Memoirs of a Hayseed Physicist by Peter Martel

Part 203:

In my early days at Chalk River, Roger was my inspiration and mentor, even though at a tender age of 20 he was some 10 years my junior. He was also indirectly responsible for my learning downhill skiing. This happened since he was considered an indispensable staff member, because he produced up to fifteen papers a year in a field where two papers was considered quite adequate. The hierarchy was so scared of losing him that he was granted the privilege of taking every Wednesday off in winter to go to a ski hill some 90 kilometres away. He also had the privilege of inviting staff to accompany him.

Summer’s Bounty by L. Martel second try (more like 10th try)

Thank you Don and Tubularsock for your suggestions. I’ll give this three tries before declaring it a SNFU. So here goes:

Summer’s Bounty by L. Martel

This is a water colour I did awhile ago. I finally framed it and if I can figure out how to transfer it ..you just might get to see it. Maybe somebody could tell me how to do this because it doesn’t seem to be working? How do you insert a Featured image?

This is My Summer Song by swo8 Blues Jazz

It’s been a lovely summer here – long and hot. The garden was good and we managed to get a few tomatoes and peppers from the garden. I’m reading the work of the fifth century (of the Christian era), Indian poet, Kalidasa. It’s a translation from Sanskrit. There are several plays and, of course poetry. I’m reading about the maiden Shakuntala of the Hermitage. The story is classic and the poetry is beautiful. It’s a perfect ending to a beautiful summer.

Want of You by swo8 Blues Jazz from the album Osaka Time in iTunes

It’s been a long hot summer and of course this song is right on point. Looks like this is the new editor – I never asked for that. I’ll have to write a song about it!

Leslie

Memoirs of a Hayseed Physicist by Peter Martel

Part 268:

The results of our measurements contradicted the NMR results. The reason turned out to be that NMR is a “slow” probe that samples collisions in biological matter caused by cell walls and other structures. These collisions appear like bound water to NMR. Neutrons are fast enough to capture the dynamic behaviour of water before collisions can occur.

*This concludes this years time with Dr. Martel. The events/experiments were real and can probably be Googled under Peter Martel Neutron. The names haven’t been changed. I do apologize for the, somewhat, complicated details of the experiments. Pure research looks for the unknown, unfortunately, very little pure research is being done today. Even science has been monetized and this is most unfortunate, because science builds on what those, who have come before, have discovered.

Leslie

Memoirs of a Hayseed Physicist by Peter Martel

Part 267:

Besides the crystalline studies mentioned earlier, some of my first forays into biophysics involved the bringing of water to biological structures. These experiments were carried out in the late seventies. At that time nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) studies seemed to indicate that there were large fractions of water that were not free to move in plants and animals. To verify the accuracy of these NMR measurements we carried out measurements on fresh rat muscle, live plant leaves, and ice;—the measurements on the latter to serve as a sample of immobile water.

Memoirs of a Hayseed Physicist by Peter Martel

Part 266:

My recollection of IUPAB conferences brings to mind a fantastic meeting I’d attended in Mexico City some years earlier. On arrival in Mexico City airport we were greeted by a sign saying “IUPAB attendees this way”. We were then ushered past customs to buses that drove us to all the hotels on the list IUPAB had submitted to the authorities. The next day, the meeting was opened by none other than the President of Mexico. I concluded that biology and biophysics were far more important to Mexicans than to Canadians.

Memoirs of a Hayseed Physicist by Peter Martel

Part 265:

My letter of application to NATO was immediately sent in and after filling out a few forms my application was accepted. I was again set to travel. One of my destinations would be Paris because I’d enticed Bernard Henion of the Laboratories Leon Brillouin to join me on the project.This had helped my cause because NATO likes to foster collaborations involving its members. I forget the exact amount of my grant, but it was a fair fraction of a million Belgium francs.

Memoirs of a Hayseed Physicist by Peter Martel

Part 264:

The next morning I was having coffee and donuts with a nuclear physicist named Jim Forster. The answer to my travel problem was simple he said. All I had to do was get a grant from NATO. He’d gotten one and had become the administrator of a large grant that had even permitted him to purchase a computer.

Memoirs of a Hayseed Physicist by Peter Martel

Part 263:

The way a scientific career can be influenced by serendipity is manifested by how I came to apply for a NATO grant. I had attended an IUPAB (International Union for Pure and Applied Biophysics) conference in Vancouver in the early 90’s and because these are usually big events cheap accommodation can be difficult to find. I’d stayed at a hotel for $110.00 a night and when I returned and made out my expense account the branch head of the day exploded. It looked like my traveling days were over, supposedly because I stayed in high priced hotels while on company business. In fact I had had no choice. The IUPAB had a membership even larger than the American Physical Society. As a result all the inexpensive hotel rooms had been taken before my arrival.