Invisible Substance Research Articles

Fluorescent sensors for detecting anions

Fluorescent sensors for detecting anions Nicola Edwards, Associate Professor of Chemistry at the University of St. Joseph, is conducting research on the development of fluorescent sensors for anion detection. Fluorescent (chemo)sensors are molecules that register changes in their “glow” (fluorescence ) when bound to an analyte (the substance of interest that is being studied), thus reporting the presence of that analyte. These changes can be detected with the naked eye. and/or instrumentation. Therefore, the presence of this invisible substance can now be detected. Fluorescent sensors are generally more sensitive and have lower limits of detection for a particular analyte compared to colorimetric sensors. Anions—chemical entities with an overall negative charge—are found everywhere and are involved in numerous chemical, biological, and industrial processes. As an example, cavity-fighting kinds of toothpaste and gels contain anion and fluoride. Additionally, chemical compounds containing anions, nitrate and phosphate are used in fertilizers. In this piece, Dr. Nicola Edwards discusses her ongoing work on developing fluorescent sensors for anions.

Micro(nano)plastics: invisible compounds with a visible impact.

The plastic related research has been an epicentre in recent times. The presence and spread of micro (nano) plastics (MNPs) are well-known in the terrestrial and aquatic environment. However, the focus on the fate and remediation of MNP in soil and groundwater is limited. The fate and bioaccumulation of ingested MNPs remain unknown within the digestive tract of animals. There is also a significant knowledge gap in understanding the ubiquitous organic environmental pollutants with MNPs in biological systems. Reducing plastic consumption, improving waste management practices, and developing environmentally friendly alternatives are some of the key steps needed to address MNP pollution. For better handling and to protect the environment from these invisible substances, policymakers and researchers urgently need to monitor and map MNP contamination in soil and groundwater.

Micro(nano)plastics: invisible compounds with a visible impact

The plastic related research has been an epicentre in recent times. The presence and spread of micro (nano) plastics (MNPs) are well-known in the terrestrial and aquatic environment. However, the focus on the fate and remediation of MNP in soil and groundwater is limited. The fate and bioaccumulation of ingested MNPs remain unknown within the digestive tract of animals. There is also a significant knowledge gap in understanding the ubiquitous organic environmental pollutants with MNPs in biological systems. Reducing plastic consumption, improving waste management practices, and developing environmentally friendly alternatives are some of the key steps needed to address MNP pollution. For better handling and to protect the environment from these invisible substances, policymakers and researchers urgently need to monitor and map MNP contamination in soil and groundwater.

Evaluation of indoor air pollutants and new buildings’ solutions to reduce them: literature review and fundamentals

During the past few decades various symptoms and illnesses have been increasingly attributed to nonindustrial indoor environments. In general, indoor exposure to noxious chemical, physical, and biological hazards occur at low levels, however, such indoors exposition are very common (Seltzer, 1994: pp. 318-326). Symptoms such as drowsiness, headache, fatigue, burning eyes and breathing difficulties are signs that could indicate a high percentage of pollutants in the indoor environment, although we often tend to attribute them to other causes. This phenomenon which causes disease is called - sick building syndrome - (SBS) and it is a growing problem (Carrie A Redlich, 1997: pp. 1013-1016). SBS has been reported with increasing frequency since the 1970s, as older, naturally ventilated buildings have been replaced by more energy efficient, “airtight” buildings. SBS was frequently associated with workplaces, where the employees work together and spend most of their time. However, in this pandemic and post-pandemic situation, the smart working, and the greater crowding of living spaces, could cause this problem to arise even in private homes. Now, in the framework of COVID, it has become even more necessary to look closely at the quality of the air in homes. Indeed we spend more and more time inside enclosed and shared places, where the air can be much more polluted than outside. At home and office, we are surrounded, and we daily breathe dangerous but invisible substances, which penetrate our body without being noticed. In order to propose the best house's construction and rebuilding solutions, this review considers the contamination sources that can cause diseases in the house's environment. The innovative approach, based on the complexity of the problem, it focuses attention about the different factors in order to reduce the indoor air pollutions. Finally, having identified the factors that play a significant role in environmental indoor house's contamination, a clear picture should emerge to draw conclusions and propose the best buildings solutions. Based on the complexity of the problem and the need for interdisciplinary research.

Creating our own Black Books: keeping a journal as a loom of life.

