NSF

The tragedy of the commons says that self interest and competition can cause people to ruin a shared resource. If people ruin what they share, sometimes the best avenue is to have them not share. Research supported by the National Science Foundation has shown that privatization, cooperation, and regulation can all work to protect commons, but only if proper enforcement exists.

Infrared can be divided into three separate categories – near, mid, and far, and even though we can’t see it, in some cases we can detect it. Many things, including people and planets, emit infrared. We also use it to transmit information via remote controls and video game consoles.

A binary system of numbers is one that is composed only of ones and zeros. It was the system of choice for people who developed early computers--they needed a reliable way to get information across electrical circuits, and a way that was easy for the systems to understand.

The tragedy of the commons is a dilemma that developes when a group holds a limited resource in common. If each person acts rationally in his or her own self interest often the resource will be depleted or destroyed by the group even if the individuals know that their behavior will ultimately be harmful.

Liquid crystals are a kind of matter that exists somewhere between a liquid and a solid. We can control the order of the liquid crystals used in liquid crystal displays with electricity. Think of it like a valve for light. We can open and close the valve by changing the alignment of the liquid crystals using electrical fields.

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's largest and highest-energy particle accelerator. It is expected to address some of the most fundamental questions of physics, advancing the understanding of the deepest laws of nature.

The electromagnetic spectrum is the range of all possible wavelengths of energy, including the visible light that makes plants grow, and the infrared that your remote control uses to command your television. Wavelength decreases as frequency increases, so we can say that it is inversely proportional to both frequency and energy.

Electromagnetic radiation (ER) is a form of energy, and it acts like a wave as it moves at the speed of light--it’s how energy from the sun reaches Earth. ER is classified by frequency—how many times the wave oscillates in a given amount of time.

DNA contains the genetic code used by all known living organisms. It also contains historical information, because it collects “mistakes,” called mutations, over time. DNA is a building block too--it has the ability to self-assemble into complex structures.

This episode of Chalk Talk gives viewers a look inside the "power plant" of most complex cells. Mitochondria provide energy for cells to move, divide, and do all the things they need to do to function properly. Mitochondria are found within almost all living organisms with complex cell structures.