{"id":10873,"date":"2017-08-11T07:43:08","date_gmt":"2017-08-11T12:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/?p=10873"},"modified":"2017-08-11T07:43:08","modified_gmt":"2017-08-11T12:43:08","slug":"word-of-the-day-197","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/2017\/08\/11\/word-of-the-day-197\/","title":{"rendered":"Word Of The Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

Metastable<\/em>:<\/p>\n

In\u00a0physics<\/a>,\u00a0metastability<\/b>\u00a0is a stable state of a\u00a0dynamical system<\/a>\u00a0other than the system’s\u00a0state of least energy<\/a>. A ball resting in a hollow on a slope is a simple example of metastability. If the ball is only slightly pushed, it will settle back into its hollow, but a stronger push may start the ball rolling down the slope. Bowling pins show similar metastability by either merely wobbling for a moment or tipping over completely. A common example of metastability in science is\u00a0isomerisation<\/a>. Higher energy isomers are long lived as they are prevented from rearranging to their preferred\u00a0ground state<\/a>\u00a0by (possibly large) barriers in the potential energy. [Wikipedia<\/strong><\/a>]<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Noted in “Bigger bang theory: teach atoms new tricks to beef up explosives<\/em><\/a>,”\u00a0David Hambling, NewScientist<\/strong><\/em> (29 July 2017, paywall):<\/p>\n

A good way to change a game is to change its rules. One line of research to do just that builds on a curiosity that was\u00a0exercising the Royal Society back in the 1660s<\/a>\u00a0just when gunpowder was: Prince Rupert\u2019s drops. These tadpole-shaped trinkets are formed by molten glass cooling rapidly, and are named after Prince Rupert of the Rhine, a cousin of King Charles II who first brought them to England. The way the drops form leaves them under tremendous internal strain. A hammer will bounce off the drop\u2019s body and not break it, but if you snap the tail the strain is suddenly released, sending a wave through the drop,\u00a0shattering it into powder<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This explosivity is based on the release of not chemical energy, but mechanical strain. At the US Army Research Laboratory (ARL) in Maryland, Jennifer Ciezak-Jenkins and her colleagues have been experimenting with the same principle using nanoscopic diamonds. Diamond forms only at high temperatures and pressures, such as those found deep in Earth\u2019s mantle, and is a \u201cmetastable\u201d form of carbon. It is stable in ambient conditions, only crumbling over cosmic timescales back to graphite.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Metastable: In\u00a0physics,\u00a0metastability\u00a0is a stable state of a\u00a0dynamical system\u00a0other than the system’s\u00a0state of least energy. A ball resting in a hollow on a slope is a simple example of metastability. If the ball is only slightly pushed, it will settle back into its hollow, but a stronger push may start the \u2026 Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10873","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10873","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10873"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10873\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10874,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10873\/revisions\/10874"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10873"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10873"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10873"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}