ScienceIQ.com

Getting Burned By Acid Rain

If we measure the pH of distilled water, we will find that it is most often in the middle of the pH scale (7) - not too acidic, not too basic. Rainwater, without a lot of outside contaminants, tends to be a bit more acidic, between 5 and 6 on the pH scale, because it interacts with the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. But the average rainfall in ...

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AcidRain
Biology

Respect Your Nose

Our language seems to indicate that we think of the world as divided up into things that 'smell' and things that don't. Garbage smells. Groceries don't. A dirty sock smells. A clean one doesn't. That ... Continue reading

NoseScience
Biology

A Humongous Fungus Among Us

Did you ever wonder what the world's largest organism is? If we had to guess, maybe we'd pick an elephant, a giant sequoia or a whale. Well, those choices would be wrong; this organism is actually a ... Continue reading

AHumongousFungus
Geology

Finding Ice In The Rocks--Evidence Of Earth's Ice Ages

In the late 1700s, geologists began trying to determine how huge boulders of granite weighing several tons could have moved as much as 80 km (50 miles) from their origins in the Swiss Alps. Some ... Continue reading

EarthsIceAges
Engineering

The Truth About Atomic And Hydrogen Bombs

In the 1930's Enrico Fermi and other scientists studying the properties of radioactive materials observed an interesting phenomenon. They found that the readings taken with a Geiger counter were lower ... Continue reading

AtomicAndHydrogenBombs

How To Calculate The Volume Of A Cylinder

VolumeOfACylinder Calculating the volume of a cylinder is even easier than calculating its area. All you have to do is recognize that a cylinder is no more than just a bunch of circles stacked to a certain height, just like a cube is just a bunch of squares stacked up one on top of the other, and every circle in the stack is identical. The area of each circle is obtained by multiplying the radius of the circle by itself and then by the value of p. The length of the cylinder is just the length of the cylinder. The volume of the cylinder can then be calculated by the general formula: V = pr2l.

As an example of how to use this formula, suppose you have a large water storage tank by your garden that you need to fill with water. You also promised to take the kids to a baseball game in exactly four hours. Your garden hose delivers 25 liters of water every minute, and you want to know how long it will take to fill the tank this way The tank is three meters long and 1.5 meters wide, which means the radius is 0.75 meters. (use p = 3.1416 for a more accurate estimate). The volume is therefore; V = pr2, = 3.1416 X 3 X 0.75 X 0.75, = 5.8905 cubic meters.

Each cubic meter contains 1000 liters, so the tank holds 5890.5 liters. At 25 liters per minute it will take 235.62 minutes to fill the tank from your garden hose, or 3 hours and 56 minutes. Turn the hose on right now, and don't forget to turn it off when you take the kids to the baseball game.