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June 15

Phobos orbital height - I must be missing something

Phobos orbits at a height above the Martian datum of 6km. Olympus Mons is 26km in height. Maybe Phobos has a stable orbit and won't collide with it, but I feel like I'm missing something or misinterpreting the data? Surely Phobos can't really be that low? Dr-ziego (talk) 12:10, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Where did you get the idea that Phobos orbits 6 km above Mars? It's about 6,000 km, per our article. Matt Deres (talk) 12:19, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

It'll collide eventually causing a titanic explosion. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 13:48, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Phobos has an orbital inclination of 1.093° degrees, relative to the Martian equator. Olympus Mons is located 18.65° North of the Martian equator. Therefore, Phobos never overflies Olympus Mons. LongHairedFop (talk) 13:39, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

Oh right, that too. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 13:54, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

On another hand, Pavonis Mons is on the equator. —Tamfang (talk) 07:29, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

Pavonis is 1.48°North, so Phobos doesn't overfly it. However, IIRC, the inclination of moon's orbits can vary over times, so eventually Phobos will overfly it. LongHairedFop (talk) 22:05, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

I don't know what's at 1.48°; the highest point? the middle of the caldera? The south rim crosses the equator. —Tamfang (talk) 03:08, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

It could make a Hole around Mars as postulated by Jerome Bixby. Sjö (talk) 07:14, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

What airliner requires the most runway at over 40 Celsius and 0 to 1000 feet elevation?

I've heard it might not actually be the Airbus A380. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 13:44, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

For passenger aircraft, it is the Airbus A380. If you look into cargo planes, the AN-225 Mriya requires more (about 9,000 ft for the A300 and 10,000 for the Mriya). 209.149.113.5 (talk) 14:00, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Isn't there a big difference in minimum recommended runway between frigid, low ladenness and good weather and hot, highly laden and unfavorable wind? Or landing in tropical rain while highly laden for landing lengths? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 14:22, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Yes. A pilot should use the temperature, humidity, wind speed/direction, and air pressure to calculate the "density altitude", which is the altitude the aircraft appears to be at if the conditions were optimal. Then, with the density altitude, the minimum required runway length is calculated. There are cases where normal airports shut down runways because they are too short for the calculated density altitude. Minimum length can get very long. In Tibet, there is a runway that is at least 3 miles long - and sometimes it can get too short. 209.149.113.5 (talk) 14:49, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

This isn't under the above conditions and also doesn't seem to clearly specify it's referring to the rare 747-8I (passenger) variant but for "minimum requirements that apply to an aircraft at Maximum Certified Takeoff Weight (MTOW), taking off at sea level under ISA condition" gives Airbus A380-800 2900 metres and Boeing 747-8 3050 metres [1] Nil Einne (talk) 16:44, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

This quick guide also gives similar figures for the MLW [2]. Actually the 747-400 is the also higher. Nil Einne (talk) 16:59, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

I think you should be able to work out from these documents if the above is correct for the specified conditions [3] [4] Nil Einne (talk) 17:11, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

So it appears that at maximum takeoff weight, 0 pressure altitude and 30C sea level equivalent (it doesn't give more) the 747-8I needs a longer takeoff than the A-380-800 but it's roughly the same at 1,000 feet and the other way around above that. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 22:30, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

Solar noons and midnights

Earth in its Orbit

The occurrence of the "Number of solar noons (middays)" is always equal to "Number of solar midnights"

The diagram (not to the scale) on the right-hand side depicts the path traced by the earth for day and night in its orbit (either circular or elliptical) around the sun. Any point on the outer circle represents solar midnight while on inner circle solar noon. The length of an outer circle is greater than the length of the inner circle and hence Arc I > Arc II. This means the appearance of midnight points (anti noon) are more than middays points (solar noon) when the earth revolves around the sun in its orbit – Any special reasons

As # of midnights = # of solar noons when the length of arc I = length of arc II but since arc I > arc II, therefore

Are solar noons and solar midnights equal in numbers in the arc I and arc II or after the completion of 4 years?--Eclectic Eccentric Kamikaze (talk) 13:57, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

... or another way of looking at the situation is that the midnight point is always moving faster than the noon point. Dbfirs 14:46, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

The first thing to bear in mind is tidal force. If the Earth did not rotate, or more precisely, were tidally locked, its outer edge would have to revolve faster than the inner edge, like a phonograph record. This doesn't precisely match the expected orbital period, so there are tides raised by the Sun - the other part of the planet gets a gentle nudge like it should fly off to space, while the inner has a gentle nudge to fall toward the Sun, though of course if separated somehow neither would get far before returning where they were in some sort of elliptical orbit, sans planetary integrity. So the point is, the "midnight" part of Earth is always going a bit faster to make up the distance. Wnt (talk) 18:48, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

In other words: there are just as many middays on the inner circle as midnights on the outer one, but space (not time!) between midnights is a bit larger. Right? 194.174.76.21 (talk) 10:15, 18 June 2018 (UTC) Marco Pagliero Berlin

With rotating systems, it is often more useful to consider things in terms of angles, rather than distances. The earth is moving 2pi radians per year. There are 365.25(ish) middays and midnights for a point on the surface in each year. Therefore, each successive midday is separated by 2pi/365.25, and the same for each successive midnight. The midnights are further out, so the linear distance between them is greater, but that's not relevant here. MChesterMC (talk) 10:31, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Does it mean time dilate during nighttime when the earth orbits the sun? - The Earth spins at the same speed no matter if it's day or night.

Any point on the outer circle, which represents midnight if connected to the center of the sun via a straight line passes through the noon (inner circle). When there is midnight, there is a noon, therefore, duration/occurrence of midnights must be equivalent to the duration/occurrence of noons and hence their lengths.50.66.1.32 (talk) 18:20, 18 June 2018 (UTC)eek

Attribution note - the diagrams at Talk:Season#Earth's Rotation and its Orbital Motion were uploaded by Eclectic Eccentric Kamikaze, and not as stated by Dbfirs. Just to clear up any possible misconceptions from the present discussion, clocks set to mean solar time and sundials when adjusted to mean solar time measure time at the same rate whatever the time of day and wherever on the surface of the Earth they may be located. 86.132.186.246 (talk) 13:26, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

The statement I made was about the text, not the diagrams, but I agree with your comment about normal clocks. A sundial could be adjusted to mean solar time by using a clock. Dbfirs 19:19, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

I believe most people who are not dab-hand in astronomy are messed up with sidereal and solar times. Astronomy isn’t my field - My biggest apology for the diagram in Talk:Season#Earth's Rotation and its Orbital Motion.

Please read EEK 139 if it doesn’t bother you. Scroll up couple of posts to "Reply #23 on: June 20, 2018, 02:38:00 PM". I believe it may help. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.66.1.32 (talk) 19:34, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Bees and butterflies question

There has been an abortion debate in Argentina in those days, as the Congress is discussing a bill to legalize it. But there is a part of the text of the bill that I did not understand: translated to English, instead of talking about women, it talks about "women and people that may become pregnant". It feels weird having to ask this, but does such wording make sense, can someone other than a woman become pregnant? I know that there are transsexual people and sex reassignment surgery, but is that enough to make a person that was once a man to become pregnant and deliver a baby? Did that ever happened? Or is it just political correctness gone mad? Cambalachero (talk) 19:17, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

"No results found for 'women and people that may become pregnant'".[5] Maybe it is not available in English. Can you post the text in the appropriate language? Bus stop (talk) 19:25, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

If "women" is taken to mean "adult females" then of course other people who may become pregnant are females below the age of adulthood. DuncanHill (talk) 19:28, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

And see also male pregnancy. DuncanHill (talk) 19:29, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Also, women can consider themselves men and still become pregnant. Bus stop (talk) 19:40, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

That's under transgender pregnancy. Also, some people regard themselves as a third sex, etc. My feeling is that "women and people who may become pregnant" is inelegant; one (presumably the latter) should suffice for most intentions. True male pregnancy in humans is probably not far off anyway, so "people" would seem like a reasonable replacement in a forward-looking statement. Wnt (talk) 21:45, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

It's downright criminal that every news outlet to discuss this bill doesn't tell us what it's frickin' name is!. Makes it very hard to search for. Still looking - I was hoping to just read the Spanish version directly. Someguy1221 (talk) 22:16, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

OK, I think this is the bill that was just voted on, but I don't see what the OP is referring to anywhere. Someguy1221 (talk) 22:54, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

The term in Spanish is "mujeres y personas gestantes". I have not found a single-word translation of "gestante" to English, so I made the translation myself. The word would be an adjetive for a living being with the hability of becoming pregnant. In any case, I was not asking about the bill (that's a local bill in a Spanish-speaking country, after all; I do not expect many people abroad to be following those news events) but about the pregnancy aspect. If I understood the article, barring discussions of what would be theoretically possible there are no actual cases of children born from male-to-female transgender people. There are some named cases of children born from female-to-male transgender people (that is, someone who was born as a woman, and retains all the required organs), but how often does that happen? Do they get pregnant as easily and frequently as straight women, or are those special fortunate cases? Cambalachero (talk) 00:36, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

