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photonic_sorcerer , in Does Higgs exist in nature or is it merely artificially synthesized particle?
@photonic_sorcerer@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

The higgs particle itself isn’t important, it’s the higgs field that makes the world go 'round. The way I understand it, is the field permeates all of space and time (like all other fields) and the particle appears at places of high disruptions in the field, like what the LHC created.

Now, I’m no PhD, so take this with heaps of salt.

roguetrick ,

Yeah, you prove the field exists by exciting it and making it produce quanta, kind of like photons being the quanta of the EM field being excited.

Hedup OP ,

Photons are excitations in the EM field, but they also carry the electromagnetic force between particles - thus giving them charge. But in order to do that photon actually needs to be created and travel from one particle to another. If Higgs works in a similar way also being a boson, one might expect it also to need to exist to do it’s job. . What is the difference here?

skillissuer , (edited )
@skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

Higgs boson has mass and quite large one at that and this puts limitations on how hard is it to generate it and on how field behaves

When you don’t provide enough energy to get whole Higgs boson, interactions happen via virtual particles. It’s easier to grasp this idea with weak interactions and W and Z bosons

CanadaPlus ,

But in order to do that photon actually needs to be created and travel from one particle to another.

Not really, no. At some point I’m going to exceed my own expertise here since I’m not a QFT expert, but in quantum mechanics things don’t firmly exist or not exist. The photons in question are “virtual particles”.

count_of_monte_carlo ,

But in order to do that photon actually needs to be created and travel from one particle to another.

The electromagnetic force is mediated by virtual photons. These don’t exist as free particles, such as a photon emitted by a light source, but only as an intermediate particle. Because they’re only intermediate states, virtual photons can have non-physical energies (so long as they’re within the uncertainty principle), resulting in some having an effective mass. Suffice it to say virtual photons are quite distinct from real ones! Technically, I believe you could have some of the basic features of the em force (namely attraction/repulsion by 2 point charges) with just virtual photons. Things get tricky once charges begin accelerating though, as this leads to the emission of real photons.

If Higgs works in a similar way also being a boson

The short answer is, it doesn’t. The Higgs Field gives mass to fundamental particles. Existing in that field causes certain particles to have mass due to their coupling to the field. The W and Z weak gauge bosons gain mass through electroweak symmetry breaking, quarks and leptons gain mass through a different coupling. I realize this is a very unsatisfying answer as to “how” the Higgs field creates mass, but the mechanism involves some complex math (group theory and non-abelian gauge theory), so it kind of defies a simpler explanation. Regardless, it’s through interactions with the Higgs field (which can exist without any Higgs bosons around) that fundamental particles gain mass. The search for the Higgs boson was just to confirm the existence of the field, because while the field can exist without Higgs bosons present it must be possible to excite it sufficiently to create them.

Going back to your original question: these particles have almost certainly been created “naturally” in high energy collisions between particles and matter. Nature can achieve much higher energies than our particle accelerators. The highest energy particle ever observed was a cosmic ray. However, Higgs bosons are extremely short lived, with a lifetime of 10^-22 seconds. So whenever they’re created, they don’t stick around for a meaningful amount of time.

Etterra , in Is there an insect that can devour plastic, breaking it down to less harmful components?

What would be ideal IMO is a bug with a gut bacteria exclusive to that species alone that could eat plastics and digest them fully so microplastics aren’t an issue. Likely, a species for each type of problem plastic. A natural analogue would be termites, which can only digest wood because of such a relationship.

It would have to be an artificially engineered relationship, and an insect that’s not particularly proliferate. Preferably with a narrow set of habitat tolerances. That way they could be farmed, but be unlikely to get into the environment and become a nuisance by eating plastics we don’t want them to.

qyron , (edited )

Like black soldier flies?

-#-

Black soldier flies are prolific and when proper conditions to reproduce are met, the females do not wander far from the place they are born and because of this are already used in organic waste disposal.

Using a complex organism to treate waste, even if only plastic, requires specialized infrastructure, designed to contain any event possible to pose a threat to the environment; this is not something we want or can do at home. Specialized infrastructure would make possible ideal conditions for the flies.

Black soldier flies also have the advantage that adults do not live for very long, do not feed, do not pose threat to human beings and the larvas die quickly if no food is available.

These flies also are vulnerable to cold and extreme heat conditions.

Treczoks , in Is there an insect that can devour plastic, breaking it down to less harmful components?

I would not want anything like that even close ot my LEGO collection...

Damaskox OP ,
@Damaskox@lemmy.world avatar

It’s a shame you cannot see bacteria with naked eye!

You’d need some kind of a bacteria alarm system!

