Essays, News and Primers on Physics Math & Technology

Math: The Mandelbrot Set

	The Mandelbrot Set is that beautiful fractal made famous in the 1980's with wonderful photographs that brought complex dynamics to popular culture. Or rather, brought the subject of complex dynamics into the discussions in the coffee shops and made mathematics just a little cooler in the eyes of the young.
Images of the Mandelbrot set created by a simple algorithm and rendered by a simple matlab application are shown and the method of creating these images is described.

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More Short Articles & News Stories

Stark Effect

The Stark Effect is shown here in the splitting and shifting of spectral lines in hydrogen under the influence of an external electric field.

What is the Stark Effect? This article discusses the spectroscopic effect of strong electric fields known as the Stark effect, named for Johannes Stark, the first to experimentally demonstrate the effect.

Platonic Solids

Platonic Solids more exciting than a platonic relationship. A discussion of symmetry, regular polygons, platonic solids, and the Euler Characteristic

News: Phoenix Landing on Mars

	Phoenix lands on Mars described as close to first hand as you will find anywhere.
News of the Phoenix spacecraft landing on mars from one of the insiders: Richard Warwick. This is a beautifully detailed description of the event along with some great photos from Phoenix and some from HiRis viewing Phoenix from orbit.

The Physics of Bowling

	The physics of Bowling described by someone that loves the game.
If you really want some insight into the physics of bowling then ask a physicist with a passion for bowling. Dr. Dave Terry, AKA Dr. 300, is a wide ranging physicist with a real passion for bowling. In this pdf presentation, contributed by Dr. Terry, you will learn some of the basic mechanics of the game from a serious physicist's point of view.

Winning the Lottery

Winning the Lottery: Just what is the probability of winning the lottery? Do you have a chance? This short page will show you how to calculate your chances, and justify the lottery's alias: A Tax on People That Can't Do Math.

The Rogowski Coil

The Rogowski Coil. This article describes the theory of operation of a great tool for measuring fast pulsed currents or high frequency currents without direct contact.

Photosynthesis

Photosynthesis depends heavily on quantum effects.

Fibonacci Numbers

Fibonacci series: The first recursive series known to Europe. This article shows what the Fibonacci numbers are and how the recursive series works. It only hints at some of the amazing applications of the series.

Golden Ratio

The Golden Ratio, a fascinating number. The Golden Ratio has applications to aesthetics, biology and other sciences, this article shows one example.

How MP3 Files Work

How do MP3 files Work? The Science and Math Behind All That Entertainment.

Assigning Orthogonal Axes to a 2D Distribution

Finding the angle of a 2 dimensional distribution Continuous or discrete 2D distributions have a best fit angle. Here is how to find it.

Zernike Polynomials

Zernike Polynomials used for representation of light beam wavefronts. Represent any 2-D surface as long as it has a circular footprint.

Mathcad file for Zernike Polynomials

Zernike Polynomials MathCAD sheet, in mathcad 2001i format. (Right Click and Select Save File to Download). This sheet calculates the zernike polynomial of your choice and displays a 3D graph. (Requires mathcad from mathsoft)

Laser Beam Propagation

Basics of Laser Beam Propagation. Here are some of the formulas and descriptions of wave phenomena in coherent beams. This is a work in progress, so please have patience, but go ahead and tell me if you see something wrong!

The Quadratic Formula

The quadratic formula is a quick, easily recalled formula for solving a quadratic equation. Quadratic equations show up in all kinds of science and engineering problems as well as your high school homework. This short article shows how to derive the quadratic formula just in case you forgot the formula or you are just going crazy trying to remember how you derived it once a long time ago.

Taylor Series Expansion

A Taylor series expansion can turn a complicated function into a simple power series polynomial, sometimes. This little trick is very useful in science and engineering and especially in computer modeling of physical phenomena when working with functions that are difficult and time consuming to calculate values for.

Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem

Gödel's incompleteness theorems put a limit on what a system of mathematics can claim about itself. They may also show a limit for what we can know.

The Man Behind Maxwell's Equations

Maxwell at StarkEffects.com James Clerk Maxwell was one of the most productive physicists in history. His contributions to fluid dynamics and later the electromagnetic field have changed our understanding of the world around us in ways that are hard to imagine living without. The essay here is actually a full blown biography. The work is a derivative of a book in the public domain.

Why Educated People Have Trouble Learning

The toughest roadblock to learning is shared by all, but is especially prevalent among the the well educated and highly successful.

Problem Solving Techniques

Problem Solving, the most important skill you can learn, is all about balance. The critical concept is the trade off between analysis and action.

Quantum Physics & Success

Quantum Physics & Success: Does success in life depend on quantum physics in some way other than the chemistry that keeps you alive.