[6]. It has apparently been the standard language used by the Ministry of Health since 2015 in cases regarding abortion, and explicitly with transmen and similar situations in mind. As for how often this happens, we have an article on Transgender pregnancy, but no statistics, and I also could not find any statistics on this in the scientific/medical literature. I would assume that it is quite rare. However, as to how easy it is, that depends. The majority of transmen do not undergo sex reassignment, leaving them physically as capable of conceiving and bearing a child as they would be otherwise. There is insufficient data to say what the long-term effects of hormone transition therapy are on the fertility of transmen. It's believed that such therapy impairs fertility, especially while it is being taken (and may also impact fetal development), but it's not clear to what extent. There is a review on the subject here, but mostly it just clarifies that we don't know a lot. Someguy1221 (talk) 00:53, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

"Pregnant people" is also used more and more in English these days, rather than the phrase "pregnant women" that was nearly exclusively used historically. Some examples: [7] [8] [9] [10]

Something of an aside, but "bees and butterflies"? Are they the Argentine equivalent of the birds and the bees? DuncanHill (talk) 00:59, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

The equivalent of Spanish gestante is English gestant from gestation, which is a rather unsual word compared to pregnant. --62.99.192.174 (talk) 23:16, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

I am reminded of the term Embarazada. Bus stop (talk) 23:25, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

Public Health England no longer offers cancer screening to "women". It offers it to "anyone with a cervix". 86.132.186.246 (talk) 10:47, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

June 16

if the half-life of estradiol cypionate is around 8 days, what would be the half life of estradiol dicypionate?

Is there a rule of thumb for estimating the half-life depot steroid medications if both hydroxyl groups on a steroid are esterified versus just one hydroxyl group? I note that estradiol dipropionate is an ester described as having a relatively long half-life, but this article seems to imply that diesterification can lengthen the half-life by two to eightfold, since before the innovation of estradiol dipropionate, most esters were injected 2-4 times a week, now could be injected once every 1-2 weeks. Yanping Nora Soong (talk) 04:12, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

According to Ullmann's "Hormones", esterification of estrogens increases their duration of action. A similar approach would be increasing the carboxylic acid chain length (like in the series Estradiol valerate, Estradiol enanthate, Estradiol cypionate). Furthermore, alkylation of estradiol derivatives at position 17 (ethinyl estradiol, quinestrol) increases their oral activity many times. --62.99.192.174 (talk) 23:39, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

This doesn't answer my question. I already know that!! I can't figure out how to apply Bates' equation in radioactive decay for a decay chain to this problem. Yanping Nora Soong (talk) 01:30, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

Do I add the half lives?? Do I multiply the half lives? I've tried all sorts of approximations and differential equations. Is the half life more like 16 days or 64 days?? The problem with the Bates equation is that it does a poor job when k1 and k2 are very close in magnitude, because you have to divide zero over zero. Agh! Yanping Nora Soong (talk) 01:33, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

I thought you were trying to deduce the pharmacokinetics of some hypothetical estradiol esters. But is it first order, zero order, nonlinear? First there is hydrolysis of the ester, then there is the metabolism of the estradiol, each of which seem to follow different kinetics, also depending on the route of administration. A Google search for "estradiol ester pharmacokinetics" and "estradiol ester metabolism kinetics" throws up lots of interesting hits. --62.99.192.174 (talk) 02:12, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

This is a a depot *diester* prodrug. Both functional groups must be removed to produce the active drug. I'm not interested in monoester pharmacokinetics and I already did the relevant research, hence why I'm here. I also tutor biochemistry... Also why aren't people reading my entire question?  :( I really need help with the Bateman equation. I don't need a lecture on routes of administration for a depot formulation? Yanping Nora Soong (talk) 05:19, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

@Yanping Nora Soong: The Bateman formula gets very complicated for intermediates in a decay chain. However, the stability of the first isotope, or compound, has nothing to do with anything that comes afterward (some of those pi terms where you multiply a series of numbers don't have anything to multiply). In this case it probably is easier to redo the derivation of the math than to figure out what the formula means. You are looking at estradiol dicypionate -> estradiol cypionate -> estradiol, I think. Now do you already know the biological activity and the rate of decay for each of these intermediates? Then we can go over it. But if your assumption is that the first ester is broken at the same rate as the second, well, to begin with, we have no idea if that's true since this is biology (and chemistry...), but if it is true, then half-life of estradiol cypionate should logically be the point where just 25% of the estradiol dicypionate has been broken down to estradiol (a 50/50 chance for each bond), and two half-lives for estradiol (that would leave 25% left) would correspond to leaving 1-0.75*0.75 = 44% of the estradiol dicypionate or cypionate left. Note I'm not expecting a true half-life relationship for the "E1-2C -> estradiol decay" starting with E2C because the nature of "E1-2C" will change over time. Wnt (talk) 13:28, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

1 AU

How thick is the belt? What is the height and width? 123.108.246.27 (talk) 18:46, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

What belt? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 19:23, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

See Astronomical unit. Ian.thomson (talk) 19:45, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

See also Kuiper belt, possibly. If by 'width' the OP means 'span of distances from the Sun, then that article suggests 30–50 AU, hence a 'width' of about 20 AU. Thickness and height presumably mean maximum (known) distance span perpendicular to the Ecliptic plane, which the article does not specifically state, but applying simple maths (I actually drew a diagram) to the stated orbital inclinations of "up to 30°" I come up with about 35 AU either side of the ecliptic at 50 AU out, so about 70 AU. Doubtless others can find Reliable Sources for an answer better than my Synthesis/OR. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.125.75.224 (talk) 09:46, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Retaining carbonation

Suppose I want to open a cold, carbonated beverage and have it retain the maximum possible carbonation when I take the first sip, right after the pressure has dropped to atmospheric. Holding constant things like starting temperature and without previous agitation, do I lose less carbonation by the most sudden pressure drop, like popping the cap on a glass bottle, or by lowering the pressure as slowly as possible, like v-e-r-y slowly unscrewing a screw cap, and letting the pressure drop infinitesimally slowly? Or would just unscrewing a cap at a typical fast rate retain the most bubble? What is the scientific basis for the conclusion? Edison (talk) 19:06, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

If you open the cap as slowly as possible, the bottle will have been open for a long time, and will thus be entirely flat. For openings that last no more than a few seconds, I don't think it makes any appreciable difference, except that if you actually let the gas undergo free expansion it won't cool off and will thus keep the interior a bit warmer (which accelerates loss of the dissolved gas). --Tardis (talk) 21:38, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

I guess my phrasing left open the prospect of taking an hour or more to unscrew the cap, leaving the pop warm and flat. In practice, I might do it “fast” in one-half second from first escape of pressure up to 10 seconds to very slowly release the pressure from the time it is first heard hissing out. I wondered if a sudden drop, like rapid unscrewing or popping a metal cap from a glass bottle would produce a shock causing a greater loss of carbonation, similar to shaking it or setting it down hard before opening it, which clearly causes a massive loss of carbonation. As I asked initially, what topics in chemistry address the issue of the rate at which gas dissolved in liquid is liberated in a solution at atmospheric pressure. From experiments done long ago I think the volume of carbon dioxide might initially be equal to or even greater than the volume of the liquid, which itself is amazing. Edison (talk) 14:12, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

From a knowledge of brewing and beverages I can confirm your last point. The volume of CO₂ per volume (of liquid) is for real ale in good condition considered to be a little over 1. However, in other beverages it can be several times this. To quote from Beverages: Technology, Chemistry and Microbiology by Alan H. Varnam & Jane P Sutherland (Chapman & Hall 1994), p 92: "The optimum level of carbonation varies according to the flavour and perceived character of the different drinks. In general terms, fruit drinks are carbonated to a low level (ca. 1 volume CO₂), colas, ginger beer, alcohol-containing drinks, etc., to a medium level (2-3 volumes CO₂) and mixer drinks such as tonic water and ginger ale to a high level (ca. 4.5 volumes), to allow for dilutions in the non-carbonated liquor. Soda water filled into syphons, however, contains up to 6 volumes of CO₂ to maintain internal pressure during use."

