Today is Nostalgic Tuesday for me in Munich, so I'll share stories from my stay here a little more than 14 years ago, and more.  I would say that Munchen ( nowhere do you see Munich ) is my favorite German city.  Note how far south it is, making weather here better than the rest of the country.   This particularly featured day was a time for  Fasching , the carnival season. Carnival originally began as a pagan festival, and later became associated with the Catholic Church as a celebration the day before the beginning of Lent. During the main Fasching season in Munich, there are more than 800 balls, the biggest parties with thousands of people One early example for this blog site  goes back more than 14 years: In 2010, this was my 600th posting since my blog began. I woke up in Munich only aware that I was to have lunch at the Hotel Konigshof. I began to walk around and found myself next to Marienplatz: I don't think this is how people from Munich dress on a normal day. Most had

  From the 11 September 2023 American Energy Society,  Energy Matters : True or False?  Global warming is becoming so serious that the world is now using less coal.  FALSE.  However, mostly Asia is increasing usage. -   In 2022, global coal consumption increased 3.3% to 8.3 billion tons, setting a new record.   That record will be broken in 2023 due to increased industrial use of coal in Asia.   Indeed, China, India and Southeast Asian countries consume   3 out of every 4 tons   of coal worldwide.   China, India and Southeast Asian countries together are expected to account for 3 out of every 4 tonnes of coal consumed worldwide in 2023. Is this a solution for global warming? ( Hint:  I don't think so .) -   It takes a lot of energy and equipment to capture CO2 before it escapes into the atmosphere. However, MIT researchers have designed a   capture   system   that uses an electrochemical cell at room temperature and requires less energy   than conventional, amine-based carbon-captu

Nearly a dozen years ago I wrote an article for  The Huffington Pos t on  Star Power for Humanit y.  The latest June issue of  Scientific American  featured  Star Power: What is the future of fusion energy?   You can click on that link for the full article.  I'll summarize: This past December, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory ( LLNR ) claimed a breakthrough in attaining net positive with their laser fusion system.  No one had ever done that before. As an aside, I worked there in the 1970's on that project, and left because I could not envision the laser that would accomplish this task.  Can you believe that was around half a century ago? The bad news is that net positive is a long way from commercialization.  And certainly, that intriguing ultimate laser has not yet been invented. Well anyway, this article was written by Philip Ball, a British science writer who is my same age.  He has a PhD in physics from Bristol University.  Easy to read  Sci Am  article with no eq

Scientists have been speculating on an even lighter element than Hydrogen .  Will this revolutionize chemistry? How can this be?  Hydrogen has just one proton and one electron. Well, Muonium also has an electron.... BUT NO PROTON .  There is an antimuon inside, which is lighter than a proton. The reason why you don't see Muonium in the Table of Elements is that it is not an element, for it is energetically impossible for this antimuon to transform into a proton. Thus the answer to the title above is NO. Might also mention Positronium, to be defined next. Some background. Back to hydrogen, its simplest isotope deuterium has one electron, one proton and one neutron, while tritium has one electron, one proton and two neutrons.   Sorry to keep bringing up these terms, but hydrogen is also known as protium There are 90 naturally-occurring elements on Earth, plus 18 or so other artificial ones. Muonium is artificial. Has one electron.  No proton or neutron. The nucleus is an antimuon, wh