Although we know inhaling helium is not a healthy choice, most of us can say we have tried it. When you speak your first word after you inhale the helium, everyone in the room is hysterical. Why does your voice sound like this though? First, lets start with the air flow through your lungs without helium. When you talk, air travels from the lungs and up through the larynx where it meets the vocal cords. Infoldings from the mucus membrane stretch horizontally across the larynx, hit the underside and then vibrate. These vibrations determine, pitch, quality and frequency of your voice. Everyones voice is unique and there own way, but what confuses me is how does helium make everyones voice sound so similar?

When you inhale the helium, you change the type of gas molecules in your throat and increase the speed of sound of your voice. Helium is changing the quality of sound in your voice, instead of the pitch or frequency of your voice. This results in that squeaky voice that we all find extremely hilarious. Since helium is considered a lighter gas, what would happen if we inhaled a deep gas like Sulfur Hexafluoride? Ultimately, your voice would do the exact opposite and slow the speed of sound resulting in deep grown mans voice.

Now how can this affect your body? Well, when you are breathing in helium, you are not breathing in the correct amount of oxygen that your brain needs to function correctly. This may result in that dizzy light headed feeling, which means you should probably take a break. Frank Pegueros, executive director of DARE, Drug Abuse Resistance Education stated “it’s important to remind kids that ingesting any substance—for the sake of getting high or just changing their voices—can be dangerous”. This statement came shortly after one of few helium related deaths. Although this harmless gas brings many kids joy, you need to know when it is a good time or bad time for it. Matter fact, there really is no right time to inhale helium, but almost everyone will tell you that they have tried it at least once in their life. One thing people need to make sure they do not do is directly inhale the helium from one of the tanks, because that will rupture your lungs and result in a possible stroke, seizure or even death.

http://mentalfloss.com/article/21590/why-does-inhaling-helium-make-your-voice-sound-funny

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2012/02/23/teen-dies-after-inhaling-helium-at-party/

http://www.livescience.com/34163-helium-voice-squeaky.html

When a person consumes alcohol, it shows up on someones breath because it gets absorbed from the mouth, throat, stomach and intestines into the bloodstream. Alcohol is not digested upon absorption or chemically changed in the bloodstream. As the blood goes through the lungs, a physiologically predictable amount of the alcohol will moves across the lung membranes and into the lungs themselves.

Once in contact with the air in the lungs, it evaporates and is exhaled. The concentration of the alcohol in the air in the lungs is directly related to the concentration of the alcohol in the blood. Alcohol leaves the body via the breath, because the percent of the total blood alcohol that exists this way is predictable, the alcohol content of the breath can be used to calculate the total blood alcohol content, or BAC. The hand-held breathalyzer uses electrochemical fuel cell technology to identify the elements found in the sample, of course, searching specifically for alcohol. Some devices use an infrared spectrophotometer to scan the sample, identify alcohol and calculate its percentage content. The ratio of breath alcohol to blood alcohol is 2100, so the alcohol content of 2100 milliliters of exhaled air will be the same as for 1 milliliter of blood. The math is simple from there and leads to blood alcohol readings expressed as a percentage of alcohol in the blood.

The partition ratio can vary between 1700 and 2400 depending upon the individual and local environmental conditions, leading to a breath analysis reporting either a higher or lower calculated blood alcohol reading.

In the 1954 Dr. Robert Borkenstein of the Indiana State Police invented the Breathalyzer. It was first developed for police use to test alcohol levels. The breathalyzer contains a system to sample the breath of a suspect and also two glass vials containing the chemical reaction mixture. The breathalyzer also has a system of photocells that a re connected to a meter that measures the color change associated with the chemical reaction. Other devices include a intoxilyzer and a alcosensor. The intoxilyzer detects alcohol by infrared spectroscopy, while the alcosensor detects a chemical reaction of alcohol in a fuel cell.

http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/gadgets/automotive/breathalyzer3.htm

For thousands of years in mythology, mermaids have existed. The myth came around 1000 B.C. when a Syrian goddess jumped into a lake in attempt to turn into a fish. Instead the goddess was to beautiful, so only her bottom half was transformed. Every since that original story, many more have been born all around the world. Even famous explorer Christopher Columbus claimed to have seen a mermaid near Haiti in 1493, describing them as “not as pretty as they are depicted, for somehow in the face they look like men” (according to the American Museum of natural History). Although we can all have trust in Columbus, analysts believe that what he actually saw could be big mammals like a manatee.

Most recent evidence of this myth was released by Animal Planets new special  for Monster Week, Mermaids The New Evidence. The show immediately started new trends on twitter while people all over the world continued to share their opinion on this debate. The show began by displaying apparently more new evidence of the existence of mermaids. Following that was a scene of two grown men on a bot holding on for their life. While this as going on a mermaid looking creature jumped out of the water starring at the camera. ALthough one scientist  claimed that the creature was a seal, Animal Planet remained constant with their interpretation that it was a mermaid. Despite all the hype in Animal Planets new show, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration stated that ” No evidence of aquatic humanoids has ever been found. Why then do they occupy the collective unconscious of nearly all seafaring peoples? That’s a question best left to historians, philosophers and anthropologists.” Despite this statement, people continued to keep an open mind on twitter.