My personal experience (OR warning!) of opening bottles of carbonated drinks with a higher than usual overpressure, perhaps due to warming, agitation, prolonged secondary fermentation in the container (which for real ale is by definition mandatory), or a combination of these, is that rapid opening may lead to immediate excessive foaming (aka 'fobbing') but that this can be mitigated by slower release of pressure taking at least several seconds – longer than that might reduce the over-foaming even more, but who would have the patience? {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.125.75.224 (talk) 13:23, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Mystery tide pool creature (Southern California)

What is this thing? I assume it's just the mouth/siphon of something hiding in a rock crevice, and it was shooting jets of water. 169.228.163.250 (talk) 20:10, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

Dejavacrapped link: [11] Every pageview you make on the internet that Google doesn't know about is a theft, and therefore, a revolutionary act. Wnt (talk) 22:21, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

Kind of gross looking. See Trypophobia. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:41, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

I see the extremities of many thin tentacles sorrounding some thick ones sorrounding a mouth. It seems to me to be a retracted sea anemone waiting for high tide. Some see anemones do live in rock cavities, although I don't know whether they can dig one themselves. 194.174.76.21 (talk) 15:49, 18 June 2018 (UTC) Marco Pagliero Berlin

June 17

Bateman equation

Suppose A decays to B via first order rate constant k1 and B decays to C via first order rate constant k2. All the treatments of the Bateman equation in radioactive decay I've found assume that k1 is never close in magnitude to k2. This is really frustrating because I want to use it to approximately model to my pharmacological diester duration of action problem. If k1 = k2 (you would think this is a simple situation!!) then you get division of zero over zero and l'Hôpital's rule doesn't solve the problem. (I've even tried using the ratio k2/k1). Help? If k1=k2=0.086 (corresponding to half lives of 8 days each), then how much time does it take for half of A to break down to C? Is it more like 16 days or 64 days? Yanping Nora Soong (talk) 01:43, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

I get about 18 days, just using a secret engineer's method (a spreadsheet model, renders most calculus redundant). The mass of B is a maximum at about day 11. Greglocock (talk) 06:01, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

In your problem when $k_{1}=k_{2}=k$ and $A(0)=1$, $B(0)=0$ and $C(0)=0$

$C(t)=1-e^{-kt}(kt+1)$.

which, when $C=1/2$, leads to $kt\approx 1.65$ and $t\approx 1.65/0.086=19.2$ days. Ruslik_Zero 10:19, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

Thank you!!!!! I am also going to write a script for a Monte Carlo method later. Now I suspect because of increased steric bulk that k2 is slightly bigger than k1 (but around the same order of magnitude), but the problem k1=k2 was bugging me because I was worried that the half-life was unbounded. It turns out that HRT users report that a med that includes this diester (Climacteron) is injected every 30 days (although manufacturer monograph says 4-8 weeks). Yanping Nora Soong (talk) 17:21, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

Your problem is the repeated eigenvalue issue in linear differential equations. It’s usually as far as i know solved by multiplying C1e^kt by t and then adding C2e^kt, which is the same thing really as what the engineer said above. Something similar in decaying harmonic motion is called “criticallydamped.” — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.128.146.22 (talk) 18:10, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

Hmmmm... per my logic in the last question section I would think that if the half-life of each of two bonds is 8 days, then after 19.2 days, each bond is only unbroken 19% of the time, so the amount with both broken at that point is 81%*81% = 66%. I think the difference in the math above is that you suppose the half-life of A is the same as the half-life of B -- but in the previous question A has *two* ester bonds either of which can be broken while B just has one, so we'd expect a different rate constant. Again, I don't really know the stability of A and it doesn't have to be half of B or any other particular value, but I just thought I should point this out. Wnt (talk) 21:42, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

I've realized this -- there are two intermediates -- but I made that approximation to try to obtain a value that made sense. I saw a "complex" chain treatment that looked like my problem, and I'll try a Monte Carlo method later. Thank you so much!!! Yanping Nora Soong (talk) 02:04, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

• For the complete math: the original problem is a "simple" matrix differential equation ${\begin{bmatrix}{\dot {A}}\\{\dot {B}}\end{bmatrix}}={\begin{bmatrix}-k_{1}&0\\k_{1}&-k_{2}\end{bmatrix}}{\begin{bmatrix}A\\B\end{bmatrix}}$ (add a column/row if you want C), which does have an analytical solution in the general case. Tigraan^{Click here to contact me} 11:47, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Dividing line between angina and heart attack

Doesn't angina always involve at least some loss of oxygen to the heart, and therefore a possibility of damage? So if a self-interested hospital wants to increase revenue, what’s to stop the hospital from calling a case of angina a heart attack? Is there news or opinions in media about this as a conflict of interest? Thanks 67.128.146.22 (talk) 10:01, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

There are tons of literature about differential diagnosis of heart attack and angina pectoris. You can search yourself in Google. Ruslik_Zero 12:23, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

”you can search yourself in Google” is a weird response for a volunteer at reference desk.67.128.146.22 (talk) 17:57, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

At an academic reference desk, the answer is sometimes "here are the search terms you need; look through them, and feel free to come back if you want further assistance". Nyttend (talk) 01:10, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

(I am assuming, based on your IP address, that you're interested in the U.S. "healthcare system".) Most U.S. hospitals bill on a fee-for-service basis; that is, the charges are based on the services and procedures performed, not on the specific diagnosis attached to a particular patient. If a patient undergoes cardiac catheterization, the bill is the same whether the diagnosis is "angina" or "infarct". (That oversimplifies a bit; in practice the billing goes into rather a lot of arcane detail, with separate charges for staff, operating room time, drugs, instruments, tests, etc.)

Now, if a hospital makes a habit of over-diagnosing and thereby performing unnecessary tests and procedures, pushback happens in a number of ways and places. Insurance companies tend to notice when one hospital seems to have unusual patterns of diagnosis and treatment, and will start to deny reimbursements that aren't accompanied by sufficient documentary evidence. Overdiagnosis to increase billings is a gross breach of medical ethics, and can lead to both civil and criminal penalties for the parties involved.

(More common and more difficult to deal with is over-testing and over-treatment done in good faith. For physicians, it's hard – and sometimes legally risky – to tell a patient that expensive tests aren't necessary; it's hard to tell a patient that the best way to treat their condition is sometimes to do nothing. This New Yorker article is an accessible overview.) TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:00, 17 June 2018 (UTC::thanks good response67.128.146.22 (talk) 17:57, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

June 18

Terminal dehydration mechanism

I looked for this on Google, but all the results I saw were too technical for me to understand.

If you die of terminal dehydration, what's typically the reason of death? Is it dehydration itself (and in particular, what fatal effect does extreme dehydration cause), or is it some side thing, like a simple illness (e.g. the sufficiently dehydrated immune system can't function properly), or urea poisoning (you don't have enough water to urinate, so you build up urea to a fatal level), or something else? Nyttend (talk) 01:07, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

I dont have expert medical knownledge. Good chance someone else can answer this way better but i think i have the basics right and you wrote that you didnt want tomuch detail anyway: It depends on your body's condition, training and your surrounding. In a hot area you will fail to regulate your body temperature, overheat and then multiple vital organs may fail. If you are used to living in a hot desert your body will adapt and you likely already have allot of experience with dehydration. So you may survive a level of dehydration that would kill anyone else even in an earlier stage. In a mild climate your kidneys will likely stop working first and as a result you slowly become "toxic", which will affect other organs. So the typical reason of death is some (or multiple) Organ dysfunction(s). Because many organs have a vital function its hard to pin the cause down to one. --Kharon (talk) 02:35, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Popular Science magazine says likely liver or kidney failure. Rmhermen (talk) 16:58, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Giordano Bruno crater

Per our article, Giordano Bruno (crater) is on the far side of the Moon "that always faces away from Earth", so how five Canterbury monks could have observed the crater's formation? Thanks. 212.180.235.46 (talk) 07:01, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

There is no actual evidence that they did, but the location of the crater isn't the real issue. It's just behind the limb, and from our article "At this location it lies in an area that can be viewed during a favorable (sic) libration". Also, debris would be thrown much higher, out past the limb, even if the impact itself wouldn't be visible. Fgf10 (talk) 08:02, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Let's not bicker and argue about who killed who.

Or favourable (sic). ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 14:07, 18 June 2018 (UTC) Not what the article says, so would be an incorrect quote. Do you have anything factual to add to my answer? Fgf10 (talk) 17:31, 18 June 2018 (UT Can you restrain yourself from gratuitously provoking Americans in an otherwise useful answer? --Trovatore (talk) 17:36, 18 June 2018 (UTC) What on earth did I say that was a gratuitous provocation?! I gave a correct and useful answer to the OP. Is that against the Trump ethos or something? Fgf10 (talk) 18:37, 18 June 2018 (UTC) Favorable is not (sic) in America. I'm not offended but some might be. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 18:47, 18 June 2018 (UTC) Really? That's it? I would expect Americans do to exactly the same the other way around. That's how language works. Christ, you people need to grow some thicker skin. Fgf10 (talk) 19:19, 18 June 2018 (UTC) Probably only the unusually nationalistic would be offended. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 19:43, 18 June 2018 (UTC) Or would feel the need to say (sic) after an acceptable spelling. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:45, 18 June 2018 (UTC) It's not acceptable in Fgf10's language, which is British English. Why do you assume that he/she must be familiar with all spellings in a foreign language, namely American English? {The poster formerly known as 87.981.230.195} 2.125.75.224 (talk) 14:45, 19 June 2018 (UTC) English is English. It was originally "-or". The Brits changed it.[12] ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:44, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

June 19

Viscosity from DFT (VASP) using the Green-Kubo relation

Hello! In this paper https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/e8a2/02f25555cd8c4f947bbbdff5a61a0ea0efd2.pdf the authors use VASP to determine MgSiO3 viscosity using the Green-Kubo relation $\eta ={\frac {V}{3k_{\rm {B}}T}}\int _{0}\left\langle \sum \limits _{i<j}\sigma _{ij}(t+t_{0}).\sigma _{ij}(t_{0})\right\rangle dt$ where $\sigma _{ij}$ (i and j = x, y, z) is the stress tensor, t is time and t0 is the time origin. But I've seen other papers use: $\eta ={\frac {V}{3k_{\rm {B}}T}}\int _{0}^{\infty }dt\left\langle P_{xy}(t)P_{xy}(0)\right\rangle$, where $P_{xy}$ is the off-diagonal component of the stress tensor $P_{\alpha \beta }$ ( α and β are Cartesian components).

