beyond the Standard Model. If it’s successful in finding any of these particles, MoEDAL could help to resolve fundamental questions such as the existence of other dimensions or the nature of dark matter .

Making antimatter

Antimatter often pops into existence inside CERN’s high-energy accelerators, as one half of a particle-antiparticle pair. But in the usual course of events, the antiparticles don't last long before they're annihilated in collisions with ordinary particles. If you want to create antimatter that stays around long enough for detailed study, you need more than just an accelerator. 

This is where CERN’s Antimatter Factory comes in.

It takes antiparticles created in the Proton Synchrotron and slows them down to manageable speeds in what is effectively the exact opposite of a particle accelerator: the Antiproton Decelerator, according to CERN. 

The resulting anti-atoms can then be studied by a range of instruments such as AEGIS (Antihydrogen Experiment: Gravity, Interferometry and Spectroscopy). One question that AEGIS should be able to answer soon is the fascinating one of whether antimatter falls downwards in a gravitational field, like ordinary matter, or upwards in the opposite direction.

Is CERN dangerous?

For various reasons over the years, people have speculated that experiments at CERN might pose a danger to the public. Fortunately, such worries are groundless. Take for example the N in CERN, which stands for nuclear, according to the public body UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) . 

This has nothing to do with the reactions that take place inside nuclear weapons , which involve swapping protons and neutrons inside nuclei. CERN’s research is at an even lower level than this, in the constituents of the protons and neutrons themselves. It’s sometimes referred to as 'high energy' physics, but the energies are only 'high' when viewed on a subatomic scale. 

Particles inside the LHC, for example, typically only have the energy of a mosquito, according to CERN's official site . People have also worried that the LHC might produce a mini black hole, but even if this happened — which is unlikely — it would be unbelievably tiny, and so unstable that it would vanish within a fraction of a second, according to the The Guardian .

We spoke to CERN scientist Clara Nellist about her work with the LHC’s ATLAS detector, one of the LHC’s two principal general-purpose detectors. 

How did you come to be involved with the ATLAS experiment?

"I started on ATLAS for my PhD research. I was developing new pixel sensors to improve the measurement of particles as they pass through our detector. It’s really important to make them resistant to radiation damage, which is a big concern when you put the sensors close to the particle collisions. 

Since then, I’ve had the opportunity to work on a number of different projects, such as understanding how the Higgs boson and the top quark interact with each other. Now I’m applying machine learning algorithms to our data to look for hints of dark matter. One of the biggest mysteries in physics right now is: what is 85% of the matter in our universe? We call it dark matter, but we don’t actually know much about it!"

What’s it like working with such a unique and powerful machine?

"It’s really amazing to be able to work on this incredibly complicated machine with people from all over the world. No one person can run it all, so each team becomes an expert on their specific part. Then when we all work together, we can make discoveries about the smallest building blocks of our universe."

Are there any exciting new developments you’re particularly looking forward to?

"We’re starting the Large Hadron Collider up again this year, so I’m really excited to see what we might find with it. Part of our work is to understand the particles we already know about in as much detail as possible to check that our theories match what we measure. But we’re also looking for brand new particles that we’ve never seen before. If we find something new, it could be a candidate for dark matter, or it could be something completely unexpected!"

For more information about CERN and the LHC visit their website . Also check out, " A Day at CERN: Guided Tour Through the Heart of Particle Physics ", by Gautier Depambour and " Large Hadron Collider Manual (Haynes Manuals) " by Gemma Lavender. 

• Jennifer Chu, " Scientists make first detection of exotic “X” particles in quark-gluon plasma ", MIT News, January 2022. 
• Matthew Sparks, " 2022 preview: Large Hadron Collider will reach for the edge of physics ", New Scientist, December 2021. 
• Micho Kaku, " The end of the world as we know it? ", The Guardian, June 2008. 
• UK Research and Innovation, " Facilities and resources ", January 2022. 
• CERN, " Where did it all begin? ", accessed April 2022. 
• CERN, " Facts and figures about the LHC ", accessed April 2022. 
• CERN, " The Safety of the LHC ", accessed April 2022. 
• CERN, " LHCb" , accessed April 2022. 
• CERN, " MoEDAL-MAPP ", accessed April 2022. 
• CERN, " MoEDAL-MAPP Experiment ", accessed April 2022. 
• Ana Lopes, " LHCb sees new form of matter–antimatter asymmetry in strange beauty particles ", CERN, October 2020. 

