Recent
Articles
Which Came First, the Galaxy or the Black Hole?
Every Wednesday Michio Kaku will be answering reader questions about physics and futuristic science on his blog at Big Think. If you have a question for Dr. Kaku, just post it in the comment section on his blog; Dr. Kaku’s Universe and check back on Wednesdays to see if he answers it. Today, Dr. Kaku addresses a question posed by Andy Speight: Are the supermassive black holes at the center of galaxies involved in the formation of those galaxies?
What’s New @ Big Think (Video Interview & Blog Entries)
Dr. Kaku’s recent video
interview at the Big Think
studio has finally been
published and split into
three parts: Inventions
of the Future,
Will Mankind Destroy Itself
and
How to Stop Robots from
Killing Us.
The three most recent blog
entries on Dr. Kaku’s
Universe are:
1)
Water and Organic Compounds
Found on a Second Asteroid
2)
With WMAP’s Primary Mission
Finally Complete, It’s Time
to Say Goodbye
3)
Graphene Will Change the Way
We Live
The Last Ten Blog Entries from Dr. Kaku’s Blog; Dr. Kaku’s Universe (Hosted by BigThink.com)
Take a look at
the last ten blog entries on
Dr. Kaku’s BigThink.com
blog; Dr. Kaku’s Universe.
Don’t forget to
- Found: The Holy Grail of Planetary Science
- Successful Test of NASA’s New Composite Material “Unobtainium”
- Breakthroughs Are Slow but Steady in Quantum Computers
- U.N. to Establish Protocals for When We Make Contact With Aliens
- Tracking Space Junk from the Ground — And Now From Space
- Alien Invasions — Should We Be Worried?
- Take a Ride into Space — And Circumnavigate the Moon
- Is Our Moon Really Shrinking?
- Should We Use Nuclear Weapons to Deflect Comets From the Earth?
- Should We Use Comets and Asteroids to Terraform Mars?
Book TV’s In-Depth 3 Hour Interview with Dr. Kaku
Michio sits down with Peter
Slen of Book TV (C-Span2)
for a 3 hour In-Depth
interview talking about his
life, career, and his work.
Dr. Kaku also responded to
telephones calls and
electronic communications.
Please visit http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/id/234213 to watch the entire interview.
The Book TV Interview will air again on Monday, October 4th at 12am (ET) on C-Span2
Physics of the Future: How Science Will Change Daily Life by 2100 by Michio Kaku (To be Released on March 22, 2011)
Physics
of the Future: How Science
will Change Daily Life by
2100 by Michio Kaku -
To Be Released on
March 22, 2011
Based on interviews with over three hundred of the world’s top scientists, who are already inventing the future in their labs, Kaku—in a lucid and engaging fashion—presents the revolutionary developments in medi cine, computers, quantum physics, and space travel that will forever change our way of life and alter the course of civilization itself.
Pre-Order Your Copy of Physics of the Future by clicking on one of the vendors below:
Dr. Kaku’s astonishing revelations include:
- The Internet will be in your contact lens. It will recog nize people’s faces, display their biographies, and even translate their words into subtitles.
- You will control computers and appliances via tiny sen sors that pick up your brain scans. You will be able to rearrange the shape of objects.
- Sensors in your clothing, bathroom, and appliances will monitor your vitals, and nanobots will scan your DNA and cells for signs of danger, allowing life expectancy to increase dramatically.
- Radically new spaceships, using laser propulsion, may replace the expensive chemical rockets of today. You may be able to take an elevator hundreds of miles into space by simply pushing the “up” button.
Like Physics of the Impossible and Visions before it, Physics of the Future is an exhilarating, wondrous ride through the next one hundred years of breathtaking scientific revolution.
Debut of Season 2 of Sci-Fi Science is September 1st on The Science Channel
I am proud to announce
that the second season of “Sci
Fi Science: Physics of the
Impossible,” debuts
next Wednesday,
Sept. 1, at 9 pm, on the
Science Channel
(check your
Opportunity to have Dr. Kaku answer some of your Science Questions on Camera in a BigThink.com Interview
My new television show “Sci-Fi Science” on The Science Channel is inspired by my book “Physics of the Impossible.” The first season of the show takes viewers through the wildest frontiers of science with a real-world look into the world of phasers, teleportation, light-sabers, invisibility, time travel and more. Filming for the second season is nearing an end, and will be launched on The Science Channel on Sept. 1 at 9 pm. I’ve decided to try something new with my Big Think blog—offering you the opportunity to have me answer some of your questions on camera. The basis of the topics are “shows” from the first season of “Sci-Fi Science.”