OK, so clearly these are essentially exactly the same equation but the second uses only the xy component whereas the first seems to suggest a summation? So which is correct?

Also, VASP outputs the stress tensor components as XX YY ZZ XY YZ ZX. So which of these should I use to input into the Green-Kubo equation? And are there missing components? what about yx, zy, xz?

Thanks in advance. Polyamorph (talk) 15:01, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

• For your second question, per our article Cauchy stress tensor, the stress tensor is symmetric, thus having only six independent stress components, instead of the original nine, see also Stress_(mechanics)#General_stress. For the first question, I am not sure; it could be that only one off-diagonal component is nonzero in the context (for instance in a shear flow where water flows in from (x=±Inf,y=0) and out from (x=0,y=±Inf), and the flow is uniform across z), as is the case in many viscosity-measurement experiments; or it could be the Einstein notation by taking x and y as free variables (but then a factor 1/2 is missing). Tigraan^{Click here to contact me} 16:49, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

I think that in both case sum of off-diagonal components is implied. Ruslik_Zero 20:16, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

Tigraan and Ruslik0 Cool, symmmetry reduces the 9 components to 6, makes sense. But I'm still not sure that the sum is implied in the second equation, only that the xy off-diagonal component of $P_{\alpha \beta }$ should be used, at least that's how I interpret how they've written it. But in any case, to clarify if it is the sum to be taken then should I take the sum of the $P_{xy},P_{yz},P_{zx}$? Many thanks for your help. Polyamorph (talk) 09:59, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

I think that the second equation is just an example, and xy is just one of the components to be used.Polyamorph (talk) 12:35, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Aerial refueling a commercial jet?

Apparently aerial refueling doesn't make much economic sense for commercial jets. [13] But suppose radar operators were scanning for MH370 on the day of its disappearance and after almost all hope (and fuel) is lost, a passenger had gotten on the radio and said the pilots are dead, but some of us woke up, where are we, all we see down there is water!... Is there any conceivable way that some fast military aircraft swoops up from a carrier and slows down, and we see a boom projecting forward from it or a hose dangling down from in front of the wing, with a hard-bitten soldier or a decently designed robot on the end that can unscrew a gas cap and start pouring gas into the plane's tank so that the passengers don't end their adventure in the Indian Ocean? Or is it completely hopeless? Wnt (talk) 17:38, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

Bear in mind that tanker planes aren't particularly fast; they're primarily freight aircraft. The first picture at aerial refueling shows a Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker, with a cruising speed of 530 mph and a maximum speed of 580 mph, while another picture shows an Ilyushin Il-78, whose maximum speed is similar to the cruising speed of the Stratotanker. If the plane's virtually out of fuel, there's no way you can get a tanker on-site unless it's already really nearby. This assumes that the airliner is comparatively close to land, or that it's not far from a carrier-based tanker. Also see Aerial_refueling#Buddy_store, which notes that carrier groups don't generally have tanker aircraft, so the chance of finding a carrier-based tanker is even tinier. Nyttend (talk) 17:50, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

PS, see Gimli Glider and its paragraph beginning with "On airliners the size of the 767"; a recent commercial airliner without fuel is exceptionally difficult to control, even by professionals, since a Ram air turbine doesn't have much power compared to jet engines. Nyttend (talk) 17:58, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

Modern airlines are set up for single-point refueling, also known as underwing fueling, which requires a fairly complex set of motions when connecting the refueling nozzle. To add another level of complexity, the refueling point is commonly found under an access panel, which will either be held shut by the slipstream or act as a impromptu air brake when opened. So ignoring the logistics of getting the tanker in the right place at the right time... once you have it there, it'll be near impossible to connect and refuel on a commercial airlinger not designed with air-to-air-refueling in mind. WegianWarrior (talk) 18:12, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

Here's a 747 refueling in-flight: [14] —2606:A000:1126:4CA:0:98F2:CFF6:1782 (talk) 21:59, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

Might that be Air Force One? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:10, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

There's a doghouse, so that's a NEACP, not the Trump Tourbus. Some other civilian aircraft in long-duration military service (such as covert ELINT) have been fitted for refuelling too. The current Airforce One was built as a Boeing VC-25, the designed-in Airforce One variant, but the new Airforce Ones are to be recycled from bankrupt Russian oligarchs (seems appropriate), so will require conversion.

Outside the US, there are also Airbus variants, such as the A330 Multi-Role Tanker Transport, which can offer both refuelling supply and consumption. So if you're writing a Dan Brown novel, it's off-the-shelf parts. Andy Dingley (talk) 23:33, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

Unrelated question: At Aviation fuel what does this mean: "Aircraft have a high peak power and thus fuel demand during take-off and landing"? Does that mean that a disproportionate amount of fuel is consumed "during take-off and landing" relative to the rate of fuel consumption at cruising speed and cruising altitude? Bus stop (talk) 23:07, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

Not so much "take off" itself, but the climb to altitude. This is why many military mission profiles involve refuelling very soon after take-off - the aircraft can take off and climb in a much lighter state. Andy Dingley (talk) 23:23, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

"disproportionate amount at take off?" It seems so. According to https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20060813151514AAVe8Ms&guccounter=1 a Jumbo Jet consumes 1 gallon per second at cruising regime and 8 gallons per second at take off and climbing. Somewere else it talked of three tons in the first three minutes and eight tons per hour cruising. 194.174.76.21 (talk) 09:54, 20 June 2018 (UTC) Marco Pagliero Berlin

Among other things, you're using a richer mixture at those times. It's vaguely like with a car: you use less fuel when you're cruise-controlling down a straight and flat highway than when you're climbing a hill and accelerating from a stop. Cars don't use much fuel when descending hills, but they don't have to worry about maintaining power in order to avoid stalling too soon and falling out of the sky too fast; the aircraft has to maintain lift until it's ready to stall over the runway, so lots of power has to be used. Nyttend (talk) 00:22, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Thanks everybody. That is interesting. And I guess the fighter plane has a much further distance on its itinerary than the tanker plane, and that one tanker plane refuels many fighter planes. Bus stop (talk) 01:14, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Fighters have to be fast and maneuverable, so they can't carry enough fuel relative to their empty weight to provide a long range as well. --76.69.118.94 (talk) 08:36, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Fighters can, but they do it with drop tanks. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:13, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. This is an interesting topic. Bus stop (talk) 12:14, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

June 20

Trumpeter Swan question

Ok, this is kind of a weird one. I was kayaking on one of our local lakes just now and saw that Trumpeter Swans were again present there. They used to only come by during migration but the last few years there has been a pair of them summering there. As I paddled around I came upon what had to be their nest. It was two vegetation-covered rotting logs in shallow water, with lots and lots of shiny white feathers scattered all over. They looked more or less like one expects from a waterfowl nest except for one thing: the poop. I declined to take a picture as I assume words will suffice here. Normally bird excrement is a runny, whitish sort of thing. These two nesting areas each had at the outer corner a pile of very solid turds, as one would expect from a dog or a human. I can’t find anything in our article on these birds about this, but it seems highly unusual to me. Beeblebrox (talk) 01:11, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Are you asking "what do their feces look like"? Can't speak directly to swans, but if you've ever seen Branta canadensis feces, you'll remember that they're nowhere close to runny or whitish; it's one of the biggest reasons large populations of them are often considered pests in the lower 48. Nyttend (talk) 01:41, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

I used a well known search engine to find images of 'swan faeces' and it provided a few which showed large solid cylindrical motions. For what it's worth it also showed motions from geese and chickens which are solid and shaped, so by no means are all bird faeces liquid. Having kept finches for a while my experience was that liquid faeces usually indicated a digestive problem. Richard Avery (talk) 07:32, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

I guess it’s just something I’ve somehow never run into before, or at least not recognized it for what it was before. Thanks for your replies. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:58, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

FYI, the white part of bird waste is their equivalent of urine (white crystals of uric acid, much more concentrated than our pee); bird feces are typically dark and more or less solid. However, since it all tends to be voided at once from the same fissure (the cloaca), it's easy to conflate the two. Matt Deres (talk) 20:47, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

How to figure out the most energy-efficient way to eat food in an industrialized country?

