Molecular dynamics and youtube

18 September 2009 - Art

We all know youtube from the stupid-people videos, the nasty-accident videos and the pirated-movie-or-music video videos but the youtube servers also store a lot of chemical stuff that might be interesting. Take for instance molecular dynamics clips: the origin can be obscure, the copyrights contested, the movie length ultrashort, loading time excessive, the description vague and as with everything on internet the content should probably not be believed but the entertainment value is undeniable. Here is a sampling. In movie 1 we watch 9 billion atoms of copper and aluminum in the melt demonstrating Kelvin-Helmholtz instability. In movie 2 we watch a nanoparticle melt, silica is hydrolyzed in movie 3, a polymer chain snakes through solution in movie 4, water freezes here , nitromethane detonates here , a rotaxane flops around here, a nanotube oscillates here, a beta hairpin folds here, pottasium wriggles it's way through intercalated graphite here and finally - is it art or science? the dynamic simulation of liquid benzene here.