Kids Research Express

The invention of the rocket is generally ascribed to the Chinese, who as early as A.D. 1000 stuffed gunpowder into sections of bamboo tubing to make military weapons of considerable effectiveness. The 13th-century English monk Roger Bacon introduced to Europe an improved form of gunpowder, which enabled rockets to become incendiary projectiles with a relatively long range. Rockets subsequently became a common if unreliable weapon. Major progress in design resulted from the work of William Congreve, an English artillery expert, who built a 20-lb (9-kg) rocket capable of traveling up to 2 mi (3 km). In the late 19th cent., the Austrian physicist Ernst Mach gave serious theoretical consideration to supersonic speeds and predicted the shock wave that causes sonic boom. The astronautical use of rockets was cogently argued in the beginning of the 20th cent. by the Russian Konstantin E. Tsiolkovsky , who is sometimes called the "father of astronautics." He pointed out that a rock

Rocket, any vehicle propelled by ejection of the gases produced by combustion of self-contained propellants. Rockets are used in fireworks, as military weapons, and in scientific applications such as space exploration. Rocket Propulsion The force acting on a rocket, called its thrust, is equal to the mass ejected per second times the velocity of the expelled gases. This force can be understood in terms of Newton's third law of motion, which states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. In the case of a rocket, the action is the backward-streaming flow of gas and the reaction is the forward motion of the rocket. Another way of understanding rocket propulsion is to realize that tremendous pressure is exerted on the walls of the combustion chamber except where the gas exits at the rear; the resulting unbalanced force on the front interior wall of the chamber pushes the rocket forward. A common misconception, before space exploration pointed up its obvious fal

Photochemistry, study of chemical processes that are accompanied by or catalyzed by the emission or absorption of visible light or ultraviolet radiation. A molecule in its ground (unexcited) state can absorb a quantum of light energy, or photon, and go to a higher-energy state, or excited state (see quantum theory). Such a molecule is then much more reactive than a ground-state molecule and can undergo entirely different reactions than the more stable molecule, following several different reaction pathways. One possibility is that it can simply emit the absorbed light and fall back to the ground state. This process, called chemiluminescence, is illustrated by various glow-in-the-dark objects. Another possibility is for the molecule to take part in a photo-induced chemical reaction; it may break apart (photodissociate), rearrange, isomerize, dimerize, eliminate or add small molecules, or even transfer its energy to another molecule. Photochromic compounds—compounds that change color rev

Aerosol dispenser, device designed to produce a fine spray of liquid or solid particles that can be suspended in a gas such as the atmosphere. The dispenser commonly consists of a container that holds under pressure the substance to be dispersed (e.g., paints, insecticides, medications, and hair sprays) and a liquefied gas propellant. When a valve is released, the propellant forces the substance through an atomizer and out of the dispenser in the form of a fine spray. These devices are more properly termed spray dispensers rather than aerosol dispensers because the particles of the dispersed substance are usually larger than the particles of a true aerosol (see colloid), such as a fog or a smoke. Freon was the most common aerosol propellant, but its use has been banned because it is believed to contribute to destruction of the ozone layer of the stratosphere; common propellants now include propane, butane, and other hydrocarbons.

Chronometer, mechanical timekeeping device of great accuracy, particularly one used for determining longitude (see latitude and longitude ) at sea. Early weight- and pendulum-driven clocks were inaccurate because of friction and temperature changes and could not be used at sea because of the ship's motion. In 1735 John Harrison invented and constructed the first of four practical marine timekeepers. The modern marine chronometer is suspended to remain horizontal whatever the inclination of the ship and differs in parts of its mechanism from the ordinary watch. A chronometer may provide timekeeping accurate to within 0.1 second per day. See also Ferdinand Berthoud.

Electrocardiography (ĭlĕk'trōkärdēŏg`rəfē), science of recording and interpreting the electrical activity that precedes and is a measure of the action of heart muscles. Since 1887, when Augustus Waller demonstrated the possibility of measuring such action, physicians and physiologists have recorded it in order to study the heart's normal behavior and to provide a method for diagnosing abnormalities. Electrical current associated with contraction of the heart muscles passes through the various tissues and reaches the surface of the body. What is actually recorded is the change in electrical potential on the body surface. The first practical device for recording the activity of the heart was the string galvanometer developed by William Einthoven in 1903. In this device a fine quartz string is suspended vertically between the poles of a magnet. The string is deflected in response to changes in electrical potential and its movement can be optically enlarged and photographed, or, if

Nutation, in astronomy, a slight wobbling motion of the earth's axis. The causes of nutation are similar to those of the precession of the equinoxes , involving the varying attraction of the moon on the earth's equatorial bulge. However, the period of the motion is only 18.6 years, the same as that of the precession of the moon's nodes, as opposed to the nearly 26,000-year period of the precession of the equinoxes. Nutation was discovered by the English astronomer James Bradley in 1728 but was not explained until 20 years later.