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Magic! Acoustic Levitation of Liquids!

This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American


Video of the Week #61 September 20th, 2012:

From:Acoustic Levitation of Liquids Looks Like Magic by Joanne Manaster at PsiVid.


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Source:Argonne Labs

From Argonne Labs comes this intriguing video demonstrating the acoustic levitation of liquids on a piece of equipment developed for NASA to simulate microgravity conditions. Two sets of soundwaves from two speakers set up a standing wave and at certain points along this standing wave, known as nodes, there is no net transfer of energy at all. Because the acoustic pressure from the sound waves is sufficient to cancel the effect of gravity, light objects are able to levitate when placed at the nodes.