Welcome


The title says it all: this blog features physics videos found everywhere on the web: animations, demonstrations, lectures, documentaries.
Please go here if you want to suggest other nice physics videos, and here if I mistakingly infringed your copyrights. If you understand French, you'll find a huge selection of physics videos in French in my other blog Vidéos de Physique.

Tuesday 31 January 2012

Alpha, Beta and Gamma - which objects can they travel through?

How particles are able to travel through certain objects.

How Rutherford shaped nuclear physics

2011 was the 100th anniversary of Ernest Rutherford publishing his seminal paper describing the discovery of the atomic nucleus. The New-Zealand-born physicist reached this profound insight after his landmark alpha-particle scattering experiments carried out at the University of Manchester. To mark the centenary, the university hosted a special week-long conference in August, organized by the UK's Institute of Physics.

Monday 30 January 2012

Symmetry - From Kaleidoscopes to Theories of Everything and Nothing

How the idea of symmetry helps us understand the world.

Dr. Howard Georgi - Harvard University
April 29, 1997

Other lectures from Jefferson Lab Science Series

Coffee Mug on String

Angular momentum helps save a red ceramic coffee mug from certain destruction. We used some string, two stolen mugs, and two Ticonderoga Dixon No. 2 pencils. Please do attempt.

Sunday 29 January 2012

Yoav Medan: Ultrasound surgery -- healing without cuts

Imagine having a surgery with no knives involved. At TEDMED, surgeon Yoav Medan shares a technique that uses MRI to find trouble spots and focused ultrasound to treat such issues as brain lesions, uterine fibroids and several kinds of cancerous growths.

Other TED Talks


Saturday 28 January 2012

How Old Is The Earth?

The Earth is clearly old, but exactly how old was difficult to work out. People long believed the Earth had only existed for several thousand years. Then, in the 1800's, a study of geological features (including fjords) led scientists to the conclusion that the planet must be much older - at least millions of years old. Later, the discovery of radioactivity provided a mechanism by which the Earth's core could be continually heated. This meant it was much older than previous estimates of 20-40 million years based on the cooling rate of the Earth. Today through many different methods we have established that the Earth is roughly 4.54 billion years old!

Other Veritasium videos

MIT 8.01 Classical Mechanics Lecture 34

MIT Physics Course

Professor Walter Lewin

8.01 Physics  I: Classical Mechanics, Fall 1999

The Wonderful Quantum World - Breakdown of Classical Mechanics

See other videos in this series.


Thursday 26 January 2012

Wave Function - Sixty Symbols

If you think you understand this video, you probably don't. Another adventure into the world of quantum mechanics with three professors of physics and astronomy.

Other Sixty Symbols videos



Extra footage:

Monday 23 January 2012

How do 3D glasses work - Sixty Symbols

A visit to the toilet is included in Professor Phil Moriarty's explanation of 3D glasses. How do 3D films give us that three dimensional effect?

Other Sixty Symbols videos

Sunday 22 January 2012

Saturday 21 January 2012

Friday 20 January 2012

Light Fantastic: the Science of Colour

The Institute of Physics produces annual Schools and Colleges' lectures. Dr Pete Vuskusic from the School of Physics at Exeter University delivers the 2007 lecture.

Wednesday 18 January 2012

Angular Momentum - Sixty Symbols

A rather dizzy Professor Bowley sacrifices his well-being in the name of science.

Other Sixty Symbols videos

Tuesday 17 January 2012

Monday 16 January 2012

Surface Tension in Fluid Mechanics

National Committee for Fluids Mechanics Films
With Lloyd Trefethen, Deptartment of Mechanical Engineering, Tufts University

Other videos from this series

Sunday 15 January 2012

Conductivity of Glass

Insulating glass becomes a conductor of electricity when heated with a blowtorch.

Two ceramic lightbulb sockets are wired in series to a household AC power cord. When two incandescent bulbs of the same Wattage rating are screwed into the sockets and the cord is plugged in, they both pass the same amount of current and so they both light with the same intensity. When one bulb is unscrewed, the circuit is broken and the other bulb goes out. If we can replace the missing bulb with a conductive material, the circuit will once more be complete and the remaining bulb will light again.

