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1649
1650

An air bubble, trapped inside a water droplet, on the International Space Station (i.imgur.com)

submitted ago by Audioworm

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[–]4nuQvZmbm9N1NHbSkzSV 37 points38 points ago

Dr. Evil's on the ISS?

[–]theunpire 22 points23 points ago

I belive it is the Dutch astronaut, André Kuipers.

[–]gogocrazyark 8 points9 points ago

Yep can confirm this for you!

[–][deleted] 1 point2 points ago

Hey thanks! Now I can finally sleep.

[–]TheLoneHoot 1 point2 points ago

It's André's evil twin, Meta Kuipers.

[–]411eli 0 points1 point ago

How can you confirm this? Are you him? Is he you? Am I here?

[–]uyg412u3yg423uy 1 point2 points ago

He's coming back to Earth this weekend.

[–]somesortof 4 points5 points ago

And then he'll go to the best part of it... the Netherlands =]

[–]suanny 16 points17 points ago

A water droplet in an air bubble in a bigger droplet of water then, the bubble fights begin

[–]rjp0008 6 points7 points ago

Bubble war. New favorite word.

[–]willscy 1 point2 points ago

I really liked the way that guy narrated it. Plenty of info without any extra wordiness.

[–]layendecker 0 points1 point ago

Osmos

[–]coalWater -1 points0 points ago

Anybody else noticed he ends each of his sentences as if they were questions?

EDIT: especially after 2mins

[–]Itsweshere 9 points10 points ago

Hes smiling in behind the water bubble, but in the air bubble hes not so happy.......

[–]HeLiX_C 4 points5 points ago

That's neat.. how old is that?

[–]Audioworm[S] 10 points11 points ago

Not sure, but I saw it pop up on all the science blogs this morning. Here is the Discover article

[–]HeLiX_C 1 point2 points ago

Sweet =]

[–]mbouma 4 points5 points ago

He posted it to Flickr himself on June 24

[–]lilLocoMan 0 points1 point ago

Can't be very old since André Kuipers is still On the ISS (his first time), if it were old we would've seen it before.

[–]SirPrice 0 points1 point ago

second time

[–]urbo425 3 points4 points ago

its friggin bubbleception

[–]dj_conway 6 points7 points ago

Why in the background image can you see his teeth, and in the inner bubble, you cannot

[–]aahdin 2 points3 points ago

I think it's just at an angle so that his mouth is a bit twisted. That with a little distortion from the bubble makes it look like he's not showing his teeth.

Or maybe this whole thing is fake and he took the picture last night in his living room and photoshopped it, in which case you should let the fine folks at /r/KarmaConspiracy know.

[–]Reyer 0 points1 point ago

light travels slower through a liquid like water, thus the light being emitted by his smiling face travels a bit faster as it is going through the bubble of air in the center of the water orb. This is 100% science, never doubt me.

[–]songbook 1 point2 points ago

sounds fishy...

[–]dj_conway 0 points1 point ago

I want to call bullshit, but i have been wrong before

[–]steph26 7 points8 points ago

Why is reflection is upside down in the water bubble?

[–]homan525 6 points7 points ago

It's acting as a convex lens

[–]Moldybooks 1 point2 points ago

When I saw it I immediately thought of how the eye works.

[–]aahdin 0 points1 point ago

it's pretty cool how well it works out, I don't think I've ever seen a lense within a lense before like that.

I'm actually a little curious as to why the air bubble has it the right side up, however. I might just be remembering my highschool physics wrong, but I thought the image is only inverted if it's going into a material that causes the light to move slower.

[–]ThePendulum 0 points1 point ago

A difference in density will influence the path of a light beam. Air to water will influence it in a certain way, and water to air will cause the exact opposite of that influence.

[–]CopperKat 2 points3 points ago

Anyone know why he shows up upside-down in the outer bubble?

[–]ikma 2 points3 points ago

Sorry it took so long... I imagine no one will see it, but I worked on this for a while, so i might as well post it.

http://i.imgur.com/m7RiX.jpg

[–]CopperKat 1 point2 points ago

Wow! Thank you so much. You're awesome. I wish I had more upvotes to give you.

[–]ikma 1 point2 points ago

yes!

I'll post a MS paint picture on imgur after I make it, but here is the explanation.

First, you should know that light moves faster in air than in water. So, when the light enters the water droplet, it slows down a little bit, then speeds up again when it enters the air.

Second, you should know that (in this instance), light behaves like a wave, not a particle. Imagine a wave in the ocean - it moves forwards, oscillates up and down, and extends to the left and right. If you're having a hard time picturing this, it will be clearer in the picture.

So, you have this light wave traveling away from the guy's forehead, when all of a sudden it hits the top edge of this water droplet. Since the water droplet is rounded, the bottom of the light wave hits the water before the top of the wave. At that instant, the bottom of the wave slows down a little (since light moves slower in water), but the top is still in the air, and keeps moving at the same speed it was before. The result of this is that the light wave gets bent downwards, and continues through the water droplet. When it hits the air on the other side, the bottom of the wave is then the first to cross into the air. As a result, it speeds up slightly, bending the wave back up, parallel to it's original path, only now, it is coming out of the bottom of the water droplet, not the top.

again, sorry if that was unclear - hopefully the image will help.

