7 ms·

Nope, the quantum dynamics of individual atoms of carbon cause the buckling, no gradient needed. It doesn't make macro sense. I'm leaving the door all the way o

Nope, the quantum dynamics of individual atoms of carbon cause the buckling, no gradient needed. It doesn't make macro sense. I'm leaving the door all the way open for some alternative explanation, but so far the science seems solid. It needs to be replicated and scaled up. The weird bit is the cooling while not passing current. Does the system as a whole have a tendency to cool, and why does removing energy as electricity not cool it down? Is the quantum buckling effectively separated from the heat of the system? Particles are weird.

gus_massa 5y ago
You are confusing the quantum uncertainty effect with the Brownian motion. The quantum mechanics effect of the membrane make are real and produce effect like the Zero-energy point https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-point_energy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-point_energy But the article is about noise caused by Brownian motion, that is a classic mechanics effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownian_motion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownian_motion
- robbedpeter 5y ago
  I guess I'm confused about the source of the buckling, then. Is it directly caused by air molecules colliding with the graphene? If that's the case, then by definition, as current is produced, energy is taken from the collisions mechanically, and temperature would decrease. Thibado says that when current is not flowing the resistor cools down, and implies that when current is flowing, it doesn't heat up. >>“People may think that current flowing in a resistor causes it to heat up, but the Brownian current does not. In fact, if no current was flowing, the resistor would cool down,” Thibado explained. “What we did was reroute the current in the circuit and transform it into something useful.” If current is produced and the system isn't extracting heat (cooling) then the energy has to come from somewhere, right? That's why I was assuming they were talking about the Brownian motion of the graphene itself. If it's just the graphene, the system would work in a vacuum. If it's air molecules then Thibado has to be wrong, or the quote was sloppy or out of context. I'm gonna reread the paper, at least.
  - gus_massa 5y ago
    The buckling is caused by hits of the air molecules, sound waves transmitted by the support, photons that hit the surface (probably very small at room temperature), and any other stuff ... The idea is that the resistor acts as a small generator that produces a current that is electric notice. This transform some mechanical energy into electricity, and in a magical universe it would cool down the resistor. The problem is that the rest of the circuit is also producing electric noise. So the small current of the noise of the rest of the circuit goes to the resistor and is dissipated as heat and warms the resistor. If you live in a magical word, you can magically turn off the noise of the rest of the circuit, but in the real word that is impossible and both effect cancel and the resistor keeps it's temperature. This is pretty standard theory, but perhaps it's not the best way to explain it. My guess is that the important result of the research paper is that the spectrum of the noise of the part of the circuit with the graphene is different of the spectrum of the noise of the resistor. It's interesting, but it does not break the current laws of Physics. >>> What we did was reroute the current in the circuit and transform it into something useful That's a direct jump into the "totally wrong or Nobel price" category. That's a claim that breaks the Second Law, so they are totally wrong or they get a Nobel price, there is no middle ground. (Sometimes the Nobel committee takes a few year to assign the price, but a result like this would cause immediately a huge discussion in the Physic community, like the discovery of the Higgs boson or LIGO.)

gus_massa 5y ago

You are confusing the quantum uncertainty effect with the Brownian motion. The quantum mechanics effect of the membrane make are real and produce effect like the Zero-energy point https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-point_energy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-point_energy But the article is about noise caused by Brownian motion, that is a classic mechanics effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownian_motion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownian_motion

robbedpeter 5y ago
I guess I'm confused about the source of the buckling, then. Is it directly caused by air molecules colliding with the graphene? If that's the case, then by definition, as current is produced, energy is taken from the collisions mechanically, and temperature would decrease. Thibado says that when current is not flowing the resistor cools down, and implies that when current is flowing, it doesn't heat up. >>“People may think that current flowing in a resistor causes it to heat up, but the Brownian current does not. In fact, if no current was flowing, the resistor would cool down,” Thibado explained. “What we did was reroute the current in the circuit and transform it into something useful.” If current is produced and the system isn't extracting heat (cooling) then the energy has to come from somewhere, right? That's why I was assuming they were talking about the Brownian motion of the graphene itself. If it's just the graphene, the system would work in a vacuum. If it's air molecules then Thibado has to be wrong, or the quote was sloppy or out of context. I'm gonna reread the paper, at least.
- gus_massa 5y ago
  The buckling is caused by hits of the air molecules, sound waves transmitted by the support, photons that hit the surface (probably very small at room temperature), and any other stuff ... The idea is that the resistor acts as a small generator that produces a current that is electric notice. This transform some mechanical energy into electricity, and in a magical universe it would cool down the resistor. The problem is that the rest of the circuit is also producing electric noise. So the small current of the noise of the rest of the circuit goes to the resistor and is dissipated as heat and warms the resistor. If you live in a magical word, you can magically turn off the noise of the rest of the circuit, but in the real word that is impossible and both effect cancel and the resistor keeps it's temperature. This is pretty standard theory, but perhaps it's not the best way to explain it. My guess is that the important result of the research paper is that the spectrum of the noise of the part of the circuit with the graphene is different of the spectrum of the noise of the resistor. It's interesting, but it does not break the current laws of Physics. >>> What we did was reroute the current in the circuit and transform it into something useful That's a direct jump into the "totally wrong or Nobel price" category. That's a claim that breaks the Second Law, so they are totally wrong or they get a Nobel price, there is no middle ground. (Sometimes the Nobel committee takes a few year to assign the price, but a result like this would cause immediately a huge discussion in the Physic community, like the discovery of the Higgs boson or LIGO.)