Corn, wheat, soybeans, cotton, and hay account for 90% of harvested acreage in the United States. Corn, wheat, and soybeans are grown for both animal feed and human consumption. Per 100 grams, cooked yellow corn yields 96 calories. Wheat cannot be eaten directly. It can be turned into bread, noodles, and other wheat-based products, but who has the time to let the bread rise? Home-made bread may be eaten on occasion, but making bread everyday may be tiresome. Also, the inexperienced person who has zero cooking skills may not know how to knead dough. I suppose one can buy dried soybeans and make soymilk, but that's mostly liquid. The okara of the soybeans may be used to make less-filling dishes. Per 100 grams, Russet potatoes yield 97 calories. Per 100 grams, cooked black beans yield 132 calories. Per 100 grams, cooked white rice yields 130 calories. So, judging solely by energy content per weight, cooked black beans and cooked white rice win. However, what about the amount of energy that goes into producing the food or the amount of energy that goes into transporting food from the farm to the supermarket? By taking all things into account, which food would be most economical for a random person in, say, New York City? SSS (talk) 02:38, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

This is why McDonald's was invented. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:31, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

• There are many additional variables here. Take wheat and bread. It is more energy-efficient to make bread in a bakery than at home. This has been true since ancient times. Or look a soy beans in the US: almost all (more than 90%) of the beans and the oil are shipped to China for use as animal feed there. One crude measure of the pre-consumer energy cost is the price per calorie. This works better than you might expect, because it accounts for the energy cost of all of the inputs, including things like marketing, where the money goes to pay the salaries of people who use energy. It does not account for "free" inputs like un-captured environmental costs. You then need to add the consumer's preparation costs and the costs of post-consumer waste handling. -Arch dude (talk) 05:02, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

As an aside, use a no-knead recipe for home made bread. http://www.snk.com.au/html/s01_home/home.asp Makes very good bread. Not, perhaps the best I've ever had, but better than all but the best, and of course we fine tune the recipes to taste, lots of caroway in the dark rye bread for example.Greglocock (talk) 05:50, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Check out Soylent (meal replacement). Eat it for a week and then watch the movie Soylent Green. --Kharon (talk) 06:15, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

"Soylent Green is ... a brand of meal replacement products !?" Gandalf61 (talk) 08:47, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

It will likely make a difference whether SSS means "most energy efficient for the individual eater" or "most energy efficient for the planet overall". {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.125.75.224 (talk) 10:29, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

The question title asks about "energy-efficient way to eat" but the question asks about economical food, not exactly the same thing. The human energy and time involved in one person planning, shopping, preparing, cooking, serving, and clearing away meals (for him/herself or for a household) is significant; arguably, the more you care about your health, the more thought and time goes into this. If on the other hand "economical" is used as a synonym for "as cheap as possible, who cares about the externalities", then meal replacements, as pointed out above, are a possibility, as are Pot Noodles. You might want to read Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma to give some context to your questions. E.g. "Pollan also accuses large-scale organic agriculture of "floating on a sinking sea of petroleum" by analysing that a one-pound box of California-produced organic lettuce – that contains 80 food calories – requires 4,600 calories of fossil fuel to process and ship to the East Coast." Carbon Caryatid (talk) 11:36, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Why do small children put stones in their mouth?

Has this behavior evolved to get to a healthy microbiome, or could stones in the stomach work as gastroliths? Count Iblis (talk) 13:27, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

What children do that? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:32, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

[15] Antepenultimate para. —SerialNumber54129 ^{paranoia /cheap sh*t room} 13:58, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Moonrise Kingdom appears to be fictional. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:33, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Err. The bloke they were talking to wasnt :D —SerialNumber54129 ^{paranoia /cheap sh*t room} 14:38, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Typing "Why do small children put stones in their mouth?" into Google produces lots of results such as: "Babies putting things in their mouths, otherwise known as mouthing, is not only normal, but also signals a growing interest in the world around them. In the first year, children explore their surroundings through their senses -- seeing, touching, hearing, smelling, and tasting. The more they explore, the more they learn". [16] Alansplodge (talk) 16:29, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

I've heard that described the same way, as "exploring their world." No indication that they're swallowing them, just tasting them. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 19:35, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Besides taste, the tongue and lips are also far better at discerning fine texture detail than fingers. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 10:49, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Can you provide a cite for that? It appears to be at odds with the various representations at cortical homunculus, though I acknowledge they're not quite mapping the same thing. Matt Deres (talk) 13:51, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Small children, or babies? The former are more likely to have access to stones. The latter, well, they put everything in their mouths; it's the oral stage, and some never really outgrow it. From that article: "In Freudian psychoanalysis, the term oral stage or hemitaxia denotes the first psychosexual development stage wherein the mouth of the infant is his or her primary erogenous zone. Spanning the life period from birth to the age of 18 months..." Carbon Caryatid (talk) 11:41, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

How many cities have used subway/metro/underground/el/u-bahn/rapid transit cars ≥54 years old for revenue service?

I only know of the R32 and Buenos Aires. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 15:15, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

F Market & Wharves in San Francisco uses historical cars, for revenue service, some pre-WWI. --jpgordon^{𝄢𝄆 𝄐𝄇} 15:56, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

But that's streetcar, not subway / rapid transit. --76.69.118.94 (talk) 18:48, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

The Island Line on the Isle of Wight uses refurbished British Rail Class 483 stock. They were built in 1938, and refurbished between 1989 and 1992. They originally worked the London Underground, but the Island Line is a surface service, so I'm not sure that they meet your criteria. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:00, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Apparently the cars for Budapest's line 1 were in use from around 1900 until the 1970s. Rmhermen (talk) 17:23, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Oh, here's a good one. The Glasgow Subway opened its one and only route in December 1896 with cable-hauled trains, converting to electric motors in 1935. (By the way, they converted the two directions of travel one at a time, so for several months they had electric trains going one way and cable ones the other—which was sensible enough, because the route is a loop and had no connection between the two tracks.) They made the change by modifying the existing trains rather than buying new ones, and many of the subway's original cars remained in revenue service until May 1977 when the line was shut down for modernization. So the oldest cars were then 80 years old. --76.69.118.94 (talk) 08:15, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

The poles and towers for the overhead electric cables of the Gospel Oak to Barking line were constructed by February 2017. The wires were added later. There is still no electric train service. Is this a record? 86.132.186.246 (talk) 10:54, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

The Pyongyang Metro uses ex-german "Dora"-class rolling stock, which is between 53 and 61 years old. WegianWarrior (talk) 20:09, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Vehicle retroreflectors

In one place, the California vehicle code says "this section applies to the color of lamps and to any reflector exhibiting or reflecting perceptible light of 0.05 candela or more per foot-candle of incident illumination."

Vehicle Code
DIVISION 12. Equipment of Vehicles
CHAPTER 2. Lighting Equipment
ARTICLE 15. Light Restrictions and Mounting
SECTION 25950

I am trying to figure out exactly how to measure this in the context of a plastic retroreflector of the kind normally found on vehicles.

My problem starts with the light source. I can hit it with a foot-candle from a near point source, and the output will be vastly different that if I hit it with a foot candle from a diffuse half sphere. In the former case, the output is much larger at one angle and much smaller at all other angles, and it changes as I tilt the reflector slightly. In the latter case, I get a more even output compared to angle, but it is still a bit "lumpy".

So how do I set up my light source and light meter to measure whether the section in question applies to a reflector? Or do I just forget all that and assume that even the cheapest plastic reflector is good enough that I can assume the law applies? --Guy Macon (talk) 23:54, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

@Guy Macon: The point of a retroreflector is to reflect the light source back to itself. The best retroreflective shape is an orthogonal trihedral surface. I used to teach classes about stealth technology. As a demonstration I had three 1-foot-square mirror tiles taped together forming a corner trihedral. No matter what angle you looked in it, you always saw a reflection of your face looking back at you. That's the worst possible shape for a ship to have on it, and easy to create accidentally, say, by laying a toolbox on the deck next to a bulkhead at right angles. An anti-ship missile will go right for that.

The plastic retroreflectors in cars typically employ an array of little cube-shaped prisms to accomplish the same effect. They are arrays of trihedral prisms In this case the light enters the plastic from flat outer surface and bounces off the surfaces inside the prisms, and comes right back out.

In the case of that spec, the requirement likely applies only to normal incidence to the reflector, from a point source. The intensity of reflection will change because the projected area of the orthogonal surfaces change with angle of incidence. A diffuse half sphere source will illuminate the reflector from a wider range of incident angles. You wouldn't be able to make a valid measurement with a meter the size of a point source.

Your measuring device should be approximately the same location as your light source. In an ideal retroreflector it shouldn't matter how far away your light source is. Distance will only change the illumination incident on the retroreflector. ~Anachronist (talk) 14:05, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

I am well aware of how retroreflectors work and the geometry of corner reflectors in general (years of experience in optical engineering), but I am not convinced that your answer is correct. Yes, that is indeed one way of doing the measurement, but I am asking which of the several ways that I can measure the light is the method that the vehicle code specifies. The requirement "foot-candle of incident illumination" can be satisfied with the light coming in from a point source at any angle or from a uniformly illuminated half sphere. On the output side a candela is the luminous flux per unit solid angle, but which angle? Do I pick the one that has the highest number? I know that averaging the output from all angles is wrong -- if they wanted that they should have specified lux instead of candela.