[–]mullownium 1 point2 points ago

The ISS is itself an air bubble.

[–]Salamosam 1 point2 points ago

Astronauts must be the happiest people.

[–]captmotorcycle 1 point2 points ago

FUSHIGI!

[–]Darthvodka 1 point2 points ago

Don't you mean, an air bubble, trapped inside a water droplet, trapped inside an air bubble, trapped inside a vacuum?

[–]ErikDangerFantastic 1 point2 points ago

Any other awesome stuff that happens in zero gravity? I'm sure most folks have seen how candles work depending on gravity (http://imgur.com/gallery/iKjR0) and everyone's familiar with bone density issues with astronauts. But I'd love to see other 'stuff does not work the way you're used to it working!' type things.

[–]Audioworm[S] 0 points1 point ago

I like this 'non-crucial' research projects. It helps pose questions that make us think about are preconceptions

[–]Xysten 0 points1 point ago

I wonder what water looks like outside in actual space? Hmm. Im guessing it would just freeze because space is really cold?

[–]orost 2 points3 points ago

It would start boiling because vacuum, which would very quickly cool it down until it froze.

[–]The_MAZZTer -5 points-4 points ago

Space has no temperature, since you need atoms/molecules to have and measure temperature.

(Well not exactly, there are bits of matter here and there which have temperature. They might be cold.)

[–]ThePendulum 0 points1 point ago

I wonder why you are downvoted, because you're somewhat right.

If there are absolutely no particles in an environment, it's impossible to measure temperature. However, you'll know that the temperature is 0 K (-273.15 C, -459.67 F). This only happens if molecules are either not present, or not moving.

However, as you mentioned, there are some molecules in space. Therefor, the temperature on average is about ~2.725 K (-270.43 C, -454.77 F), and not 0 K.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point ago

I hated geometric optics...

[–]thunderplacefires 0 points1 point ago

Science is always better when it's in space.

[–]badbrownie 0 points1 point ago

with vincent d'onofrio standing behind

[–]kleanklay 0 points1 point ago

Glenn Beck always loved bubble experiments.

[–]Bullpup 0 points1 point ago

GRAVITATION

[–]pred 0 points1 point ago

R E F L E C T I O N

[–]tharosbr0 0 points1 point ago

Awesome pic, man.

[–]bengalslash 0 points1 point ago

Image was beyond the focal point.

[–]phladacian 0 points1 point ago

I can't help but think of it as a thick-skinned bubble. Aren't all bubbles air trapped inside a water droplet? This is an interesting conundrum. Call in the disambiguators.

[–]ward_1717 0 points1 point ago

convex, concave! cool pic

[–]sirushi 0 points1 point ago

I bet the air bubble could get out if it really wanted to.

[–]jeaceasar 0 points1 point ago

Two things from Friesland on the frontpage of /r/pics today :)

[–]yanktoast 0 points1 point ago

I really don't understand this picture. Who took it? Why can you see his toothy grin in the background but not in the bubbles? NASA!!!!

[–]vikingbean 0 points1 point ago

Beastie boys did it best.

[–]bamp 0 points1 point ago

Malkovich malkovich Malkovich?

[–]crazyex 0 points1 point ago

I've seen this video (or a similar one) in high definition and it was beyond amazing.

[–]pointlesslyredundant 0 points1 point ago

now if only there was a droplet in the middle with another air bubble... yo dawg.

[–]sk33lz 0 points1 point ago

Looks to be at about an [11].

[–]HenRat 0 points1 point ago

FAKE. Mouth is closed in reflection within airbubble yet open in background shot!

[–]mattj7 0 points1 point ago

that dude looks soooooo high man

[–]Dark_Saint 0 points1 point ago

In space you say

[–]drylube -1 points0 points ago

Obligatory

[–]jmnemonik -1 points0 points ago

Vote ISS americans :) they make cool stuff there... But wait a minute you canceled all your shuttles... Dumpasss president you had before. You had the best space shop and all infrastructure for suporting it and you fucking canceled it after couple old ships felt down.... Idiots just do the a MOT and bild new!

[–]ManWit3BallsCantWalk -1 points0 points ago

And only billions of dollars are funding this bullshit.

[–]Squeekme -1 points0 points ago

I bet when the Chinese complete their space station they wont be doing this shit.

[–]humanspace -1 points0 points ago

Such important research....not. What a fucking waste that thing is. At least little kids are inspired and entertained.

[–]Joke_Getter -2 points-1 points ago

Well, that was $8 billion well spent.

[–]lucky4sav -3 points-2 points ago

Shopped!?!?!

[–]DrunkenAss 0 points1 point ago

Just like the moon landing!

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