All you have to do is post your questions in the comments section on my Big Think Blog (Links Bleow). Some time in the near future, I will choose questions from each topic in the series and answer them on camera in another Big Think interview. The final product will prominently be displayed on my Big Think Blog (Dr. Kaku’s Universe).
Please find the links to the 3-Part series below (each with different topics):
PART 1) Video Blog Series– How to Explore the Universe & Travel to a Parallel Universe
PART 2) Video Blog Series– How to Become a Superhero & How to Build a Sci-Fi Robot
PART 3) Video Blog Series– How to Teleport & Become Invisible
What We’ve Learned from the Gulf Spill (WSJ Op-Ed)
WSJ Opinion Editorial (Originally Published on July 19th)
What We’ve Learned from
the Gulf Spill
In the future, relief wells
should be drilled
simultaneously with the main
well.
by Michio Kaku
If the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico were a tragedy, it would be in three acts. In Act I, there was the chaos caused by a methane explosion that killed 11 workers and unleashed the greatest environmental catastrophe in U.S. history. In Act II, we saw the floundering of BP officials, as eight failed attempts were made to cap, siphon, stuff, smother or seal the leak.
We are now slowly entering Act III, where engineers have painfully learned some valuable lessons and are on the verge of slowly killing this raging monster.
The nagging question is: Why did it take so long? Why couldn’t they have capped the leak months ago?
For three agonizing months, BP’s engineers and executives were essentially making things up as they went along, conducting a billion dollar science project with the American people as guinea pigs. The basic science of stopping oil leaks at 5,000 feet below sea level should have been done years ago.
All eight failed attempts to control the leak might have worked if the blowout had taken place at 200 feet. The 1979 Ixtoc oil leak in Mexico, which was the mother of all oil disasters, took place at 160 feet and raged for 10 months. It was eventually stopped by a relief well. The lessons learned from that and other oil disasters gave confidence to engineers in the industry that they could handle any leak.
Physics are different at 5,000 feet than they are at 200 feet. The pressure at 5,000 feet is enormous, about 2,000 pounds per square inch. Think of placing a passenger car on every square inch of your chest. You would be crushed like an egg shell within a fraction of a second. Even military submarines cannot operate at those depths. Instead, special remote controlled robotic subs are required. They are often hard to control and sometimes even collide.
Furthermore, methane, which is found as a gas in our kitchen stoves, solidifies into an ice-like hydrate at those tremendous depths and cold temperatures. The original explosion, it is conjectured, was caused when heat was applied to set the well’s cement seal, expanding the methane hydrates into gas that shot up the riser pipe and ignited. The presence of methane hydrates also foiled the first attempt to cap the leak. Later, BP engineers had greater success by sending warm water down the pipe to prevent methane hydrates from clogging it without creating gas bubbles like the one that caused the explosion.
BP officials initially low-balled the size of the leak. Although they originally stated that 1,000 barrels of oil were leaking per day, they also released video that gave a startlingly different picture.
In our freshman physics courses we teach the students that the flow rate from a pipe is the product of the area of the pipe times the velocity of the fluid. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to multiply these two numbers. Even a simple back-of-the-envelope estimate of the leak from watching the video will give you estimates of 40,000 to 60,000 barrels of oil per day. Did BP officials knowingly release misleadingly low figures, perhaps because they can be fined more than $4,000 per barrel by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency?
In the future there should be much tighter controls on deep-water drilling, and there should be redundant systems on hand so that the well can be capped or siphoned immediately if the blowout preventer fails. Perhaps relief wells should be drilled simultaneously with the main well, since they are the gold standard for stopping oil leaks and work nearly without fail. There also has to be a standby fleet of ships with skimmers, centrifugal pumps and booms ready to handle oil once it is leaked.