On a previous project involving lights as opposed to reflectors, I got an answer from the DOT that we should measure what hits a driver's eyes, keeping in mind that some people are driving low-slung sports cars and some are driving tractor trailers. By that standard, an ideal corner reflector sends 100% of its output right back into the headlight of the car behind with 0% hitting the driver's eyes. And indeed if you break open a standard plastic reflector you find that the geometry is not exactly 90 degree corners, but is a bit off (and sometimes the surface isn't quite flat) -- obviously so that the returned beam spreads out some. They also twist some sections compared to others, and in use some sections are much brighter than others, depending on the angle.

Optical engineering is easy. Lawyering (as in "properly interpreting the requirements set forth in government regulations") is hard. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:13, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

@Guy Macon: Hmm. Which angle indeed? Intuitively it seems like an integration problem. Measure the luminous flux in the solid angle emanating from a point on the retroreflector and ending at the pupil of the eye, with the radius of that pupil. Integrate over all points of the reflector. That has to be wrong, because it's too hard and seems backwards.

All I can do is make guesses..... OK, how about defining the beamwidth from the reflector as the solid angle formed by the boundary 3 db from the peak brightness, and that solid angle is large enough to cover sports cars and trucks. Then you can figure out the luminous flux per unit solid angle within that boundary? ~Anachronist (talk) 22:23, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

That has some real promise. It also has the distinct advantage that if someone on the government end thinks that it is the wrong way to do the measurement they would have to tell me what the right way is. I can pretty much set up any measuring geometry in less than an hour on my optical bench. Thanks! --Guy Macon (talk) 22:48, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Improving one's palate for subtle flavor differences

A Youtube video I saw last year, in which Penn Jillette describes his diet of eating only potatoes for a month, eventually prompted me to write the monotrophic diet stub article. It's a risky and dangerous fad diet. What interested me, however, is a side-effect that Jillette reported: eating nothing but potatoes for a month reset his palate to the point where he can now taste subtle differences in foods that he couldn't taste before, and no longer desires typical American dishes having flavors dominated by salt and sugar.

So this got me to thinking: setting aside the fad mono diet, if I wanted to reset my own palate while consuming nutritionally complete but bland foods, what would I eat? What ingredients would I buy? I do enjoy cooking challenges... Or would it be simplest just to buy a month's supply of unflavored Soylent (meal replacement)? ~Anachronist (talk) 23:58, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

The product you are looking for is unflavored Huel. See [ https://huel.com/ ].

It is well-known that when you reduce salt in your diet, after a while foods that used to taste slightly salty taste very salty. And the opposite effect is well-known with hot peppers; you build up a tolerance to them.

Is this the case with all flavors? I can think of a couple of interesting tests you could do.

One test involves experiments with sugar and purified water. At what concentration can you no longer tell sweetened water from pure water in a blind taste test? Now cut all sugar from your diet for a month and repeat the test.

Or you could pick one of those strongly flavored candies (Jolly Rancher, Jelly Belly) and suck on just one flavor for a month. Can you make it so that, say Apple flavor seems less strong while the others seem normal strength?

Please post a note on my talk page if you do something like this. I usually keep the reference desks unwatched for obvious reasons. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:33, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

@Guy Macon: Thanks, I had never heard of that. I'm not sure how nutritionally complete that is... I don't see any fats, unless the "MCTs from coconut" is a sufficient substitute. No animal protein either, but I guess that's OK for a month. A month's supply (9 pounches) to maintain a 2000 calorie/day diet seems expensive at first but not on a per-meal basis.

Yes, I knew about the peppers. I had read several research articles about how people who regularly eat spicy foods are not sensitive to other flavors. I can also see that in people I know who eat a lot of spicy food and find their sense of taste is not stimulated by subtle flavors that I can distinguish, but my own palate is by no means very sensitive either. ~Anachronist (talk) 13:37, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

4 cups of Unflavored & Unsweetened Huel have 2000 calories, 66 grams of fat, 186 grams of carbs, 148 grams of protein, 9 grams of fiber.

37% of the energy comes from carbohydrate, 30% from fat, 30% from protein and 3% from fiber.

See [ https://huel.com/pages/nutritional-information-and-ingredients ].

Are you under the impression that for humans animal protein is somehow better than plant protein? (Cats, on the other hand, get really sick and eventually die on any vegan diet. Cats need the amino acid Taurine, which plants do not produce. Humans, like most omnivores, can produce taurine from other nutrients.)

I would be interested in reading those research papers about spicy foods. That wasn't my understanding, but I have not studied the question other than running across stuff like this:[17] If only there was some sort of online encyclopedia where we could look this sort of stuff up.... --Guy Macon (talk) 14:13, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

@Guy Macon: I freely admit I have no informed opinion about the value of human protein versus animal protein, other than knowing the human organism is adapted to neither a vegetarian nor carnivorous diet, but rather to an omnivorous diet, which implies we are adapted to require protein from multiple sources, not just from plants. I am skeptical that a vegan diet is healthy over the long term, but there is no harm in it for the purpose for which I started this conversation.

OK, I dug up some searches I had done way back in 2007 about spicy foods and taste desensitization. At the time I was unable to find references indicating that the desensitization is permanent. I concluded that it may seem permanent if a person eats spicy foods on a daily basis. Here are quotes I had found back then. I haven't looked to see if there's been anything more recent.

• "With respect to desensitization following an initial series of stimuli, the present results appear to confirm that, given a particular hiatus in stimulation, the recovery period differs markedly between these irritants. Previous research has shown that the recovery time of capsaicin from desensitization is in the order of hours to days, depending on the concentration (Green, 1989; Karrer and Bartoshuk, 1991),..." [18]
• "Immediately after capsaicin, responses [by rats] to each tastant were in nearly all cases depressed (mean, 61.5% of control), followed by recovery in most cases.... These results support a peripheral site of capsaicin suppression of taste possibly via direct or indirect effects on taste transduction or taste receptor cell excitability. The depressant effect of capsaicin on gustatory transmission might underlie its ability to reduce the perceived intensity of some taste qualities."[19]
• "As to the reason why some people can cheerfully withstand the ravages of irritant-packed food and others bolt for the water fountain at the first nibble on a wayward jalapeno, part of it is no doubt genetic, but there's also a phenomenon known as "transient desensitization." Keep eating chili after chili, and your mouth is going to get hotter and hotter. Take a break, though, maybe two or five minutes, and when you resume your meal, the burning sensation won't be quite so fierce. Desensitization can last hours, and people who make a habit of eating spicy food may be partly desensitized virtually all the time." [20](link is now dead, try http://archive.is/6tDBI instead)

FWIW. ~Anachronist (talk) 22:09, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Interesting! One thing you wrote caught my eye; "the human organism is adapted to neither a vegetarian nor carnivorous diet, but rather to an omnivorous diet, which implies we are adapted to require protein from multiple sources, not just from plants" I am not sure that it implies that. I think that it implies that we are adapted to thrive on protein any one of multiple sources. We know that this is true of bears; in some seasons they pretty much live on berries, while in other seasons they live on a pure salmon diet. Likewise with humans, some thrive on a vegan diet (if they get enough protein, vitamins, etc), while others thrive on a diet of nothing but meat and seal blubber. Evolution should select against requiring multiple food sources (but could at the same time evolve a preference for them). --Guy Macon (talk) 22:30, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

You're right of course, evolution shouldn't require multiple sources of protein, but simply allow for multiple sources. However, surviving isn't equivalent to thriving. In my view, the best diet includes both animal and vegetable protein, assuming that no protein is "complete" and that "thriving" requires completeness. I would argue that the human body has features, such as a long intestinal tract, that makes it hard to "thrive" on a carnivorous diet. Digesting meat produces toxins that are best evacuated quickly, which is why carnivores tend to have short intestinal tracts compared to vegetarian animals. Meat-eating cultures do have a higher incidence of colon cancer too. This would qualify as a MEDRS-compliant source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3108955/ ~Anachronist (talk) 22:50, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

By the way, back on the original topic, here's the original video of Penn that I saw: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NelIXCuuSZ0 — the relevant part that struck me starts near the end, at 7:35. ~Anachronist (talk) 22:58, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

June 21

Please Help me find a botanical term and an existing page

Originally published in Teahouse (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Teahouse#Please_Help_me_find_a_botanical_term_and_an_existing_page) and I was guided to reference desk.

There is a terminology for when due to secondary growth a tree engulfs surrounding foreign objects . But I forgot the term and can't recall it back. There was an Wikipedia page about the term; which contained an image of a tree engulfing a barbed wire fence; upto best of my recall. (The image was from side view, and not from oblique view). Today I searched a lot of page; but could not find the page. Please help me to find the term and the page. Thanks in advance.

If I've asked the question in an inappropriate location or formatting then please do necessary guide/correction.