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Andrew May holds a Ph.D. in astrophysics from Manchester University, U.K. For 30 years, he worked in the academic, government and private sectors, before becoming a science writer where he has written for Fortean Times, How It Works, All About Space, BBC Science Focus, among others. He has also written a selection of books including Cosmic Impact and Astrobiology: The Search for Life Elsewhere in the Universe, published by Icon Books.

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• General Discussion

Are Dangerous Physics Experiments Suitable for End-of-Year College Classes?

• Thread starter Andy
• Start date May 6, 2003
• Tags Experiments Physics
• May 6, 2003
• Researchers achieve super-Bloch oscillations in strong-driving regime
• The Higgs particle could have ended the universe by now—here's why we're still here
• Ultrafast electron microscopy technique advances understanding of processes applicable to brain-like computing

Might be real nice to be in a lab, controlled space, saftey measures in place, warnings , and persons capable of ensuring that SAFETY measures are properly taken, but I would wonder/question the Wisedom of posting such types of instruction(s) is this 'milieu', as "Saftey First" isn't always practised as carefully, in 'uncontrolled/unmonitored environments', as it should be to ensure that no one is hurt. Usually, the first time you try things, you do not always get it right, and that can be harmful, to say the least. If I can think of anything that might help you, perhaps I will PM you, as that might just be a much Safer way to go.  

COOL , no problemo, but I would, respectfully, suggest that Chemistry is where you might find the Loud Noises, Bangs, Flashes, and whatever else you might be looking for, that is "fun". Not that physics doesn't have the above, but a little difficult, and probably really- really dangerous to try to re-create a 'Super Nova" in the lab.  

• May 7, 2003

Aerospace Engineer

Do not, I repeat DO NOT try this... A high school chem teacher of mine got in trouble for playing around with the gas in the chem room. He got a tub filled with really soapy water, hooked up a tube to the gas cock, turned the gas on low, and placed the tube under the water. We watched as the gas bubbles started to rise, when the teacher whipped out a lighter and set fire to the bubble. Like I said, he got severely repremanded from what I heard.  

Getting a thermite reaction going is pretty easy and fun.  

The best one that me and my mate did was wrapping some thin copper wire around someone else's pencil case, we then plugged the wire into the positive and negative terminals of a pwer pack put it up 2 full voltage and then flicked the switch on, the wire glowed red hot before turning black with a cloud of smoke, and the pencil case was no more!  

• May 8, 2003

Originally posted by KL Kam propanone (we also call it acetone) is carcinogenic.

We had one in University that I particularily disliked. Before taking us into the Labs, they showed us a film of people with severe acid burns, medical stuff. So once I got into the lab, I went to the 'dispensary', and asked for the obligatory "Rubber Gloves" that were needed for handling the acids, we were about to handle. They 'shoooshed' me away, telling me that they didn't have any. Well, this was all a (really stupid) 'practical joke', meant to 'teach' us an important lesson about acids. We Handeled Nitric acid, (low power) so when we spilled it upon ourselves, which everyone does due to the nature of the glass bottles, it turns you skin yellow. There after, while walking in the cooridors, you could tell the first year 'Chem' students, by their yellowed fingers, hands, arms, etc. What I dislike about this, the loss is the message it sent to someone, like me, who did try to obtain gloves, heeded the warnings, and was still punished with "Yellow fingers" because they wanted to prove a point (to me) that I had already accepted, unfair/unjust to say the least!  

First year chem was similar here in Oz. No gloves given, and people always spilling chemicals over the jars. I remember picking up a jar of NaOH and realising my fingers suddenly felt very soapy, then the stinging began. Good job it was low concentration stuff, but it still caused slight tenderness in my fingers for days.  

• May 9, 2003

Put Caesium in oil. Make a bomb and blow it up boom  

We had a teacher in HS chem class, that made H Gas by mixing a catalyst with Hcl acid, and wanted to show us that is could carry a 'flame', without oxygen. He cause the generator to fill a tube with the gas, and lit a match at one end of it, it quickly jumped through the tube and flamed out the other side. He tried it a second time, I suspect that the generator had run low as the tube wasn't filled properly, (there was air in it) so when he lit that one, the tube blew! Certainly made me feel comfortable that I had had the saftey glasses on! Know at least two people who have suffered eye injuries as a result of, a piece of 'hot metal' off of a lathe, and the other did it by disconneting the positive side of a car battery (that had run flat, and was therefore 'gassing') First! He touched the wrench to the metal that the car is grounded to (all of the car body) and the spark set off the gas from the battery. It exploded with HOT lead shrapnel dangerously flyin all over the place, and a tiny piece of the metal caught him in the eye. It was seen a ' little ' that the had acid burns over a good part of his upper body, as the eye damage was seen as more serious. He survived, got his eye sewn, as did the lathe guy, both very fortunate guys who still have two good eyes...thanks Doc!  

