
Drunk scientists pour wine on superconductors and make an incredible discovery - JangoSteve
http://io9.com/5731129/drunken-scientists-pour-alcohol-on-superconductors-and-make-an-incredible-discovery
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alexophile
The superconductor proceeded to text its ex-girlfriend all night.

Couldn't help it. But I did try and find a more sober analysis of what was
going on as it seemed that the only accurate words in the title were
"scientists" and "superconductor." All I found was a press release from NIMS
saying they would announce at ASC2010.

"The National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS; President: Sukekatsu
Ushioda) has discovered that alcoholic beverages, including red wine, beer,
and others, are effective in inducing superconductivity in Fe(Te,S), which is
an iron-based superconductivity related substance. This result was obtained in
research by a team headed by Dr. Yoshihiko Takano, Group Leader of the Nano
Frontier Materials Group of the NIMS Superconducting Materials Center
(Managing Director: Hiroaki Kumakura)."

<http://www.nims.go.jp/eng/news/press/2010/07/p201007270.html>

~~~
yan
The first comment on the reddit thread is also pretty entertaining: "Similar
decreases in resistance occur when wine is poured on sorority girls."

~~~
zachrose
They would say that at Reddit, wouldn't they.

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fleitz
It appears that science has reached its Ballmer Peak. <http://xkcd.com/323/>

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burgerbrain
Ok, I've got to ask: is there anything red wine _won't_ do? Maybe scientists
should start investigating it for use as an alternative to fossil-fuels as
well? ;)

~~~
fleitz
It will work wonders as an alternative as long as you remove the 90% water
content.

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luigi
Did they all jump then into the hot tub? And did John Cusack get transported
back to the '80s?

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tintin
I'm sorry, but it doesn't state they were drunk. They had a party and decided
to test other liquids. Wine came out best. <http://arxiv.org/abs/1008.0666>

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michaelty
I demand a similar experiment with marijuana.

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seltzered
this reminded me of an article back in 2004, where an engineer discovered sake
can be used to make wood pliable enough to form it into speaker cones: \-
[http://www.boingboing.net/2004/04/06/sake-marinade-
soften.ht...](http://www.boingboing.net/2004/04/06/sake-marinade-soften.html)

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delackner
Sigh. 12 comments so far and only 2 or 3 are not jokes?

~~~
chanux
I personally am happy to have a bit of humor. I hated the time humor was not
an option here.

~~~
delackner
Though completely content-less humor comments are not explicitly against the
guidelines, as you point out, for a long time now many many users have frowned
on them.

Maybe its just time for me to start ignoring the discussions.

~~~
docgnome
The reason they are frowned upon is because the discussion section should
contain, ya know, discussion. Not 30 pages of tired memes.

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neworbit
I am suddenly struck with a flashback to the Cold Fusion experiments. I want
to see this reproduced in a (pun totally intended) more sober setting

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chanux
Fellow HNer mmaunder has got a point here:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1419536>

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jff
I bet the superconductor just _thinks_ it conducts better a little buzzed.

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FiddlerClamp
I was either hoping for Gay Robot* or Electric Dreams, but this is quite cool.

* Gay Robot was created when his inventor accidentally spilled a wine cooler on the motherboard.