Saturday 14 January 2012

Friday 13 January 2012

Sound + Fire = Rubens' Tube

Sound waves in a tube of gas create flames of different heights that dance to the music. A metal tube with holes in it is filled with gas. The gas is lit to create a row of tiny flames. A speaker at one end plays sound into the tube, which creates a standing wave of sound: areas where air molecules are vibrating rapidly separated by areas where the air is fairly still. This produces the different heights of flames and allows the wavelength of the sound wave to be estimated.

Another Rubens' Tube demonstration

Other Veritasium videos

How lasers work (in theory)

How does a laser really work? It's Bose - Einstein statistics! (photons are bosons)

Other Minute Physics videos

Thursday 12 January 2012

Wednesday 11 January 2012

Plasma in a magnetic field

Demonstration of spinning plasma in a magnetic field from a permanent magnet.

Tuesday 10 January 2012

The Science of Seeing Inside Your Body

Find out how scientists build machines that do what our eyes cannot - see inside the human body.

Medical imaging:  X-rays, nuclear medicine, Ct-scanning, magnetic resonance imaging, pet scanning.


Paramagnetism Of Liquid Oxygen

First, liquid oxygen is made by passing gaseous oxygen through a tube submerged in liquid nitrogen. Then the oxygen is poured between the poles of a strong electro magnet. The paramagnetic nature of the oxygen causes an induced dipole. As a result, the oxygen is suspended in the magnetic field. Once the field is disabled the oxygen returns to its original state and falls from the magnet. Note: liquid oxygen is dangerous and can cause spontaneous combustion please do not try this at home.

Other demonstrations from MIT

Monday 9 January 2012

Yale: Frontiers and Controversies in Astrophysics, Lecture 22

Professor Bailyn offers a review of what is known so far about the expansion of the universe from observing galaxies, supernovae, and other celestial phenomena. The rate of the expansion of the universe is discussed along with the Big Rip theory and the balance of dark energy and dark matter in the universe over time. The point at which the universe shifts from accelerating to decelerating is examined. Worries related to the brightness of high redshift supernovae and the effects of gravitational lensing are explained. The lecture also describes current project designs for detecting supernovae at high or intermediate redshift, such as the Joint Dark Energy Mission (JDEM) and Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST).

Other lectures from this course

Radiation vs Radioactive Atoms

There seems to be confusion about what radiation is and where it comes from. Many people believe it is the radiation that comes directly from nuclear power plants that poses a threat to public safety. In fact it is the radioactive atoms, which can escape in the event of an explosion, that pose a safety risk. They can be scattered by the wind over hundreds of kilometres. Then they may be ingested or breathed in. If they release radiation at this point, it is damaging to the body's molecules and cells because the radiation is delivered directly to tissues.

Other Veritasium videos

Saturday 7 January 2012

Redshift - Sixty Symbols

You've heard of redshift, but what about the "blue shifting galaxy" on a collision course with the Milky Way!?

Other Sixty Symbols videos

Friday 6 January 2012

MIT 8.01 Classical Mechanics Lecture 32

MIT Physics Course

Professor Walter Lewin

8.01 Physics  I: Classical Mechanics, Fall 1999

Heat, thermal expansion, bimetal, mercury thermometer, shrink fitting.

See other videos in this series.



Thursday 5 January 2012

Neutrons and Nanoscience - Backstage Science

Beams of neutrons can be used to make important discoveries in the world of nanoscience. Here we explore three instruments (and beamlines) at the ISIS facility in Oxfordshire, where Neutrons are put to use.

Other Backstage Science videos

The Tacoma Narrows Fallacy

The collapse of the Tacoma Narrows bridge wasn't resonance.

Other Minute Physics videos

Wednesday 4 January 2012

Tuesday 3 January 2012

MIT 8.02 Electricity and Magnetism Lecture 12

MIT 8.02 Electricity and Magnetism, Spring 2002

Professor Walter Lewin

Review before exam:  Gauss's Law, