Bristol physicists break 150-year-old law

University of Bristol ^ | July 19, 2011 | Unknown

[decimon]

Thermo couple ping.

[MWS]

I hope it carries a hefty jail sentence and/or fine.

[frogjerk]

Not much of a law then.

[BipolarBob]

Arrest them.breaking the law is breaking the law. I don’t care if they are physicists.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

First she’s on Dancing with the Stars
Then she buys a mansion in AZ
Then she has a NYT best selling book
Now, a University is named after her!

Wow! Bristol Palin is on the move!!!

[bvw]

Phonons and Fermi-levels.

[ClearCase_guy]

Perhaps this is connected to the nearby thread — “Men who buy sex commit more crimes, study finds”

[Constitution Day]

This thread needs a Judas Priest soundtrack.

[KarlInOhio]

For the past 150-plus years, the Wiedemann-Franz law has proved to be remarkably robust, the ratio varying at most by around 50 per cent amongst the thousands of metallic systems studied.

50% variance? That's barely a suggestion, much less a law.

186,000 miles per second speed limit ... now that's a law.

[ImJustAnotherOkie]

The new one we'll call Obama's Law.

It only applies to what he says it does.

[farlander]

The really interesting thing here is that the metal is 100,000 more heat conductive than expected. There are serious commercial implications/uses to this.

[thackney]

the electrons split into two distinct components or excitations, one carrying spin but not charge (the spinon), the other carrying charge but not spin (the holon). When the holon encounters an impurity in the chain of atoms it has no choice but for its motion to be reflected.

The technical details for those of us that wanted to know how.

[thackney]

A non-conductive heat sink for power electronics, LEDs, etc.

It has real uses, not just a gee-whiz factor for nerds.

[ImJustAnotherOkie]

I wonder what was expected?

A lot of spin? Or lack of spin?

[Eagle of Liberty]

The really interesting thing here is that the metal is 100,000 more heat conductive than expected. There are serious commercial implications/uses to this.

Wow. That's pretty neat!! So much for the LAW, huh?

[Sgt_Schultze]

If this “law” 150 years old, shouldn’t it be considered “settled science” and thus beyond question?

[Robert A Cook PE]

Sounds interesting. As you point out - IF (big “IF” there) it works out in practice, there could be a lot of applications.

(But the “science” was settled” wasn’t it? “Everybody” agrees on the “scientific consensus” involved, right? Where have we heard that recently?)

[decimon]

A non-conductive heat sink for power electronics, LEDs, etc.

Apparently.

Maybe internal combustion engines - get the heat from where you don't want it to where you might want it. Put the waste heat to work.

[aruanan]

Wow. That's pretty neat!! So much for the LAW, huh?

A natural law or physical law is a description of observed regularities of behavior. It's not necessarily the case that it will apply in all situations. And it's certainly not true that there are "laws" that physical systems must obey.