He tried it a second time, I suspect that the generator had run low as the tube wasn't filled properly, (there was air in it) so when he lit that one, the tube blew! It exploded with HOT lead shrapnel dangerously flyin all over the place, and a tiny piece of the metal caught him in the eye.

• May 10, 2003

a really good experiment to watch is a "chip pan" experiment where a small container if cooking oil is heated until it catches fire and then water is poured on to the oil, visually this is very cool!  

Fill a balloon full of hydrogen then put a lighted splint in it. Get pure undiluted alcohol and fill a beer casket with it. Miz this with liquid alsterene. Get a huge plastic container and fill it with gunpowder, shot gun cartridges and pure Caesium. Cover this in flour and drop napalm on it. Its so cool  

• May 13, 2003

Just so no one gets the wrong impression, of all of the times that I have spent in labs, and other dangerous workplaces, the VAST mojority of those times everything went very well, safely , good visual explanations, and a good education, therein.  

Related to Are Dangerous Physics Experiments Suitable for End-of-Year College Classes?

1. what makes a physics experiment dangerous.

A physics experiment can be considered dangerous if it involves high levels of energy, radiation, or pressure that can cause harm to the experimenter, the environment, or both. It can also be dangerous if proper safety precautions are not taken.

2. What are some examples of dangerous physics experiments?

Some examples of dangerous physics experiments include experiments involving nuclear fusion, high-voltage electricity, and extreme temperatures, as well as experiments with highly reactive chemicals or radioactive materials.

3. How do scientists ensure the safety of dangerous physics experiments?

Scientists take various precautions to ensure the safety of dangerous physics experiments. This includes conducting thorough risk assessments, following safety protocols and guidelines, using protective equipment, and having emergency plans in place.

4. Have there been any major accidents or disasters caused by dangerous physics experiments?

Yes, there have been several major accidents and disasters caused by dangerous physics experiments, such as the Chernobyl nuclear disaster and the explosion at the Large Hadron Collider. However, these incidents are rare and scientists continuously work to improve safety measures.

5. What are the potential benefits of conducting dangerous physics experiments?

Dangerous physics experiments can lead to groundbreaking discoveries and advancements in various fields, such as energy production, medicine, and space exploration. These experiments also help scientists better understand the natural world and push the boundaries of human knowledge.

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Former NASA Scientist Doing Experiment to Prove We Live in a Simulation

Did we really take the red pill, the blue pill.

Could we be trapped inside a simulated reality, rather than the physical universe we usually assume?

It's a tantalizing theory, long theorized by philosophers and popularized by the 1999 blockbuster "The Matrix." What if there was a way to find out once and for all if we're living inside a computer?

A former NASA physicist named Thomas Campbell has taken it upon himself to do just that. He devised several experiments, as detailed in a 2017 paper published in the journal The International Journal of Quantum Foundations , designed to detect if something is rendering the world around us like a video game.

Now, scientists at the California State Polytechnic University (CalPoly) have gotten started on the first experiment, putting Campbell's far-fetched hypothesis to the test.

And Campbell has set up an entire non-profit called Center for the Unification of Science and Consciousness (CUSAC) to fund these endeavors. The experiments are "expected to provide strong scientific evidence that we live in a computer-simulated virtual reality," according to a press release by the group.

Needless to say, it's an eyebrow-raising project. As always, extraordinary claims will require extraordinary evidence — but regardless, it's a fun idea.

Simulation Hypothesis

Campbell's experiments include a new spin on the double-slit experiment, a physics demonstration designed to show how light and matter can act like both waves and particles.

Campbell believes that by removing the observer from these experiments, the actual recorded information never existed in the first place. That's instead of current quantum physics suggesting the existence of entanglement that links particles across a distance.

In simple terms, without a player, the universe around them doesn't exist, much like a video game — proof, in Campbell's thinking , that the universe is exclusively "participatory."

Campbell isn't the first to explore a simulation hypothesis. Back in 2003, Swedish philosopher Nick Bostrom published a paper titled " Are You Living in a Computer Simulation? "

Basically, his idea was that if we progress far enough technologically, we'll probably end up running a simulation of our ancestors. Give those simulated ancestors enough time, and they'll end up simulating their own ancestors. Eventually, most minds in existence will be inside layers of simulations — meaning that we probably are too.

Campbell's hypothesis takes a different tack than Bostrom's "ancestor simulation," arguing that our "consciousness is not a product of the simulation — it is fundamental to reality," in CUSAC's press release.