Jung's The Black Books are annotations of his inner world after his process of self-experimentation, which he called his 'confrontation with the unconscious'. They preceded The Red Book in which, as a scribe, he reworked his initial notes and drawings. This was the raw material for the work that Jung developed over the rest of his life. From his experimentation, he formulated the method of active imagination and the concept of the transcendent function, a psychological function that creates symbols and integrates the unconscious contents in consciousness. Jung invites us, with his experience, to write and paint our own Black Books and to explore our inner images. With this proposal to keep a journal as a loom of life, we welcome his invitation, which allows us to weave and integrate the visible and invisible substances of our lives. Our intention for the journalling is to provide a space for the unfolding of the individuation process. In Jung's invitation we see that a life that does not confront itself cannot be realized as such.

The first results of PandaX-4T

Dark matter, an invisible substance which constitutes 85% of the matter in the observable universe, is one of the greatest puzzles in physics and astronomy today. Dark matter can be made of a new type of fundamental particle, not yet observed due to its feeble interactions with visible matter. In this talk, we present the first results of PandaX-4T, a 4-ton-scale liquid xenon dark matter observatory, searching for these dark matter particles from deep underground. We will briefly summarize the performance of PandaX-4T, introduces details in the data analysis, and present the latest search results on dark matter-nucleon interactions.

Constraints on bosonic dark matter from ultralow-field nuclear magnetic resonance.

The nature of dark matter, the invisible substance making up over 80% of the matter in the universe, is one of the most fundamental mysteries of modern physics. Ultralight bosons such as axions, axion-like particles, or dark photons could make up most of the dark matter. Couplings between such bosons and nuclear spins may enable their direct detection via nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy: As nuclear spins move through the galactic dark-matter halo, they couple to dark matter and behave as if they were in an oscillating magnetic field, generating a dark-matter-driven NMR signal. As part of the cosmic axion spin precession experiment (CASPEr), an NMR-based dark-matter search, we use ultralow-field NMR to probe the axion-fermion "wind" coupling and dark-photon couplings to nuclear spins. No dark matter signal was detected above background, establishing new experimental bounds for dark matter bosons with masses ranging from 1.8 × 10-16 to 7.8 × 10-14 eV.

The Darkness of Dark Matter and Dark Energy

The visible universemdashincluding Earth, the sun, other stars, and galaxiesmdashis made of protons, neutrons, and electrons bundled together into atoms. Perhaps one of the most surprising discoveries of the 20th century was that this ordinary, or baryonic, matter makes up less than 5 percent of the mass of the universe. The rest of the universe appears to be made of a mysterious, invisible substance called dark matter (25 percent) and a force that repels gravity known as dark energy (70 percent).Cosmological observations provide compelling evidence that about 95 percent of the content of the universe reside in two unknown forms of energy, which we call dark matter and dark energy-the first resides in bound objects in the form of non-luminous matter, the later in the form ofnbsp a zero point energy that pervades the whole universe. In this article I shall try to explore the essentials of dark matter and dark energy, with particular emphasis on the experimental evidence.

Case studies of Chinese acupuncture’s comprehensive effectiveness on knee pain

Conventional Western medicine (CWM) and traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) have different approaches and lead to different practices in experimental design, research methodology, regulation, and standards. TCM emphasizes on the optimal or holistic health. In contrast, CWM is an allopathic medicine primarily based on anatomy, biology, biochemistry, molecular biology and modern technology, and rejects the concept of invisible substances and quantum entanglement. Consequently, CWM emphasizes on abnormal lab tests or obvious diseases. In the early 1970s, TCM and acupuncture quickly emerged as an alternative to CWM as Westerners explored new TCM concepts while questioning the side effects of CWM. Many countries accept traditional acupuncture as a legal alternative medical practice. Some CWM physicians nowadays are more enthusiastic and are receptive to learning and practicing acupuncture. The common goal of CWM and TCM is to enhance human health, but problems arise over differences in approach. As a response to some Western journal papers that failed to validate the real acupuncture effect because of their incorrect methodologies and their ignorance of the holistic acupuncture approaches, the authors hereby present a group of case studies to demonstrate the real and unique effects of genuine acupuncture. The objective was to explore the clinical effects of acupuncture for knee pain. Thirty-six patients with knee pain were divided into five groups based on age. Holistic TCM diagnosis was performed at the beginning of each case and then made a personalized acupuncture treatment prescription according to the root of illness found by the diagnosis. The symptoms and signs were recorded before and after every treatment, and the treatment effects were assessed based upon the self-reported feeling and the observed changes of the patient following the numeric rating scale (NRS). The results were summarized after the completion of the minimal 5 acupuncture treatments or the standard 10 acupuncture treatments. Among the 36 patients who participated in the cases studies, 17 patients reported a complete healing for knee pain (47.2%). About 60 kinds of illness other than knee pain were improved (98.9%) and the complete healing rate was about 44.2%. This leads to the conclusion that TCM acupuncture is remarkably effective in treating knee pain. TCM and CWM share a common goal in promoting the health of human being. The efficacy of TCM acupuncture in treating knee pain shouldn’t be denied or distorted.