So do mermaids exist? I can give you four reason to believe why they do not. The first reason is simple, we have no physical evidence of them! Second, we cant just pick and choose what a mermaid is suppose to look like. Although we wish mermaids came of as a beautiful women with a fish like tail, it is just simply not possible. Mammals are defined as warm blooded creatures with hair.  How is an animal suppose to have both mammal and fish characteristics? Third, they would be extinct by this time. How are they suppose to reproduce? Maybe like us humans do, but that would mean internal fertilization. The other option would be external like fish do, but could mermaids even lay eggs? There are to many unanswered questions. Finally, how would they go to the bathroom? Mammals digest their food through a complex digestive tract. Fish only have one simple intestine, while humans have large and small intestines. So could you really have a mammalian digestive tract leading into a fish oriented digestive end?

The debate will continue to go on for centuries, but ultimately I wouldn’t wait on the evidence to magically appear sooner than later.

http://www.ibtimes.com/do-mermaids-exist-animal-planets-mermaids-new-evidence-ignites-twitter-debate-about-creatures-being

http://deepseanews.com/2013/10/fishful-thinking-five-reasons-why-mermaids-cant-physically-exist/

As the technology of the smartphone has been dramatically increasing most of us can considered it way more than a cell phone. Instead, these handheld devices are more like small computers, allowing people to do much more than call their families. In fact, i can personally say that throughout the day I use my phone the least to call people.  The tradeoffs include, searching the web, access to over thousands off apps, and even taking pictures on your camera. The problem that most people can agree on with the smart phone is the battery life. You can not go a full day without giving your phone an extra charge. The only way
this is possible is to just not even really use the phone at all.  However, with technology constantly improving this problem will be sold rather sooner than later.

One solution to this problem is simply a bigger battery. Before the iphone 6,  iphones had around a 1500 mAh lithium-ion battery. In other words, 1 mAh produces 1 milliamp of current for 1 hour. With that being said, wouldn’t a 3000 mAH battery produce double the amount of energy? It would but that means the battery is going to be twice as big and heavy, which would create a weird looking iphone. The only solution would be to make the overall phone bigger, but at that point it would seem like an ipad mini.

The Second option to a longer battery life would be to increase the battery energy density. Most phones contain a lithium-ion battery with an energy density of 0.9-2.63 MJ/L. Other types of energy densities are to powerful for handheld devices (check them out here). In the near future I’m sure they will find a energy density around 5 Ml/J, but that would still only increase the battery life by 2.

The last option includes charging your phone while you use it. Maybe every time you type, that energy was converted into energy to charge the phone. Although it is a brilliant idea, its a bust. You wouldn’t receive enough energy. Another idea which caught my attention was solar charging. What if their was a phone case that had solar panels attached to it? Well there in fact is one and with direct sunlight facing the phone it will charge within 4 hours. Overall, the future of battery life is within the hands of the scientists. Clearly they are capable of thinking far outside the box.

http://www.wired.com/2014/09/can-increase-smart-phone-battery-life/ 

For those other fisherman out there, you never really think if a fish is suffering or not while its on the line. In fact, most fisherman are only concerned with either how much money they will receive or what they are eating for dinner. On the other hand, fish do not feel pain the same way as us humans do. Fish are missing the neuro-physiological capacity to have an awareness of pain. In order to understand what exactly that means, you have to understand how pain works for humans. Once an injury occurs for a human, it stimulates nociceptos. The nociceptos then send electrical pulses through your nerves and spinal cord and finally land at the cerebral cortex. This is when these pulses are now processed into a sensation of pain.

In terms of anatomy, you can not compare fish to humans. Fish do not contain a neocortex, which is huge evidence regarding the pain awareness of fish. Most mammals have nerve fibers known as c-nociceptors, which reveal intense experiences of pain. These c-nociceptors are missing in sharks, rays, all cartilaginous fish and bony fish. However, some bony fish do contain simple nociceptors and show reactions to injuries, but it is not clear whether or not this is perceived as pain.

Now what does this all mean? To answer your question, a physiologist know as Lynee Sneddon tested an experiment which left people guessing. Sneddon preformed a study on rainbow trout (bony fish) to see whether or not they could feel pain. She did so by discovering 58 nociceptors along the trouts lips. She proceeded by injecting the fish with bee venom and acetic acid directly into the mouth. The fish reacted by rubbing its nose into the gravel and shaking its body. Sneddon concluded that the trout displayed clear discomfort and responses of pain.

It doesn’t take a scientist to see whether or not a fish is uncomfortable. For example, when i fish with my dad and its time to pull the hook out, the fish continues to shake its head and flop all over the boat. Is the fish feeling pain? Or is the fish suffering because it is simply out of the water? Whether or not either are true, you can see that the fish is in a state of discomfort.  After doing research on this intriguing topic, I can now say that scientifically fish do not feel pain. However, as a fisherman and reader of Sneddon’s experiment, their are signs that fish display discomfort. Whether or not this discomfort can be defined as pain is another argument for another day.

Resources:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/08/130808123719.htm

http://adventure.howstuffworks.com/outdoor-activities/fishing/fish-conservation/responsible-fishing/fish-pain1.htm

Hey everyone, my name is Justin Fernandez and im from Long Island New York. I am a freshman here at Penn State majoring in finance. Back in high school, sciences courses such biology, chemistry and physics were not my strong suit. Not only did i find them challenging, but i had no interest in them. SC 200 immediately caught my attention when my advisor recommended it. I ended up choosing this class because of all the positive feedback, as well as the various amount of unique topics it covers. I don’t plan on being a science major because all of my potential career paths are non science related. Being from New York i am a huge Ranger fan