Author Topic: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?  (Read 1675 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline TerraHertzTopic starter

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 3958
  • Country: au
  • Why shouldn't we question everything?
    • It's not really a Blog
So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« on: July 07, 2018, 12:21:13 pm »
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-5918477/Electric-fields-atmosphere-secret-spiders-FLY-thousands-miles.html
Spiders can FLY using electricity in the air, allowing them to travel thousands of miles on windless days

The writing quality is cringe-inducing. But an interesting story.
Collecting old scopes, logic analyzers, and unfinished projects. http://everist.org
 

Offline Gyro

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 9392
  • Country: gb
Re: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« Reply #1 on: July 07, 2018, 02:37:42 pm »
Quote
The writing quality is cringe-inducing. But an interesting story.

Indeed.  Hopefully the bit about  honeybees using electric fields to "communicate with the hive" was his own invention!
Best Regards, Chris

"Victor Meldrew, the Crimson Avenger!"
 

Offline JohnnyMalaria

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 1154
  • Country: us
    • Enlighten Scientific LLC
Re: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« Reply #2 on: July 07, 2018, 02:49:23 pm »
Quote
The writing quality is cringe-inducing. But an interesting story.

Indeed.  Hopefully the bit about  honeybees using electric fields to "communicate with the hive" was his own invention!

Open your mind :)

Honeybees can move each other with electric fields



You should also look up how over-excited scout bees returning to the hive get head-butted by bees in the hive to shut them up so that other scouts can share their information. Eventually, the hive makes a collective, democratic decision as to which new location to move to.

And then there are the undertaker bees:

The undertaker bees are incredible to watch as these bees work very hard to carry out all the dead and dying bees from the hive.  Sometimes they fly them easily 20 or more feet away from the hive and drop them to the ground. Other times they haul out bees that are bigger and heavier than they can lift into the air.  I have seen undertaker bees struggling for 15 or more minutes to fly with these bees, reposition them several times to try to get a better grip, only to fly a few inches, fall to the ground and painstakingly drag them all the way off of my roof.  If you look in the gutters around my rooftop hives, you will see hundreds of dead bees deposited there over time by the undertaker bees.  My gutters have become the defacto bee cemetery.
« Last Edit: July 07, 2018, 03:03:00 pm by JohnnyMalaria »
 

Offline Gyro

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 9392
  • Country: gb
Re: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« Reply #3 on: July 07, 2018, 02:59:08 pm »
The link didn't work but I found it... https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2013/03/26/honeybees-can-move-each-other-with-electric-fields/

You learn something new every day! Thanks.  :)
Best Regards, Chris

"Victor Meldrew, the Crimson Avenger!"
 

Offline JohnnyMalaria

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 1154
  • Country: us
    • Enlighten Scientific LLC
Re: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« Reply #4 on: July 07, 2018, 03:00:11 pm »
Thanks - I pasted the title instead of the link  :palm:

I've corrected it and added a bit more amazing stuff, too.
« Last Edit: July 07, 2018, 03:02:04 pm by JohnnyMalaria »
 

Offline Doctorandus_P

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 3313
  • Country: nl
Re: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« Reply #5 on: July 07, 2018, 03:32:43 pm »
Please explain how a spider is going to generate an electric field of 6kv/m over a distance of several km.
You can nail a dog to the ceiling, but that does not mean it can walk over the ceiling like a Gecko.
 

Offline JohnnyMalaria

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 1154
  • Country: us
    • Enlighten Scientific LLC
Re: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« Reply #6 on: July 07, 2018, 05:57:55 pm »
Please explain how a spider is going to generate an electric field of 6kv/m over a distance of several km.

The article doesn't say that. It says:

Quote
Biologists from the University of Bristol (yay! I went there) believe the answer lies in the Atmospheric Potential Gradient (APG), a global electric circuit that is always present in the atmosphere.
The strength of the APG varies as on a calm day with clear skies, when it may reach 100 volts per mertre
On a stormy day or in the presence of charged clouds, the APG can soar to 10 kilovolts per metre.
 

Offline ChunkyPastaSauce

  • Supporter
  • ****
  • Posts: 539
  • Country: 00
 
The following users thanked this post: mtdoc

Offline Refrigerator

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 1540
  • Country: lt
Re: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« Reply #8 on: July 07, 2018, 06:30:00 pm »
So that's why even on windless days i get spiderwebs flying at and sticking to my face  >:(
I have a blog at http://brimmingideas.blogspot.com/ . Now less empty than ever before !
An expert of making MOSFETs explode.
 

Offline Vtile

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 1144
  • Country: fi
  • Ingineer
Re: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« Reply #9 on: July 09, 2018, 05:38:35 pm »
Interesting. Makes sense.
 

Offline Benta

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 5817
  • Country: de
Re: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« Reply #10 on: July 09, 2018, 06:46:42 pm »
"Biologists from the University of Bristol (yay! I went there) believe the answer lies in the Atmospheric Potential Gradient (APG), a global electric circuit that is always present in the atmosphere."

That's total mumbo-jumbo. Not the potential gradient, but the reference to a "circuit".

 

Offline TerraHertzTopic starter

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 3958
  • Country: au
  • Why shouldn't we question everything?
    • It's not really a Blog
Re: So you understand electrostatics, but can you do this?
« Reply #11 on: July 11, 2018, 02:47:58 am »
"Biologists from the University of Bristol (yay! I went there) believe the answer lies in the Atmospheric Potential Gradient (APG), a global electric circuit that is always present in the atmosphere."

That's total mumbo-jumbo. Not the potential gradient, but the reference to a "circuit".

How do you suppose that electrostatic gradient is formed and maintained?
« Last Edit: July 11, 2018, 02:51:21 am by TerraHertz »
Collecting old scopes, logic analyzers, and unfinished projects. http://everist.org
 


Share me

Digg  Facebook  SlashDot  Delicious  Technorati  Twitter  Google  Yahoo
Smf