The Watch
LATITUDE
UNDERWATER VOLCANO BUILDS AN UNDERWATER MOUNTAIN
ONE SMALL STEP FOR ROBOTKIND
Stories about smart clothes have weaved their way in and out of The Watch for years, suggesting a complicated route to market. We suspect that it’s going to be a while before Old Navy carries a stylish top that monitors your heartrate, does your taxes, and gives you doggy cam alerts. Still, this looks promising. Researchers from the University of Cambridge and China’s Jiangnan University have figured out how to combine electronics and textiles to create battery- like devices that are both washable and wearable. Published in the journal Nanoscale , the research shows that inks made of graphene (a two-dimensional form of carbon) and other materials can be used in textiles, where they can store and release electricity. The technology could lead to fabric-based power supplies within the clothes we buy, while still allowing comfort and flexibility. Researchers say applications could include things like health monitoring, wearable energy and data storage, and military outfitting. For now, however, you might want to hold on to that smartwatch. Or, if you're really old fashioned, that strap that attaches your smartphone to your shoulder. Because the material can self-repair, it has the potential to reduce the vast amount of waste that broken phones and tablets represent. Their return to full song, after all, is currently at the whim of consumers and technicians. The uses don’t end there. Think underwater touchscreens. Think responsive robot skin. Think Battlestar Galactica and the Cylon invasion. OK, not the last one. THE FUTURE IS WEARABLE—AGAIN It’s a win for the robots. And the smartphones. And all kinds of other things with electronic circuitry. Researchers at the National University of Singapore have created an electronic, water-resistant skin that can repair itself in dry or wet conditions. The material is transparent, stretchable, and touch-sensitive, making it a good mimic of biological tissues. What the researchers created is actually a gel containing a fluorocarbon-based polymer and a fluorine-rich ionic liquid. This mixture is printed into electronic circuits, which is where it does its healing.
It took just six months for a brand-new volcano to come into being off the island of Mayotte, between Madagascar and Mozambique in the Indian Ocean. For months, inhabitants of the French island had felt small earthquakes almost every day—and a large, magnitude 5.8 earthquake in May of last year—but the island’s only seismometer wasn’t enough for local authorities to pinpoint the source In February, the Institute of Geophysics in Paris (IPGP) led a scientific investigation into the phenomena. Researchers were stunned when they examined imagery created during a recently concluded mission: there it was, a brand-new mountain about 800 metres high and five kilometres wide. They sent an expedition to the site, which placed six seismometers on the ocean floor. After analyzing the data a few months later, researchers found a cluster of earthquake activity 20-50 km into Earth’s crust. The team suspects that a deep magma chamber fed molten rock to the ocean floor before shrinking, creating the cracking and creaking of the surrounding crust that Mayotte’s residents felt as earthquakes. This hypothesis is supported by the fact that the island has sunk 13 cm and shifted 10 cm east within the last year. Also, it appears that about five cubic kilometres of magma erupted onto the ocean floor. This information came from a map of the floor made by multibeam sonar on the expedition’s ship. Sonar data also show that plumes of bubble-rich water emerged from the volcano, explaining why local fisherman had recently come across large numbers of dead fish. It’s an exciting time for scientists and locals. After all, it’s been 4,000 years since the area has had any volcanic activity at all. There’s plenty more to do. Scientists will now analyze the chemical composition of water samples to understand more about the volcano—like the depth of the magma before it erupted, and how likely it is that the volcano will explosively erupt again. Researchers also think that this birth of a volcano explains a mysterious seismic hum, detected by seismometers around the world months before. Heard as an ultra-low frequency, the hum wasn’t consistent with the mixed-frequency waves associated with earthquakes, but it’s better explained by the eruption and cooling of magma from a baby volcano beneath the ocean.
SUMMER 2019 PEG | 45
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