Young children’s attributions of causal power to novel invisible entities

In two studies, we investigated the development of children’s reasoning about potent invisible entities. In Study 1, children aged 2.2–5.5years (N=48) were briefly told about a novel invisible substance that could produce a novel outcome—make a novel box turn green. During this introduction, children watched as one container was inverted over a box and the box lit up green, and then another identical container was inverted over the box and the box did not light up. On test trials, the experimenter inserted a spoon in novel (actually empty) containers and inverted the spoon over the box, which turned green in one trial and did not light up in the other trial. For both trials, children were asked whether there was anything in each container. Children across this age range appropriately reported that an invisible substance was present only when the box lit up. In Study 2, children aged 2.4–4.5years (N=48) watched similar demonstrations but were not explicitly provided information about the invisible substance. Children as young as 3years spontaneously inferred that an invisible substance was present when the box lit up and was absent when the box did not light up. A final task tested children’s ability to use their causal knowledge of invisible substances to produce an effect—making the box light up. The youngest children had difficulty with this task, but many children aged 3.5–4.5years performed capably. These results indicate an early-emerging understanding of potent invisible entities that develops rapidly during early childhood.

Is the universe simpler than ΛCDM?

In the standard cosmological model, the Universe consists mainly of two invisible substances: vacuum energy with constant mass-density (where is a ‘cosmological constant’ originally proposed by Einstein and is Newton’s gravitational constant) and cold dark matter (CDM) with mass density that is currently . This ‘CDM’ model has the virtue of simplicity, enabling straightforward calculation of the formation and evolution of cosmic structure against the backdrop of cosmic expansion. Here, we review apparent discrepancies with observations on small galactic scales, which CDM must attribute to complexity in the baryon physics of galaxy formation. Yet, galaxies exhibit structural scaling relations that evoke simplicity, presenting a clear challenge for formation models. In particular, tracers of gravitational potentials dominated by dark matter show a correlation between orbital size, , and velocity, , that can be expressed most simply as a characteristic acceleration, kmspc cm s, perhaps motivating efforts to find a link between localised and global manifestations of the Universe’s dark components.

Story one: Dark matter, where art thou? New study finds dearth of invisible substance in the solar system's neighborhood

Story one: Dark matter, where art thou? New study finds dearth of invisible substance in the solar system's neighborhood

Chemical and mechanical theories of digestion in early modern medicine

The aim of this paper is to survey the iatrochemists’ and iatromechanists’ explanations of digestion, from the sixteenth to the early decades of the eighteenth century. The iatrochemists substituted the Galenic thermal digestion with a series of chemical processes, the same as those produced in the laboratory. Jean Baptiste van Helmont marked a turning point in the chemical understanding of digestion, indicating the acid ferment in the stomach as the digestive agent. In the wake of van Helmont, an increasing number of physicians rejected the traditional Galenic theory of digestion, turning to the chemical reactions taking place in the ventricles. The iatrochemists saw nutrition as the outcome of the separation of an active invisible substance, i.e., spirits, from a thick inert covering. The emergence of the mechanical physiology, with its emphasis on the shape, size and motion of parts, did not bring about a decline of the chemical investigations of digestion. Descartes ruled out chemistry in the study of physiology, while a number of physiologists—notably in England—adopted a compromise between iatrochemical and mechanical theories. In the second half of the seventeenth century, the view of acid as an agent of gastric digestion became popular among physiologists. Late in the century, the acid-alkali doctrine spurred further investigations on digestion and nutrition.

Einstein's telescope: the hunt for dark matter and dark energy in the universe

Dark energy. Dark matter. These strange and invisible substances don't just sound mysterious: their unexpected appearance in the cosmic census is upending long-held notions about the nature of the Universe. Astronomers have long known that the Universe is expanding, but everything they could see indicated that gravity should be slowing this spread. Instead, it appears that the Universe is accelerating its expansion and that something stronger than gravity--dark energy--is at work. In Telescope Evalyn Gates, a University of Chicago astrophysicist, transports us to the edge of contemporary science to explore the revolutionary tool that unlocks the secrets of these little-understood cosmic constituents. Based on theory of general relativity, gravitational lensing, or Einstein's Telescope, is enabling new discoveries that are taking us toward the next revolution in scientific thinking--one that may change forever our notions of where the Universe came from and where it is going.