RIT RAJARSHI (talk) 04:38, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

• This is the right place, but I haven't found it yet. In the mean time, look at these: [[21]]. -Arch dude (talk) 05:08, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

That site asks at one point: "Is it possible there are items entirely consumed by trees that we don't know about?" I can confirm from personal experience (yeah, OR) that this is so. About 5 months ago I had a tree felled at the bottom of my garden which had grown too large (approaching a yard/metre thick at the bole) for its surroundings. The fellers discovered that it had entirely engulfed at least one metal fence post that had originally marked the garden boundary – they broke some chainsaw teeth when they unexpectedly hit the metal. Outside of the tree so few remnants of the fence remained that I (resident 27 years) had no idea it had once been there. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.125.75.224 (talk) 10:44, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

I've found a few words, but none that are quite as specific or correct for "engulfment of foreign object". For example, burl (found where this question was asked at Talk:Tree archives and did not receive an answer), engulfment, inosculation, espalier, pooktre, edaphoecotropism. DMacks (talk) 05:18, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

There is such an image here but it doesn't seem to be used in any other articles.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 14:50, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Plenty more pictures at commons:Category:Ingrown things in trees. DuncanHill (talk) 14:56, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Spiders looking like ants

I've heard some spiders and other bugs appear like ants so they can sneak around among them and then eat them. That's right, isn't it? I've actually seen some bugs like that.

So, if ants cannot see well, why is looking like an ant so important? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:58, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

• Ant mimicry#Spiders says there are over 300 species of spider that have evolved Batesian mimicry of (or for?) ants. Just because ants can't see well doesn't mean that they can't recognize a typical spider shape. Abductive (reasoning) 07:08, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

• Batesian mimicry seems to be more about evolving to protect yourself not infiltrating other species communities. Ants rely very heavily on pheromones for communication (as stated in Ant) It would seem unlikely that looking like an ant but not smelling like an ant would be a successful strategy. And remember there are hundreds of ant species and most of these do not rub along too well together. So the answer to the original question is - no, that's not right. Richard Avery (talk) 07:47, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

• So, you think maybe the article is (partly) wrong? Abductive (reasoning) 16:03, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

In the case of the Large blue butterfly, the caterpillars are mimicking the ant larvae rather than the adult ants, but this broadly fits your scenario. The first article Richard Avery linked says, in the lede: "Some arthropods mimic ants to escape predation (protective mimicry), while others mimic ants anatomically and behaviourally to hunt ants (aggressive mimicry)" [my italics], and cites a paper. In all such cases physical resemblance will be necessary but not sufficient – the mimics will have to smell and move similarly to the ants as well, which means they will have to be mimicking a specific ant species and perhaps even a specific colony population. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.125.75.224 (talk) 11:03, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

That makes sense. Thank you for clearing that up. And thank you for taking the time. It is appreciated. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 19:43, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Mandatory swim caps

Is the mandatory swim cap thing baloney? So what if hair gets into filters? Isn't that what filters are for? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:58, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Where is this rule in place. It's not in my little corner of the world - Australia. HiLo48 (talk) 07:16, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

The idea would be to prevent too much hair from getting in the filter and clogging things. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 07:47, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

This is probably a health and safety issue [22], [23], [24]. In one case, a young woman was only saved when a bystander who had been in the bar the previous evening when a huge knife was delivered for cutting ice cubes rushed to get it. He handed it to the father (who had been attempting to cut her loose with a penknife) and with one slice she was free. 86.132.186.246 (talk) 10:35, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

It's also quite unpleasant while swimming to suddenly get a faceful of floating hair that has been shed by others and has then clumped together. I myself tend to gag if I unexpectedly get one of my own hairs in my mouth. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.125.75.224 (talk) 11:17, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Thank you all. Good points. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 19:43, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

@Anna Frodesiak: Having worked extensively with swimming pool filtration in my younger days, I'll say that pool filters are best at removing particulates (dirt, bugs, leaves, and other solid materials). Hair, on the other hand, isn't friendly. It's like trying to suck a string through a pump. What gets through the first stage basket gets tangled around the pump impeller and shaft, and accumulates. Short hair doesn't present a problem. But long hair (or thread or string) doesn't just get caught in the first stage basket or the final stage filter, it gets caught in the machinery. And if there's enough of it, the only way to get it out is to take apart the machinery, which is a lot harder than simply backwashing the filter or cleaning the removable components.

The UK Health and Safety Executive lists compulsory swimming caps amongst Health and safety myths; "There is no health and safety regulation which requires people to wear hats in swimming pools". I recall caps being compulsory in some public pools in France and Luxembourg a few decades ago, on the stated grounds of hygiene. Alansplodge (talk) 09:14, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

I agree, I see no hygiene reason to require swimming caps. I think the reason is more practical: Keep hair out of the machinery. Also there may be an added benefit to keep hair oil (if people use it) from scumming up the tiles on the pool walls. And to make the overall swimming experience more pleasant for everyone by keeping long floating hairs out of the pool. A good hair-band to tie back long hair, or wearing the hair in braids, would be just as effective, though. ~Anachronist (talk) 17:59, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Ah, mainly hair in the works, understood. Still, I'd say tying one's hair back plus better filters would be better than requiring everyone to wear those daft caps. They're uncomfortable and rather spoil the experience. I do miss Canadian lakes. Thank you all again. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:21, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Japan Meteorological Agency

Is there any reason why in Japan the Meteorological Agency handles the earthquakes instead of dedicated seismological authority, given the frequency of their earthquakes? Brandmeister^talk 08:48, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

It also covers volcanoes and tsunamis. Given that these as well as extreme weather, floods and earthquakes all require a warning network as well as sometimes being causationally linked, it makes sense to group them under the same umbrella rather than having separate agencies trying to co-ordinate. The article's reference 7 links to a 32-page PDF here which may shed light on the historical reasons for this arrangement having come about. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.125.75.224 (talk) 11:12, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

The Philippines' hurricane warning center (PAGASA) is even broader. It handles meteorology, geophysics and astronomy (!) Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 18:19, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Australia, where I am, is at the other end of the seismological activity scale from Japan. Earthquakes are very much rarer and less extreme here. We don't have a "dedicated seismological authority". (Or if we do, it's low profile enough for me not to have noticed it.) I do know though than when earthquakes do occur (usually small tremors by global standards) people tend to phone up the local weather service to ask/tell them about it. I guess there's something in human nature that lumps these physical environmental things together. HiLo48 (talk) 22:42, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Squashed molecules

A few years ago there was a new Wikipedia article on a kind of molecule where the two atoms were abnormally close to each other and electrons were pushed up to higher energy levels to accommodate. This type of molecule was very unstable emitting X-rays to drop energy and push the two atoms apart. I cannot find the article though. What is this kind of molecule called? It's not in Category:Chemical bonding. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 12:28, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

I can't remember that WP article--do you remember if the two atoms were bonded or nonbonded? In the mean time, here is an item describing pushing the limits of nonbonded close contacts.[25] Perhaps WP:CHEM could help--lots of active editors there with diverse interests. For a newer ref that includes intermolecular not just intramolecular-cage, see doi:10.1021/jacs.7b01879. DMacks (talk) 12:49, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

The molecules were much more compressed than in the blog, so much so that one atom appeared to be embedded in the other. The repulsion was much stronger than the bond due to the closeness, but I would guess that the bond would be much stronger than a normal bond. However they still had defined quantum states. (They may form inside white dwarfs for example of the pressure needed). Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:52, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

By chance, was it related to Rydberg polarons? Those allow you to put atoms inside another atom. 209.149.113.5 (talk) 11:27, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

That is a good suggestion, and the atom combination is like that but at much higher energy. So it was actually another article. I think they needed particle accelerators to get an ion with enough energy to penetrate into another atom. (I should have put the page on my watch list!). Graeme Bartlett (talk) 02:39, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

Diet pills

For me, any 'fat burning' claim of diet pills is automatically suspicious. However, some diet pills claim to block the absorption of fat, something that, at a first glance, seems possible. Could indeed something as small as a pill make our bodies extract less calories from fatty food? I assume ingesting some substances with more volume than a mere pill, like lots of fiber, would have it easier. But still, a pill could de/activate some mechanism, resulting in blocking fat digestion.--Doroletho (talk) 13:03, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Eating fats don't make you fat, so blocking absorption of fats just seems counterproductive to health. Eating excessive carbohydrates make you fat. If there's a pill that is proven to block absorption of starches and sugars, I don't know what it is. ~Anachronist (talk) 13:48, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

You just haven't looked in the right places. http://media.philly.com/images/1200*800/TapewormDietPills.jpg

And please don't tell people that "Eating fats don't make you fat". Eating more calories than your body burns makes you fat. It matters little what form the calories take. See Healthy diet#Obesity. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:29, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Beware of Products Promising Miracle Weight Loss, from the FDA, the agency responsible for regulating drugs and medical products, and making sure the advertisements do not make unscientific claims.

