Different modes of oscillation for a pendulum
The period of a simple pendulum is not a trivial thing, and it depends on the initial conditions.
Shown here are ten different modes of oscillation for the same pendulum. The only difference is the total amount of mechanical energy in the system.
As a result, each one has a completely different period of oscillation, unlike what the small-angle approximation (as taught in high-school) would suggest. They can’t be in sync. You may see some really interesting patterns based on the delay between them in your browser.
The red graph above each pendulum represents the phase portrait for the respective mode of oscillation, with the current state marked as a blue dot. The horizontal axis represents angle (hence why it wraps around the sides) while the vertical axis represents angular velocity.
Pendulums are very interesting dynamical systems, as they are relatively simple to understand but can produce surprisingly complex results in certain cases, such as the chaotic behavior of double pendulums and the odd behavior displayed by coupled pendulums.
“Her native smarts and intuitive people skills had earned her a spot managing a team of 3,000 at the greatest research facility physicists have ever built. And all that was before this summer, when she and her CERN colleagues announced that, yes, they had well and truly captured the Higgs. In doing so, they had nailed the particle that gives other fundamental particles their mass. That in turn completed the so-called standard model of physics, the grand framework that ties together the universe’s three great forces — the strong force, the weak force and electromagnetism — and governs the behavior of subatomic particles. Look around at the familiar universe of planets and suns and moons and people. What happened at CERN helps explain why they exist as they do.”
Valles Caldera: The Science will be uplinked to the Public Television satellite on Thursday, November 29, 2012.
By contacting your local PBS station and requesting the documentary be screened in your area you help by showing audience generated interest. It only takes a few voices for programmers to download and schedule the show.
So here is what you can do between now and November 28th, 2012:
- Use the following link: http://www.pbs.org/about/faq/station-finder/ to find your local PBS station.
- Call or email them & tell them that you want to see: Valles Caldera: The Science. You can provide them this information as well: NOLA: VRCA 000, Feed Date: November 29, 2012: 12:30 – 1330 ET HD 05.
- Pass this info along to your friends and family across the nation so they can see the documentary too!
The stations listen to their viewers and we’d love for you to be able to see it! Please contact us if you need help locating your station.
We really appreciate your interest and time – Thanks!
Seriously - this is one awesome movie. Check out the website to see some clips of this majestic location.
StarTalk with Neil DeGrasse Tyson! This week: THE SCIENCE OF VIDEO GAMES.
Hurricane Sandy Is Even More Impressive From Space - click image for many more, including a time-lapse video | (via Wired Science | Wired.com)
SANDY APPROACHES… (click for the gif)
Modern dinosaur faces modern climate change. (via Tough Old Lizard To Face Grave Romantic Troubles, Say Scientists : Krulwich Wonders… : NPR)
Want to know what it’s like to land on Mars? AMAZING high-res video of Curiosity’s landing.
![Astronomers make observation of distant quasar with “unprecedented sharpness”
An international team of astronomers has observed the heart of a distant quasar with unprecedented sharpness, two million times finer than human vision. The observations, made by connecting the Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) telescope [1] to two others on different continents for the first time, is a crucial step towards the dramatic scientific goal of the “Event Horizon Telescope” project [2]: imaging the supermassive black holes at the centre of our own galaxy and others.
(via ESO - eso1229 - APEX takes part in sharpest observation ever)](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m7ezm8qjrq1qbmi7eo1_500.jpg)
(via ESO - eso1229 - APEX takes part in sharpest observation ever)
At the edge of the solar system, Voyager 1 is reporting a sharp increase in cosmic rays that could herald the spacecraft’s long-awaited entry into interstellar space.
Voyager 1 at the Final Frontier