More importantly, the basic science of plugging oil leaks at great depths has to be completed, so that any future tragedies will not be repeated as farce. Until we end our oil addiction and develop alternative energy sources, similar plotlines will no doubt recur.
Last Round of Autographed Books & Photos are Available for Purchase
The last round of
Autographed Books & Photos
are now available for
purchase. A new
community driven website is
currently in development, so
all proceeds from sales go
towards the continued
advancements of the
Mkaku.org community
including hosting fees and
new software. Each of the
books (Physics of the
Impossible, Hyperspace,
Beyond Einstein, Visions &
Parallel Worlds are
$40.00 and includes U.S. and
International Shipping.
You may also
purchase all 5 Autographed
Books for $150.00.
Please allow 2-4 weeks for
delivery (International
Shipments vary by Country). http://mkaku.org/home/?page_id=743
WIN! a Chance to Meet me and Take Part in Filming for SCI-FI Science in New York City on July 16th
I’m
nearly done filming a second
season of “SCI-FI Science:
Physics of the Impossible”
on The Science Channel. In
this exciting new series,
I’ve identified 12 more
familiar science-fiction
movie, TV and literature
notions and technologies.
I’ve been explaining how we
can build some of these
SCI-FI ideas into science
fact and — once again — I
want to know what YOU
think of my
designs.
The next two episodes will be: ”How to Stop the Rise of the Machines” and “How to Defeat a Cyborg Army” – I’m inviting lucky winners of our competitions to the studio shoots where I will reveal my designs.
Colbert Report Interview a Success!
| The Colbert Report | Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c |
| Michio Kaku | |
Attention ColbertNation: WE DID IT!
The fans and supporters of
Dr. Michio Kaku give a warm
welcome to the
ColbertNation. Catch Dr.
Kaku on the Colbert Report
tonight, July 5th, on Comedy
Central (11:30 EST). And
please, sign-up for our
newsletter below or become
Dr. Kaku’s fan on Facebook
so we can keep you informed
about special events and
developments like our new
vastly-expanded website
COMING SOON!
SIGN-UP FOR OUR
NEWSLETTER BELOW TO BE
NOTIFIED OF THE NEW WEBSITE
LAUNCH!
The Bizarre and Wonderful World of Quantum Theory—And How Understanding It Has Ultimately Changed Our Lives
 |
“In fact, it is
often stated that of
all the theories
proposed in this
century, the
silliest is quantum
theory. Some say
that the only thing
that quantum theory
has going for it, in
fact, is that it is
unquestionably
correct.”
Almost since its inception, the development of quantum theory has been built by some of the greatest minds of their day. Some of the framework for this theory can be traced back to the following discoveries: – In 1897 the discovery of the electron proved there were individual particles that make up the atom. Continue
Reading |
Is It a Good Idea to Nuke the Oil Leak?
 |
There was brief
speculation in the
media about using
nuclear weapons to
seal up the raging
oil leak in the Gulf
of Mexico. I think
this is a bad idea,
from a physics point
of view. Let me say
that my mentor while
I was in high school
and at Harvard,
Edward Teller,
father of the
H-bomb, was a firm
advocate of using
nuclear weapons to
dig out canals and
other grand
engineering
projects. The
logic is this:
when an H-bomb is
detonated
underground, most of
its energy is in the
form of soft X-rays,
which deposit most
of their energy in a
large sphere, where
it is absorbed and
the energy turned to
intense heat. (In
the air, this ball
of hot ionized
plasma rises
rapidly, with cold
air coming in from
the side, which
gives rise to the
familiar mushroom
cloud).
Continue
Reading |
The Birth of Our Universe (It’s Violent & Continually Changing)
 |
Up
until just a few
hundred years ago
most people thought
that the Universe
was a stable, static
place that had been
here forever and
would continue
forever. Today we
know that nothing
could be further
from the truth. In
reality, we know
that the Universe is
a violent and
continually changing
place that was born
in a mere nanosecond
of time in the
spectacular event we
call the Big Bang.
You may have heard
the Big Bang
referred to as the
mother of all
explosions but it
wasn’t an explosion
so much as an
expansion. From a
space that was
infinitely small,
the entire Universe
expanded and
continues even to
this day -13.7
billion years later.
Continue
Reading |
