Recent comments in /f/science

danielravennest t1_j97e8rr wrote

Reply to comment by fleebleganger in Scientists have figured out a way to engineer wood to trap carbon dioxide through a potentially scalable, energy-efficient process that also makes the material stronger for use in construction by giuliomagnifico

That's a completely wrong number. An 80 foot red oak grown in a forest is about 10 tons. That assumes it is 2 feet in diameter at the base.

Source: former tree farmer, and now woodworker "from the tree". That means I harvest a tree, get it cut into lumber, and dry it. I know how much those logs weigh.

The biggest log I ever dealt with was a 3 feet in diameter x 20 ft long oak, which was 5 tons. That was a yard oak, rather than a forest oak. Lack of competition allowed big side branches and therefore a fat trunk.

A freshly cut southern red oak is about 42 pounds per cubic foot oven dry weight, and an equal amount of water when freshly cut. "Dried" wood contains 6-14% moisture in addition to the dry weight. Wood is porous, and exchanges moisture with air that has any humidity in it. So in practice the weight in a finished product is about 46 pounds per cubic foot.

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danielravennest t1_j97a51j wrote

Reply to comment by altiuscitiusfortius in Scientists have figured out a way to engineer wood to trap carbon dioxide through a potentially scalable, energy-efficient process that also makes the material stronger for use in construction by giuliomagnifico

On the other hand, one old house I lived in needed concrete floor support jacks in the crawl space because the floor joists were too weak on their own. They just didn't have standards and building inspectors back then.

On the other hand, when I renovated, I found the wall studs were actual 2x4s, not 1.5x3.5 like modern ones. But they were rough cut, right from the sawmill.

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Telewyn t1_j9779bx wrote

Reply to comment by PO0tyTng in Scientists create carbon nanotubes out of plastic waste using an energy-efficient, low-cost, low-emissions process. Compared to commercial methods for carbon nanotube production that are being used right now, ours uses about 90% less energy and generates 90%-94% less carbon dioxide by Wagamaga

So, useless for everything then? This will make tiny nanotubes that can't even be woven together, won't it?

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Darkdoomwewew t1_j97567d wrote

Reply to comment by Beyond-Time in Scientists create carbon nanotubes out of plastic waste using an energy-efficient, low-cost, low-emissions process. Compared to commercial methods for carbon nanotube production that are being used right now, ours uses about 90% less energy and generates 90%-94% less carbon dioxide by Wagamaga

And some come back around down the line as we make advances in materials and processes. Progress is progress.

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LudSable t1_j974l7t wrote

Reply to Climate change and the projected savannization of the Brazilian Amazon threaten most land-based mammals that live there, new research shows. The “savannization” here refers to when lush rainforest gives way to a drier, open landscape that resembles savanna but is actually degraded forest. by MistWeaver80

That's why re-planting is crucial.

"How agroforestry can restore degraded lands and provide income in the Amazon

"nearly half of replanted trees die but careful site selection can help"

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Pretty-Theory-5738 t1_j973pod wrote

Reply to comment by Niceotropic in Pharmacological vitamin C inhibits mTOR signaling and tumor growth by degrading Rictor and inducing HMOX1 expression (Feb 2023) by basmwklz

Technically you could also deliver a low dose intravenously as well, so that’s not really a complete descriptor either. A more clear descriptor for a lay audience might be “high dose intravenous”.

But this actually still misses a small nuance, which can be understood once we know the context of how scientists tend to use the jargon of “pharmacological dose”. In bio research, we use this term mainly in contrast with “biological dose”. A biological dose refers to something relatively within the range of what could occur naturally within the body, through food consumption and/or the body’s creation of that chemical, depending on which chemical we’re talking about.

A ‘pharmacological dose’ is something significantly higher than what would occur naturally in the body. In this case with vitamin C, it’s more possible to achieve a “pharmacological dose” through IV (although with many other chemicals you can achieve a “pharmacological” dose orally if there’s not much restriction on absorption). Anyways, the point is that even saying “high dose” is not fully informative, because the scientist could be referring to just a high ‘biological dose’. Saying pharmaceutical dose gives a nod to the relative scale of the dose that we’re talking about.

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