Aux , in Is there an insect that can devour plastic, breaking it down to less harmful components?

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  • Chobbes ,

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  • Potatos_are_not_friends ,

    It’s not a binary choice

    eran_morad ,

    Gluten is neither synthetic nor semisynthetic.

    Aux ,

    It’s semisynthetic. Gluten doesn’t appear in nature on its own. Just like viscose is a semisynthetic variant of cellulose.

    eran_morad ,

    No, it occurs naturally in grains. Fucking look it up. I’m a biochemist, i know this shit. Here, fuck it: pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28244676/.

    count_of_monte_carlo ,

    This comment is on the edge for rule 6 “Use appropriate language and tone.” I’d appreciate it if you’d edit the language to be more professional.

    Thank you for providing a source in your comment!

    Aux ,

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  • eran_morad ,

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  • count_of_monte_carlo ,

    Im dealing with all rule breaking behavior. The unsourced comments have now been removed as the user is unable to provide a source to backup their claim. The comments that break civility rules, including this one, are also being removed.

    Please report rule 9 violations so that we can act on them.

    count_of_monte_carlo ,

    Per rule 9, please provide a credible source for the statement “Gluten doesn’t appear in nature on its own”

    Aux ,

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  • count_of_monte_carlo ,

    The source provided by another user gives a definitive counter argument.

    From the article: “ The wheat kernel contains 8%–15% of protein, from which 10%–15% is albumin/globulin and 85%–90% is gluten (Fig. 1).1 Gluten is a complex mixture of hundreds of related but distinct proteins, mainly gliadin and glutenin. Different wheat varieties vary in protein content and in the composition and distribution of gluten proteins.”

    TonyTonyChopper ,
    @TonyTonyChopper@mander.xyz avatar

    loads of organisms that can digest gluten already exist. Not so much for polyethylene etc. Also gluten is made of proteins with definite length not polymers

    Aux ,

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  • eran_morad ,

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  • eran_morad , (edited )

    Let me school you on this one, too. There are polymethylsilanes, polyphosphazines, etc. You aren’t even aware of common polymers like PVC that fall outside of your categories. There’s more exotic stuff like polyferrocenes. You ought to quit spouting off about things you know nothing about.

    Aux ,

    What? Lol ook.

    Aux ,

    Also PLA can be suggested by microorganisms.

    TonyTonyChopper ,
    @TonyTonyChopper@mander.xyz avatar

    irrelevant

    Aux ,

    How’s that irrelevant? PLA is a plastic. And can be digested. As well as cellophane. Also plastic and can also be digested.

    Aux ,
    N4CHEM ,

    Gluten is a protein, nobody would call it a plastic

    Aux ,

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  • count_of_monte_carlo ,

    Per rule 9, please provide a source for the statement that gluten is a “synthetic or semi-synthetic organic polymer”.

    NounsAndWords , in Is there an insect that can devour plastic, breaking it down to less harmful components?

    Bugs? I don’t know of any. Bacteria? It seems to come up again every few years.

    Damaskox OP ,
    @Damaskox@lemmy.world avatar

    Cool!

    Ideonella sakaiensis would be the name of the bacteria.

    DessertStorms ,
    @DessertStorms@kbin.social avatar

    Bugs? I don’t know of any

    Not sure if worms count as bugs, but, in the same way as the bacteria, there is an article about these every few years:
    https://www.acs.org/pressroom/newsreleases/2022/april/earthworms-like-to-eat-some-plastics-but-side-effects-of-digestion-are-unclear.html

    CanadaPlus , in Humans are notoriously bad at absorbing iron from plant sources, while herbivores seem to do fine. What's up with that?

    Are we actually that bad at absorbing iron? Honest question, I always assumed it was a matter of the amount of iron in there in the first place.

    TheBananaKing OP ,

    We suck at it. Read ferinstance this

    CanadaPlus ,

    I’m having trouble finding a comparable number for other animals, though. Apparently for a lot of trace elements (like copper or selenium) ruminants are actually much worse at absorption, because the microbes essentially put them into a less available form.

    CanadaPlus , (edited ) in Is there an easy way to generate a list of CMYK color values that will appear identical to the human eye under 589nm light?

    Here’s the Wikipedia section one general colour space, with a pretty diagram of chromaticity, and the one on CMYK colour conversion. What you want is the preimage of a CMYK colour projected into the entire perceptual space.

    CMYK actually sounds kind of complicated to do this with, so yeah look for a pre-made function to convert CMYK to CIE 1931 in whatever “normal” light you have. I can help you find the preimage from that once you do.

    Edit: Oh wait, this was a Halloween thing. Maybe for next year?