Rewritable phosphorescent paper by the control of competing kinetic and thermodynamic self-assembling events

Security inks have become of increasing importance. They are composed of invisible substances that provide printed images that are not able to be photocopied, and are readable only under special environments. Here we report a novel photoluminescent ink for rewritable media that dichroically emits phosphorescence due to a structural bistability of the self-assembled luminophor. Long-lasting images have been developed by using conventional thermal printers, which are readable only on exposure to ultraviolet light, and more importantly, are thermally erasable for rewriting. Although thermally rewritable printing media have already been developed using visible dyes and cholesteric liquid crystals, security inks that allow rewriting of invisible printed images are unprecedented. We realized this unique feature by the control of kinetic and thermodynamic processes that compete with one another in the self-assembly of the luminophor. This strategy can provide an important step towards the next-generation security technology for information handling.

Dance History and Method: A Return to Meaning

History, like a vast river, propels logs, vegetation, rafts, and debris; it is full of live and dead things, some destined for resurrection; it mingles many waters and holds in solution invisible substances stolen from distant soils. Anything may become part of it; that is why it can be an image of the continuity of mankind. And it is also why some of its freight turns up again in the social sciences: they were constructed out of the contents of history in the same way as houses in medieval Rome were made out of stones taken from the Coliseum. But the special sciences based on sorted facts cannot be mistaken for rivers flowing in time and full of persons and events. They are systems fashioned with concepts, numbers, and abstract relations. For history, the reward of eluding method is to escape abstraction. (Barzun 1974, 95)

宇宙の膨張と見えない物質

宇宙の膨張と見えない物質

Edward Taylor's Metaphors of Promise

rm HE TORMENTS of Edward Taylor's position as Puritan poet have I been emphasized recently, almost to the exclusion of its meager joys.1 Yet Puritan dogma also presents certain opportunities for poetry. It offers kind of metaphor and poetic strategy that help poet like Taylor solve the spiritual problems under which he labors. The Lord's Supper was for Taylor the crowning ritual of Christianity, and its celebration was the occasion for each of his Preparatory Meditations. As Kathleen Blake and Ursula Brumm have noticed, those celebrations offer Taylor principle of metaphor, not just single instance of metaphor.' Donald Stanford, in the introduction to his-edition of Taylor's poems, cites relevant passage from Calvin: . . the visible sign is given to us to seal the donation of the invisible substance. . . .3 Elsewhere, Calvin refers to these signs as tokens or pledges.4 This language is purposefully covenantal, and it comes, in part, from Romans 4:II, where circumcision is the visible sign and seal of God's covenant with Abraham. Taylor calls the Lord's Supper a seal of the covenant of grace.5 He uses the terms signumrn and signatum, where the sign is the celebration of the sacrament, and

The Definition of Freedom

The space which appeared above the mercury column in Torricelli's tube proved embarrassing to seventeenth-century physicists. Pascal's experiments with it enabled him, not only to invent the altimeter and barometer and to weigh the earth's atmosphere, but also opened a way for Newton's new view of force, making possible modern physics and astronomy. A representative of the traditional school, Descartes's tutor, Father Etienne Nod of the Jesuit College of La Fleche, believed there must be an invisible substance in the top of the tube to hold the mercury up. The contrary notion of a vacuum, of a something which was nothing, he considered absurd, heretical, and unscientific. Wrote Noel:

Physico-Psychical Experiments

IN the third Frederic W. H. Myers memorial lecture, which was delivered before the Society for, Psychical Research on October 25, and of which an English edition has just been issued ("Supernormal Aspects of Energy and Matter": London, 1933), Dr. Eugene Osty, the director of the Institut Meta-psychique, Paris, reviewed the recent experiments with the medium, Mr. R. Schneider. He described the nature of the apparatus employed through the use of which it is claimed that the medium is capable of demonstrating his power of externalising a ‘force’, or substance, the effects of which can be registered at a distance from him. In the course of the address, the speaker maintained that Mr. Schneider possessed exceptional powers, which he was able to exercise over the material world when in a special physiological state designated as trance. In this condition his behaviour is as if he knew and could control “the primordial resources of life and processes of creation”. The method of demonstrating this alleged action at a distance was to study its effect on infra-red rays which occupied a certain area. Interruptions and absorptions occurred which were registered photographically, and shown to be connected with the respirations of the medium. Attempts were made to photograph the invisible substance, but were not successful; Dr. Osty is of the opinion that plates sensitive enough to the radiations have not yet been produced.