Weekly round up: new matter, old blades and older statues

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stories which we think will last for more than one day

Electron crystals-clear? When we were young, we were taught that everything was built out of atoms. Now, amazingly, someone has had a go at making a form of matter from the next level down, tiny electrons. This was so impressive we had to put it first. Read this report from Nature, This is a solid made of electrons

If the conditions are just right, some of the electrons inside a material will arrange themselves into a tidy honeycomb pattern — like a solid within a solid. Physicists have now for the first time directly imaged these ‘Wigner crystals’, named after theorist Eugene Wigner. Researchers built a device containing atom-thin layers of two semiconductors and cooled it to just a few degrees above absolute zero. This slowed the electrons between the two layers enough so that they formed the elusive material.Nature | 4 min read
Reference: Nature paper

What happens to old Windfarms? They’re clean, they’re green they’re productive-what’s not to like about windfarms? Well, there’s what to do about the old blades for one thing, because they only last about thirty years. And now, not only are they piling up by the thousand, they’re very hard to recycle. We’ll reproduce a thoughtful blog which at least gives an introduction to this issue. But we think it’s going to be very big, very soon.

https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2021/03/16/the-tragedy-of-wind-turbine-blade-disposal/

Turkey Carvings We at LSS have always been big fans of the Neolithic. It’s like crossing your first farm set with The Golden Bough-all those sheep, cattle, wheat and buildings combined with deeply felt and bizarre fertility rituals. It’s amazing how early it got going in some places as Sam Tomkin explains for the Mail online:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-10050217/Stunning-carvings-human-figures-heads-uncovered-Karahantepe.html

Well that’s it for this week. We’re off to spend the next two days hunting for fuel. Wish us luck

#solids #electrons ##globalwarming #windfarms #neolithic #culture