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New Car Engine: How and Why?

Welcome back to another certified banger of a blog (the final countdown starts playing in the background). The last post for this series has to do with engineering and yet another exciting discovery. Last week it was a lake (exciting right) but this week it is something that we probably use every day, cars.  The evolution of the car and the internal combustion engine has seen the want for humans to have their 4 wheeled friends move faster and faster. Back when the first cars were invented in the late 1880s, the last thing people cared about what was was coming out the exhaust. The main focus was creating a machine that would get someone from point A to point B quickly. As time has gone on, us humans have gathered a better understanding of the harmful effects that internal combustion engines have on the environment due to emissions of green house gasses, harmful gasses and particulate matter.  The evolution of cars and engine technology has seen companies veer away from internal combu
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The Anthropocene and How a Lake has the Answers to When it Began.

If you google " The Most Important Debates of the 21st century " you will find a range of widely debated topics by various philosophers and academics. The 'Anthropocene Start Date' debate was never mentioned but I just wanted to let you know. Anyway, let's have a chat about the  Anthropocene  and why this debate, maybe, should be on that google search.  The Anthropocene is argues to be a new geological Epoch describing a period where human activity has has an undeniable impact on the environment. The reason why the Anthropocene is such a debated topic (amongst Geographers (I promise)) is because two questions need to be answered: 1. Is the Anthropocene a definable Epoch? and 2. If it is, when does it start? Due to a recent discovery of l ake sediment in Canada , an answer has (pretty much) been found.  Lake Crawford's sediment provides the equivalent of a history book with details of the past centuries' environments. This is important because of the track

Climate Change and Natural Disasters. Fact or Fiction?

So! Let me tell you why we know exactly why the world is flat! Okay okay… it’s not quite as hot a topic and as debated and contentious as that, but, as of the last five years or so it has kicked up a decent bit of a stir. The topic is the link between volcanoes and climate. But maybe not in the way you would think. We know that v olcanic eruptions cause global cooling by shooting particles into the air but what if there was a likelihood that global warming and climate change increase volcanic activity? Volcanoes The first question is: How possibly does climate change and global warming affect volcanic activity? The answer is relatively simple, fewer ice sheets means less pressure on the crust leading to more active movements and, hence more volcanic activity. The main movement occurs in the upper mantle and the crust, this increased movement means more magma production leading to more eruptions. One of the first ideas that came to be with this conclusion was the increase of volcanic

A Guide to Isotopes and How They Tell Us About Past Climates.

How do we know how old the last ice age was? How do we know how old our oldest ancestors are? How do we know how old the Earth is? Isotopes is how and this is my guide to understanding them and how they are used in dating.  What is an isotope? An element is defined by its protons, neutrons and electrons. Isotopes are elements that have differing number of neutrons to protons, affecting elemental mass but keeping chemical properties similar. Physical properties do change isotope to isotope affecting mass, melting, boiling and freezing points as well as density. These changes in physical properties are what scientists use to track and determine age and environment such as the decay of Carbon-14  or the ratio between Oxygen-16 and Oxygen-18 used in climate reconstruction.   How are oxygen isotopes used to reconstruct climate? So now that we understand what isotopes are and why they matter to scientists, I can now further elaborate on the methodological approach as to why scientists car

Summer Vacation and the Evolution of Life and Our Atmosphere

It has been about 4.6 billion years since the formation of the atmosphere and earth.  Around 500 million years ago did the air become inhabitable for life as we know it. Only about 6 million years ago did our earliest ancestors walk the earth  and most importantly, there is only 104 days of summer vacation and school comes along just to end it.  My name is Nicholas and I am by no means a professional on the history of time but I am sure you are wondering: why the comparison between the timeline of life as we know it, and Phineas and Ferb? Let's talk about it.  Phineas and Ferb were able to create around 180 inventions during their  104 days of summer vacation . A staggering rate of creation, destruction and recreation during a small time that they had. All while still managing to evade Candace, their sister, exposing the creations to their parents. I compare this to Earth. Take the start of summer vacation as the birth of Earth, and the end of vacation as today, all while not gett