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"Crowd turbulence" has deadly consequences Jan 25
Crowded areas can be dangerous and potentially fatal places when panic ensues. But disasters can be avoided by monitoring pedestrian motion for distinct "phase transitions", say physicists in Germany. The researchers analysed video images of a fatal incident that occurred during the January 2006 Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca and have made a number of recommendations that have been implemented by the Saudi authorities to help prevent similar incidents from occurring in the future. This includes the installation of an automated video surveillance system that could alert authorities when the phase transitions occur (arXiv:physics/0701203v1).
Graphene resonator is one atom thick Jan 25
Physicists in the US claim to have made the world’s thinnest resonators using sheets of carbon as little as one atomic layer thick. Paul McEuen and colleagues at Cornell University suspended graphene sheets over micrometre-sized trenches to create devices that vibrate at their own natural frequencies. According to McEuen, the resonators could be used to create highly-sensitive mass and force detectors (Science 315 490).
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