If he were to be successful in his bid to prove that humanity is trapped in a virtual reality — an endeavor that would subvert our basic understanding of the world around us — it could have major implications.

Campbell argued that the five experiments could "challenge the conventional understanding of reality and uncover profound connections between consciousness and the cosmos."

More on the simulation hypothesis: Famous Hacker Thinks We're Living in Simulation, Wants to Escape

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Testing spooky action at a distance

A quantum computing research collaboration connects mit with the university of copenhagen..

Researchers at MIT recently signed a four-year collaboration agreement with the Novo Nordisk Foundation Quantum Computing Programme (NQCP) at Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen (UCPH), focused on accelerating quantum computing hardware research.

The agreement means that both universities will set up identical quantum laboratories at their respective campuses in Copenhagen and Cambridge, Massachusetts, facilitating seamless cooperation as well as shared knowledge and student exchange.

“To realize the promise of quantum computing, we must learn how to build systems that are robust, reproducible, and extensible. This unique program enables us to innovate faster by exchanging personnel and ideas, running parallel experiments, and comparing results. Even better, we get to continue working with Professor Morten Kjaergaard, a rising star in the field, and his team in Copenhagen,” says William Oliver , the Henry Ellis Warren (1894) Professor within the MIT Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), professor of physics, associate director of the Research Laboratory of Electronics, and the head of the Center for Quantum Engineering at MIT.

Oliver’s team will supervise the funded research, which will focus specifically on the development of fault-tolerant quantum computing hardware and quantum algorithms that solve life-science relevant chemical and biological problems. The agreement provides 18 million Danish kroner (approximately $2.55 million) from the Novo Nordisk Foundation Quantum Computing Program to support MIT’s part in the research.

“A forefront objective in quantum computing is the development of state-of-the-art hardware with consistent operation,” says Maria Zuber, MIT’s presidential advisor for science and technology policy, who helped facilitate the relationship between MIT and the Danish university. “The goal of this collaboration is to demonstrate this system behavior, which will be an important step in the path to practical application.”

“Fostering collaborations between MIT and other universities is truly essential as we look to accelerate the pace of discovery and research in fast-growing fields such as quantum computing,” adds Anantha Chandrakasan, chief innovation and strategy officer, dean of engineering, and the Vannevar Bush Professor of EECS. “The support from the Novo Nordisk Foundation Quantum Computing Programme will ensure the world’s leading experts can focus on advancing research and developing solutions that have real-world impact.”

“This is an important recognition of our work at UCPH and NQCP. Professor Oliver’s team at MIT is part of the international top echelon of quantum computing research,” says Morten Kjaergaard, associate professor of quantum information physics and research group leader at the Niels Bohr Institute at UCPH. “This project enables Danish research in quantum computing hardware to learn from the best as we collaborate on developing hardware for next-generation fault-tolerant quantum computing. I have previously had the pleasure of working closely with Professor Oliver, and with this ambitious collaboration as part of our the Novo Nordisk Foundation Quantum Computing Programme, we are able to push our joint research to a new level.”

Peter Krogstrup, CEO of NQCP and professor at Niels Bohr Institute, follows up, “We are excited to work with Will Oliver and his innovative team at MIT. It aligns very well with our strategic focus on identifying a path with potential to enable quantum computing for life sciences. The support aims to strengthen the already strong collaboration between Will and Morten’s team, a collaboration we hope to make an important part of the NQCP pathfinder phase over the coming years.”

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Hurricane Debby blows $1 mn in cocaine onto Florida beach

Hurricane Debby landed in Florida Monday bringing high winds, pouring rain—and 25 tightly wrapped packages of cocaine worth more than $1 million.

Debby, which hit the state's northern Big Bend region as a Category One hurricane but has since been downgraded to a tropical storm , washed the trove of drugs ashore along Florida's southernmost tip.

"Hurricane Debby blew 25 packages of cocaine (70 lbs.) onto a beach in the Florida Keys," US Border Patrol acting chief patrol Agent Samuel Briggs II wrote on X.

The load of drugs, which Briggs reported was valued at more than $1 million, was discovered by a good Samaritan who contacted the authorities.

In July of 2023, the mayor of Tampa, Florida similarly discovered 70 pounds (31.7 kilograms) of cocaine that had been washed ashore in the Florida Keys, while enjoying a vacation day.

In addition to bringing cocaine, Debby has killed one person, knocked out power for hundreds of thousands of people, and could produce life-threatening storm surges as well as catastrophic flooding.

