After a game of curling, physicist Mark Shegelski likes to sit down with his buddies and play a little game.

91裸聊视频淚 would say, 91裸聊视频楬ey, hey, before you pour the beer91裸聊视频� 91裸聊视频� because you have to drink beer after every game of curling, right 91裸聊视频� 91裸聊视频榖efore you pour the beer, let me just show you something,91裸聊视频�91裸聊视频� Shegelski said. He would grab the empty beer glass, turn it upside down and place it on the table.

Pretending like he was concentrating hard, Shegelski would send the glass down the table. As it travelled, the glass would rotate clockwise and move gradually to the left.

It was the exact opposite to how a curling rock would move, and Shegelski91裸聊视频檚 fellow curlers would be dumbfounded.

91裸聊视频淭hey were just like 91裸聊视频楬ow? What91裸聊视频檚 going on?91裸聊视频� And for them, this was baffling. Why was the drinking glass going the wrong way?91裸聊视频� Shegelski said. 91裸聊视频淏ut for me, it was the other way around.91裸聊视频�

For Shegelski, a physicist that researches quantum mechanics at the University of Northern British Columbia, the curling rock was the mystery. Unlike a drinking glass, which curls (or moves to the side) in the opposite direction that it rotates, a curling rock will curl in the same direction of its rotation.

91裸聊视频淔rom a physics point of view, it91裸聊视频檚 easy to understand the drinking glass,91裸聊视频� he said. 91裸聊视频淚t91裸聊视频檚 harder to understand the curling rock.91裸聊视频�

Easy is a relative term of course, but the basics of drinking-glass physics can be distilled into a few sentences.

As the glass moves forward, friction increases at the front of the glass. Friction is what slows the glass down and brings it to a stop. But the glass is also rotating, moving in a clockwise pattern. Because the front of the glass is moving to the right (and the right side is moving slower because of it), there will be more friction on the left as it pushes against the table.

This means that the place with the most friction on the glass will be the front-left portion 91裸聊视频� which is why the glass curls to the left.

But with a curling rock, those rules of physics don91裸聊视频檛 seem to apply. Instead of the rock being drawn in the direction of the most friction, it curls away from it.

That perplexed Shegelski as a grad student, and prompted him to dabble in some of the science behind the sport from the late 1990s to the early 2000s. But it was research that was just for fun, and he dropped it for about 10 years.

When he came back to it, he partnered with Edward Lozowski, a physicist at the University of Alberta and the 91裸聊视频渒ing of the physics of ice91裸聊视频� according to Shegelski. Together, they came up with a theory that could explain the reason behind the unusual movement of curling rocks.

91裸聊视频淚 was just thinking, what91裸聊视频檚 the easiest way to make the rock go sideways,91裸聊视频� Shegelski explained. 91裸聊视频淚 thought, if when you shot the rock, suppose it91裸聊视频檚 stuck in the right-hand side, and rotated for a bit 91裸聊视频� Then suppose that stickiness broke and it slid the rest of the way straight down the ice.91裸聊视频�

91裸聊视频淪o then I though, well what if you have a whole bunch of brief times where it rotates and changes its direction.91裸聊视频�

The concept, which Shegelski and Lozowski dubbed the 91裸聊视频減ivot-slide model91裸聊视频� uses the bumpiness of curling ice as a key part of the theory. As the curling rock travels and rotates, it will catch on the multitude of bumps covering the ice. Each bump that pulls it to the right will result in the rock curling towards the right.

Of course, it is hypothetically possible the rock could curl to the left using this model, but that91裸聊视频檚 not likely to happen.

91裸聊视频淲e think there are sticky events or pivoting at different points around the rock,91裸聊视频� Shegelski explained. 91裸聊视频淏ut the bottom line is that pivots on the left side and pivots on the right side cancel each other out.91裸聊视频�

Because of the rotation, the movement isn91裸聊视频檛 91裸聊视频渢he same left and right,91裸聊视频� he continued.

91裸聊视频淪o as a result you get more pivoting on the right-hand side. That91裸聊视频檚 what dominates and governs the way it moves.91裸聊视频�

For Shegelski, it was a eureka moment, especially now that other experiments have given credence to his and Lozowski91裸聊视频檚 theory. But there is still more to learn.

Take the distance a rock curls for example. Normally, a rock will curl about a metre as it travels up the ice; this remains true whether it rotates two times or 60 times as it travels. But get the rock to rotate 80 times? Then suddenly the curling rock will move two metres to the right.

In another experiment, Shegelski found that if he shot the rock on hockey ice, and made it rotate quickly while sliding slowly, it would curl in a spiral pattern.

91裸聊视频淭his is why I say these rocks are amazing, the things they do,91裸聊视频� Shegelski said. 91裸聊视频淵ou91裸聊视频檙e just looking at this and you91裸聊视频檙e just shocked.91裸聊视频�

Shegelski and Lozowski will continue to work on the physics of curling, but only in their spare time. They have other research projects after all, and curling rocks will continue to move in mysterious ways, no matter how thoroughly they are researched.

91裸聊视频淭hat91裸聊视频檚 one of the things I love about physics,91裸聊视频� Shegelski said. 91裸聊视频淵ou think you get it all figured out, and then you try something and it goes exactly opposite to what you expect.

91裸聊视频淎nd then you sit down and you say 91裸聊视频榃hy does it do what it just did?91裸聊视频�

91裸聊视频淎nd by thinking enough, most of the time you can figure out the answer and realize if you really would have thought about it really carefully 91裸聊视频� you would have realized you were going to get this surprising result.91裸聊视频�

editor@cloverdalereporter.com
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