    CanadaPlus , in Hypothetically speaking, what alterations to our biology/genome would need to occur in order for us to be able to safely drink saltwater?

    Sea birds have an organ that pulls super-concentrated brine out of their bloodstream, like a kidney on steroids. IIRC it’s in their face. So, that.

    However, we can’t even grow normal human organs yet, let alone whole new ones.

    CanadaPlus , in If a sun burns hotter with greater mass, does adding a tonne of water make it hotter?

    There’s a lot of oxygen in water by star standards, so keep that in mind. It’s possible the change in metallicity will offset any change to equilibrium temperature, although I don’t really know the details.

    Sylver , in Could, in theory, we merge black holes to prolong the life of the universe?

    I believe there have been multiple sci-fi stories written about such concepts. It would go to assume that any civilization still around in 10^43 years from now will have no choice but to live around black holes while harnessing their rotational energy. My current favorite series, Xeelee Sequence by Stephen Baxter, explores some possible endings of life in the long-term life cycle of the universe. There is also the final book of the Three Body Problem, which if I remember correctly, shows civilizations in pocket universes around black holes.

    There is a YouTube video you may want to watch by Isaac Arthur. It mentions the possibility of combining black holes to elongate their life, and I won’t spoil the final answer for you. But like always, entropy prevails.

    youtu.be/pxa0IrZCNzg?si=VeHMJE8nx5hAR-1c

    StructuredPair , in Why are so many galaxies symmetrical?

    The fact they spin and the bits interact gravitationally makes them symmetric. There are almost certainly some asymmetric galaxies as we know galaxies collide and they will be asymmetric for a bit afterwards, but the spinning and fiction of gravity will make them symmetric again fairly quickly on galactic time scales.

    WintLizard , in Why are so many galaxies symmetrical?
    @WintLizard@sopuli.xyz avatar

    Your question made me realize I had never thought about this at all so I spent some time searching. If I am understanding this article correctly it essentially boils down to the factors that would cause rotational symmetry at a smaller scale ie spinning sand on a plate apply at the galaxy scale as well.

    Demuniac , in Why are so many galaxies symmetrical?

    Id guess if the arm gets too long, gravity won’t be strong enough anymore so the stars there will sort of just drift off

    21Cabbage , (edited ) in If a sun burns hotter with greater mass, does adding a tonne of water make it hotter?

    A literal ton wouldn’t do anything measurable but yeah, adding more material of lower atomic numbers would in theory work considering it’s a fusion engine and wouldn’t exactly scoff at having to break the water molecule before using it.

    Edit: like maybe if there was a star with a bunch of particularly wet planets around it and you somehow deorbited them, since as far as I’m aware the elements heavier than iron are just dead weight, they wouldn’t put out the star or anything.

    YaBoyMax ,

    I mean, if you add enough iron I believe it would eventually disrupt fusion, but you’d need an incredible amount, far more than you’d ever get from orbiting planets.

    Red_October ,

    As I understand it, the problem isn’t the presence of iron, but rather when it starts fusing silicon into iron, as that particular process consumes more energy than it releases, thus eating away at the radiation pressure that keeps the star “held up.”

    YaBoyMax ,

    I was thinking that the added inert mass would decrease the likelihood of individual fusion reactions as well as eventually overpower the radiation pressure due to its effect on total gravitational force, but honestly I don’t really know what I’m talking about so I could be completely wrong.

    EnderofGames ,

    Fusing silicon into iron should still release more energy than it takes, fusing iron-56 or heavier should be the point of not gaining energy.

    e_t_ , in If a sun burns hotter with greater mass, does adding a tonne of water make it hotter?

    Stars have a lot of mass. The Sun loses almost 5 billion tons of mass every second and has enough fuel to last another 4-5 billion years. Adding a single ton of anything would make no appreciable difference. If you were to drop Jupiter into the Sun, it would have an effect, but Jupiter is only 0.09% the Sun's mass, so the effect would be small.

    foofiepie ,

    Is it true that Jupiter itself is close to being a star if you were to add more mass? Would smooshing two Jupiters together make a star?

    e_t_ ,

    You'd need to smoosh seventy five Jupiters together to make a star.

    foofiepie ,

    Thanks. Wow. That’s insane. Stars have a lot of mass then.

    HeckGazer ,

    If you ever feel like feeling extremely insignificant: www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zlcWdTs2-s

    Shardikprime ,

    Seventy six if you relax

    4z01235 ,

    astronomy.com/…/ask-astro-could-jupiter-ever-beco…

    Depending on how you define a star, you could smush ~13 Jupiters together and make something that is maybe a star. To make a definite star you need ~80 Jupiters. To make it the same size as our Sun you’d need almost 250 Jupiters.

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