The Keys, a string of islands stretching off the state's southern tip, are located in close proximity to a number of Caribbean countries that serve as a transit hub for cocaine being trafficked from South America to Europe and North America, including into Florida.

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• 02 August 2024

The pathogens that could spark the next pandemic

• Smriti Mallapaty

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The monkeypox virus has been added to the WHO's list of priority pathogens. Credit: Kateryna Kon/Science Photo Library/Getty

The number of pathogens that could trigger the next pandemic has grown to more than 30, and now includes influenza A virus, dengue virus and monkeypox virus, according to an updated list published by the World Health Organization (WHO) this week. Researchers say that the list of ‘priority pathogens’ will help organizations to decide where to focus their efforts in developing treatments, vaccines and diagnostics.

“It’s very comprehensive,” says Neelika Malavige, an immunologist at the University of Sri Jayewardenepura in Colombo, Sri Lanka, who was involved in the effort. She studies the Flaviviridae family of viruses, which includes the virus that causes dengue fever .

The priority pathogens, published in a report on 30 July, were selected for their potential to cause a global public-health emergency in people, such as a pandemic. This was on the basis of evidence showing that the pathogens were highly transmissible and virulent, and that there was limited access to vaccines and treatments. The WHO’s two previous efforts, in 2017 and 2018, identified roughly a dozen priority pathogens.

“The prioritization process helps identify critical knowledge gaps that need to be addressed urgently,“ and ensure the efficient use of resources, says Ana Maria Henao Restrepo, who leads the WHO’s R&D Blueprint for Epidemics team that prepared the report.

It’s important to regularly revisit these lists to account for major global changes in climate change deforestation, urbanization, international travel and more, says Malavige.

The latest effort identified risky pathogens in entire families of viruses and bacteria, which broadened its scope.

Mpox and smallpox

More than 200 scientists spent some two years evaluating evidence on 1,652 pathogen species — mostly viruses, and some bacteria — to decide which ones to include on the list.

Among the more than 30 priority pathogens are the group of coronaviruses known as Sarbecovirus , which includes SARS-CoV-2 — the virus that caused the global COVID-19 pandemic — and Merbecovirus , which includes the virus that causes Middle East respiratory syndrome ( MERS ). Previous lists included the specific viruses that cause severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and MERS, but not the entire subgenuses that they belong to.

Other additions to the list include the monkeypox virus, which caused a global mpox outbreak in 2022, and continues to spread in pockets of Central Africa . The virus is deemed a priority, and so is it’s relative, the variola virus, which causes smallpox, despite it having been eradicated in 1980. This is because, owing to people no longer getting vaccinated routinely against the virus, and therefore not becoming immune to it, an unplanned release of it could cause a pandemic. The virus could potentially be used “by terrorists as a biological weapon”, says Malavige.

Half a dozen influenza A viruses are also now on the list, including subtype H5, which has sparked an outbreak in cattle in the United States. Among the five bacteria — all newly added — are strains that cause cholera, plague, dysentery, diarrhea and pneumonia.

Two rodent viruses have also been added because they have jumped to people, with sporadic human-to-human transmission. Climate change and increased urbanization could raise the risk of these viruses transmitting to people, according to the report. The bat-borne Nipah virus remains on the list because it is deadly and highly transmissible in animals, and there are currently no therapies to protect against it.

Many of the priority pathogens are currently confined to specific regions but have the potential to spread globally, says says Naomi Forrester-Soto, a virologist at the Pirbright Institute near Woking, UK, who also contributed to the analysis. She studies the Togaviridae family, which includes the virus that causes Chikungunya. “There isn’t really any one place that is most at risk,” she says.

‘Prototype’ pathogens

In addition to the list of priority pathogens, researchers also created a separate list of ‘prototype pathogens’, which could act as model species for basic-science studies and the development of therapies and vaccines. “This may encourage more research,” into less-studied viruses and bacteria, says Forrester-Soto.

For example, before the COVID-19 pandemic, there were no available human vaccines for any of the coronaviruses, says Malik Peiris, a virologist at the University of Hong Kong, who was part of the Coronaviridae research group. Developing vaccines for one member of the family will bring confidence to the scientific community that it is better placed to address a major public-health emergency for those viruses, he says. This applies to treatments, too, he says, because “many antivirals work across a whole group of viruses”.

Forrester-Soto says that the list of pathogens is reasonable given what researchers know about the viruses. But “some pathogens from the list may never cause an epidemic, and one we have not thought of may be important in the future,” she says. “We have almost never predicted the next pathogen to emerge.”.

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-02513-3

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