The portrayal of the nuclear accident at Fukushima Daiichi by the Japanese government appears to have taken a more serious tone in the past week. The severity of the accident was raised to 7, comparable to Chernobyl. Evacuations of people… Continue Reading
High radiation levels at the stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant prompted Japan’s government on Monday to raise the severity rating of the crisis from 5 to 7 — the highest level on an international scale, and one on par with… Continue Reading
In the past two weeks, I have blogged a couple of times about the nuclear reactor problems in Fukushima Prefecture, Japan, and have expressed concern about the radiation levels outside the evacuation zone northwest of the reactor. It is interesting… Continue Reading
Last week I wrote a blog post about the radiation dangers in Japan as a result of the problems with the Fukushima reactor. In that article I pointed out that there were spots just outside the 30 km shelter-in-place zone… Continue Reading
At Rice University, we want to educate our students to be prepared for the challenges they will face in the real world. With that in mind, I have been teaching a course called “Physics in Society” that teaches nonscience students… Continue Reading
When I was a student, I was taught that the universe began with the “Big Bang” and was expanding — but the expansion was slowing because of gravity. An important question was whether gravity would cause the universe to collapse… Continue Reading