Volume 3: Dance of the Aurora Chapter 29 Singular point
Ning Yu'an looked at the sculpture in front of her, and recalled the history of physics that Fang Cheng had taught her, as if playing a movie in her mind.
Every time she thought about something related to Fang Cheng, she would involuntarily wander to this sculpture, but until now she herself did not realize it, she just felt that this place was somehow a little special.
The sculpture is made entirely of brass and is not very large, only about . It stands quietly on the lawn beside the road, and is hidden under the tall tree canopy along with the Su Buqing sculpture not far away.
If it didn't have an opening at one end, it could be considered a strict Möbius strip. But unfortunately it was disconnected, and now it was just a twisted rectangular strip. However, if it was really made into a closed shape, it would be difficult to achieve in terms of technology, maybe it could be formed by casting? Ning Yu'an didn't quite understand these things.
And there was one thing she had never understood, which was that when the Möbius strip was broken, a surface would be added immediately. This fact sounded incomprehensible. What did the number of geometric faces have to do with anything?
Fang Cheng had always told her that a closed surface was only related to the number of edges, but when asked to prove it further he couldn't say anything. Thinking of this, Ning Yu'an felt a little bit of joy of victory.
Fang Cheng had told her before that people now generally believe that the symbol of infinity was inspired by the Möbius strip and was written as "∞". After all, if a person stands on the Möbius strip, then if he walks forward he will never reach the end, but in fact this assumption is incorrect.
If you think about it carefully, you will find that this forced explanation is very nonsensical. After all, even if it is an ordinary circle, you will not reach the end if you walk along one side of it. In other words, any closed surface satisfies this condition. There is no need to rely on the Möbius strip to be mysterious.
Of course, there are more direct mistakes, that is, Möbius discovered this geometric structure named after him in 1858, and the infinity symbol was created by John Wallis in 1655. This mathematician and Newton were from the same era, and they were also alumni of Cambridge University. I wonder if these two people have ever met in history.
Moreover, he was much older than Newton, so it was not excessive for Newton to call him uncle. He also made his own contribution to the creation of calculus.
It is really hard to say whether calculus has any connection with Newton. After all, when the Royal Society of London accused Leibniz of plagiarizing calculus, Newton was already an important member of the society, and the report that ruled that Leibniz had plagiarized was written by Newton himself.
If we carefully study the lives of great scientists, we will find that each of them is an ordinary person with seven emotions and six desires, but the scientific achievements of famous scientists can often cover up their flaws in character.
"The aliens told me before... this little round cake itself is a very strong electromagnetic lens. I'm thinking of a possibility, which is to use it to change the distribution of the magnetic field lines of the entire earth..."
"Ah? Are you trying to direct the cosmic rays to the ground?"
Fang Cheng was not at all surprised by her reaction. This girl would often rush to answer the teacher's questions even during class. Sometimes she would even give the numerical answer before the teacher had even finished asking the question, and she had almost never made a mistake.
If you have worked with her on scientific research for a period of time, you will be used to this kind of situation.
"You're right, but I'm thinking more specifically, using the low-energy rays emitted from the sun, which is the solar wind."
"But I remember that solar winds don't always exist..."
If we use a metaphorical migration to describe the solar wind for the sake of understanding, we can probably think of the process of releasing these particles as bubbles that pop up when boiling water and water vapor escapes from it. And on the surface of the sun, this bubble is a coronal hole.
Just like boiling water, bubbles do not burst from the sun every moment, and even if particles are released, there is only a small probability that they will hit the earth directly.
In fact, according to the size of the earth, the area projected onto the surface of the sun can be divided into directional angles of less than one degree.
If the sun really were going crazy in all directions all the time, then the auroras should be visible 24 hours a day in high latitudes on Earth.
"I watched the news while having breakfast yesterday. There is extremely strong coronal activity going on on the sun right now. A large amount of particle flow is being thrown towards the earth at this moment ."
Fang Cheng was able to develop this habit thanks to his uncle next door, who is Ning Yu'an's father.
When they were in middle school, the adults of their two families agreed to send the two children to school in the same car on alternate days so that they wouldn't have to get up early every day. Every time it was the girl's turn, he would go directly next door to have breakfast, and every morning their house would always play the morning news without fail.
It is said that watching the news every day was a habit developed by Ning Yu'an's father when he was in the army. After he retired from the army, he felt uncomfortable if he didn't watch the news for a day.
At first Fang Cheng's parents were reluctant to let the boy go and eat and drink for free, as they felt it would be too much trouble for that family. However, the parents on the other side seemed to welcome him, so Fang Cheng's parents didn't say anything.
"Oh, we are not a bother at all, Sister Jing. How much can a child eat? Besides, it is a good opportunity for Fang Cheng and Yu An to communicate with each other, and it can also improve my child's grades."
We still don't know whether Ning Yu'an's parents wanted Fang Cheng to go because of his academic performance, but his motivation for going there to eat was very pure, it was because the food cooked at home was so bad.
The breakfasts at other families were basically carefully designed, with a balanced combination of meat and vegetables. Fang Cheng once suspected that this was in accordance with the navy's standards. On the other hand, his family only had white porridge, eggs and noodles. He had no appetite in the morning and really couldn't eat these things.
This is also the main reason why he has mastered the cooking skills since he was a child. The sharpness of a sword comes from sharpening, and the fragrance of plum blossoms comes from the bitter cold.
"So I was wondering if I could use this..."
"At this time of year, the sun should be directly above the northern hemisphere. In early May, it should have just moved northward from the equator, probably at around 10 to 20 degrees north latitude?"
As she spoke, she opened her phone and swiped at the map. Fang Cheng knew that it was useless to say anything to her when she was concentrating.
"I found a triangle in the central Pacific Ocean, roughly between the Fiji Islands, the Mariana Islands and Hawaii . The area is very empty, basically all sea, and the latitude is also relatively suitable. For the sake of convenience, I will call its center of mass the singularity..."
In fact, that is indeed the singular point of the magnetic lines of force.
"You mean... we should lead it over?"
He finally answered the question.