In particular:

• "Dietary Supplements are not FDA-Approved" - this means that if a product "isn't technically" a drug, the FDA will not validate the claims they make - even if the seller wraps the product up in a pill shape and puts it in pill-bottles for retail sales... as long as they technically make no medical claims
• Any products that make medical claims - including drugs and things that technically aren't drugs - are still subject to regulation
• A huge variety of products are sold in stores, and are not approved by the FDA. Such products were not put through rigorous independent scientific testing - but you can buy them and eat/drink them anyway (at your own risk of harm, let alone risk of being cheated by the merchant)
• A huge variety of products, including drugs, are approved for treating obesity, or otherwise assisting with weight loss, but those products must be subjected to intense scrutiny - especially about the way they are advertised to consumers
• Widespread efforts by scammy companies to circumvent that scrutiny are the reason why FDA publishes consumer protection messages, like this video: Health Fraud Scams - Weight Loss

I can't find a short statement by FDA that clearly specifies whether the words "weight loss" or "diet pill" are categorically regulated as "medical claims," which probably means that they evaluate each product or situation on an individual basis. Egregious violaters who get caught lying about their unregulated medical products can be subject to civil or criminal action.

Nimur (talk) 16:16, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Excellent post. I would add that if you sell a pill with nothing in it but inert filler, the FDA will approve it as being safe without approving it as being effective, then the ads scream "FDA Approved!". Homeopathic quackery does this all of the time. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:20, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Wouldn't a hoemopathic pill that contained nothing kill you from an overdose? (slightly labored reworking of an excellent joke) Greglocock (talk) 22:36, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

The Amazing Randi regularly starts out lectures by sending someone to the local drug store to purchase homeopathic sleeping pills and then when they arrive he "overdoses" on stage. I think that CVS, Walgreens, etc. should stop selling things that they know don't work.

BTW, I created 37 new homeopathic articles on Wikipedia this week. no, not articles on homeopathy; I wrote an article, diluted it a million times, and posted the result. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:55, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Don't underestimate the power of such pills. And they can do harm. Count Iblis (talk) 23:13, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Some of the stuff sold over-the-counter can be actually harmful. "And if you’re about to take what you think of as “natural” dietary supplements, ...be aware that FDA has found some of these products also contain hidden active ingredients contained in prescription drugs.", In general, it is not safe to assume that a material is inert, let alone safe in large quantity, simply because it's a "homeopathic" remedy. Worse still, some of these products are (accidentally or intentionally) mislabeled, tainted, or contain active substances that can cause serious harm.

Here is a list of a few hundred products including "herbal remedies" and "natural bee pollen pills" that were found to be illegally tainted with hidden ingredients, often including active drug ingredients that would normally be prescribed by a real medical doctor for totally different medical purposes. Selling a controlled substance and calling it a natural remedy is not only bad, it is actually the most prevalent and widespread drug crime in the United States. Real actual drug crime! The very stuff they don't turn into big-budget Hollywood action movies! In 2016, deaths related to illegal use of controlled prescription drugs exceeded deaths from cocaine and heroin combined.

Even if we know or suspect that a product's claims are pure "quackery," we would be wise not to automatically conclude that the product itself is a totally safe and inert substance - especially in large doses. Nimur (talk) 05:39, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Do you have a citation that shows that any FDA-approved (for safety, not effectiveness) homeopathic medicine has ever been been tainted in this way? "Since 1988, it has been the de facto policy of the FDA to treat homeopathic remedies listed in the Homeopathic Pharmacopeia of the United States (a collection of homeopathic ingredients and practices continually updated since 1897), as safe and legal to market — so long as that marketing does not meet the FDA’s definition of making fraudulent claims."[26] --Guy Macon (talk) 05:57, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

• Homeopathic Products: "Examples of FDA’s concerns, include:"
  • Pleo Homeopathic Drug Products by Terra-Medica: Recall - Potential for Undeclared Penicillin...

...so, yes. There are just so many more - hundreds of cases each year - and this one example is simply the very first instance I found, after a very cursory reading through the FDA informational page.

In fact, just this week: June 18, 2018, "A 35-year-old Corpus Christi woman has pleaded guilty to one count of possessing a controlled substance with the intent to distribute and one count of receiving a misbranded drug in interstate commerce..." "The FDA found a number of the products X2Zero sold as “herbal weight loss supplements” to contain misbranded or unapproved foreign drugs." The defendant "knowingly possessed and sold diet drugs containing sibutramine," a drug illegal to sell in the United States because it "increased risk of heart attack, stroke and death."

Point being, we don't have to look hard for examples of herbal diet remedies with nasty, often illegal, contaminants.

Nimur (talk) 06:06, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

The pill that blocks fat absorption is orlistat, which is, in fact, FDA approved. I have never personally seen a plausible explanation for the "fat burning" pills, and honestly, that sounds like a really dangerous thing to do, just messing with your metabolism. Someguy1221 (talk) 01:47, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

June 22

Ecoregions follow-up

OK, here's Part 2 of the question I asked earlier about ecoregions of North America (and the real reason why I asked in the first place): Which ecoregions of the United States do not have any native Papilionidae (swallowtail butterfly) species, except maybe near boundaries with other ecoregions, or as very rare vagrants? (NO PHOTOS OF SWALLOWTAIL BUTTERFLIES PLEASE, but maps of their native range are always welcome, especially if these have state lines, major cities and/or ecoregion boundaries shown for reference!) Oh, and I'm asking only about the continental USA -- I know that these critters are found pretty much everywhere in Hawaii, but you won't find them at all in Alaska! 2601:646:8A00:A0B3:4960:40AC:D40E:12AC (talk) 03:04, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

No swallowtail butterflies here
The Imperial Dunes in the Yuma Desert

See distribution map: [27]

Note: Canadian tiger swallowtail (Papilio canadensis) is indeed distributed in Alaska.

The main blank area in the map roughly corresponds with the Yuma Desert section of the Colorado Desert region of the Sonoran Desert.—2606:A000:1126:4CA:0:98F2:CFF6:1782 (talk) 17:43, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Thanks... for the bad news! :-( So, how big can each of these critters grow (maximum size)? 2601:646:8A00:A0B3:4960:40AC:D40E:12AC (talk) 02:44, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

The largest butterfly that can be found naturally in the United States is the Giant Swallowtail (Papilio cresphontes) with a wing span of 4-6 inches.[28] —2606:A000:1126:4CA:0:98F2:CFF6:1782 (talk) 03:47, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

And the ones which are shown on the map? How big can they grow? (BTW, I was pretty sure P. rutulus could grow to 6 inches or more -- but maybe that's just me being too frightened to estimate size accurately! Or maybe it was P. cresphontes I saw on all those occasions -- is it native to California and/or Oregon?) 2601:646:8A00:A0B3:4960:40AC:D40E:12AC (talk) 06:38, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

Trademark symbols in academic writing

In academic writing is there any point in putting trademark symbols for company names and products like Thermo Fischer Scientific or SYBR Safe? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.215.47.59 (talk) 17:53, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

For company names, probably not, unless confusion is likely for some reason without it. For products, it may sometimes be useful. I have seen quite a number of papers using a trademark symbol when giving the proprietary name of a drug. For example, even doctors seeing the names diltiazem and Cardizem might not be certain which is the generic name and which is the proprietary name. Looie496 (talk) 18:04, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

I've never used or seen it in published academic writing. I wouldn't. If it was a requirement, the author guidelines for your journal of choice would say to do it. In my experience. none do. Fgf10 (talk) 08:12, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

Here's one 185.230.100.66 (talk) 00:17, 24 June 2018 (UTC)

I'd say omit ™ (and the related ® too) in general, if possible. Just use consistent and proper capitalization and spelling. From the Chicago Manual of Style: "Although the symbols ® and ™ often accompany trademark names on product packaging and in promotional material, there is no legal requirement to use these symbols, and they should be omitted wherever possible." source

--Doroletho (talk) 12:05, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

Estimating tree mass: is height and species enough?

How accurately can a tree's mass be estimated, given only its height and species? NeonMerlin 22:33, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Try GlobAllomeTree. Alansplodge (talk) 22:58, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

June 23

Where is the south pole of a power meter's north pole?

I've read that a magnetic monopole has never been observed. In Toronto in the early 2000s, I used a magnetic compass for some science-class work and noticed that when close enough to a power meter, it would always mark the meter as the magnetic north pole. (My neighborhood was of older semidetached houses; I was told my home at the time had been built in the 1950s.) Where is the south pole of a magnet, whose north pole is a power meter of the type I would have observed? NeonMerlin 03:31, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

If I understand your question properly, the "north pole" would be the compass needle's attraction to the meter's electromagnetic field (EMF) -- and in effect, the "south pole" would be, in this case, "ground". 2606:A000:1126:4CA:0:98F2:CFF6:1782 (talk) 07:09, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

No. The compass needle aligns itself along a Field line that emerges from a south magnetic pole and curves through space to return to a north magnetic pole. Both these magnetic poles are located inside the electric power meter and produce an external Magnetic field. This could be prevented by shielding the meter with an iron case. DroneB (talk) 11:40, 23 June 2018 (UTC)