electrostatic forces tagged posts

An artist’s rendering of the surface of Titan, a moon of Saturn. Courtesy: iPhoto Stock, manjik. Inset: This composite image shows an infrared view of Saturn’s moon Titan from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, acquired during the mission’s “T-114” flyby on Nov. 13, 2015.
Credit: NASA/JPL

The grains that cover Saturn’s moon act like clingy packing peanuts. Experiments led by researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology suggest the particles that cover the surface of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, are “electrically charged.” When the wind blows hard enough (~15 mph), Titan’s non-silicate granules get kicked up and start to hop in a motion referred to as saltation...

Electrostatically Driven Nanoballoon Actuator, Nano Letters (2016). http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.nanolett.6b02394

Molecular sized machines could in the future be used to control important mechanisms in the body. In a recent study, researchers at University of California, Berkeley and Umeå University show how a nanoballoon comprising a single carbon molecule can be controlled electrostatically to switch between an inflated and a collapsed state. Inflatable balloon actuators are commonly used for macroscopic applications to lift buildings, as impact protection in cars or to widen narrowed or obstructed arteries or veins. At the micro scale they are used as micro pumps and in nature jumping spiders create microformat fluid-filled cushions to power their legs in explosive jumps.

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