Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/07/05/blob-of-liquid-floating-in-zer.html
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This is a good illustration of why carbonated beverages aren’t popular in microgravity (aside from the problem of needing a special drink dispenser).
Burping is hard when gases don’t go “up.”
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Thus my fiendish experiment of a zero gravity blob of vinegar brought into tantalizing coalescence with a blob of baking soda (in solution) is rendered extraneous. -sigh- so it’s back to my sinister plans for a virus projection ray [achoo]
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It’s been done – the technology is surprisingly simple:
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“What would the average sensible American do if he encountered a pulsing ball of protoplasm from outer space? That’s right: he’d poke it with a stick.” Amazon Editorial
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It looks like the Marbleizer brand of paintballs.
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“Now NASA scientists will be able to view out-of-focus video at resolutions heretofore unattainable.”
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Well, and here I was thinking all those droppies going every which way - what could possibly go wrong? Who okayed the AlkaSeltzer?
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For a moment I was reminded of Saturn’s hexagon pattern… something has displaced all the normal material.
Put a goldfish in the next one, have him swim in and out of water bulbs, give him something to talk about when he gets back to school.
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They’ve had the technology for safely drinking carbonated beverages in space since the mid-1980s. There just hasn’t been any interest in using it since people realized how “not being able to burp” ruins one’s ability to properly enjoy a can of Coca-Cola.
Compounding the problem: no refrigerator on the ISS.
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Just hang the whole sixer out the window for a few minutes.
Wouldn’t burping be facilitated by the pressure differential between your stomach and the atmosphere inside the station? I wouldn’t have thought gravity came into play.
[Edit] I guess not[/Edit]
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But why use goldfish when space squid are an option?
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It’s actually harder than most people think to chill something in a vacuum. The cooling system in your car works by having cool air pass over thin metal vanes connected to tubes of hot fluid, thus transferring the heat into the surrounding air. But in a vacuum there isn’t anything to conduct that heat into—conduction and convection are off the table. That’s why the ISS needs huge radiator arrays to get rid of waste heat via radiation.
If you want a good illustration of how gravity comes into play with burping then try drinking a carbonated beverage and then hanging upside down by your ankles.
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I want to see zero gravity Coke and Mentos next.
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You’re in luck. FOR SCIENCE!
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They’re orbs Jerry
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Only a little disappointed this wasn’t tried during a space walk for use as a makeshift propulsion device.
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That’s the secret to the fabled Epstein Drive in The Expanse.
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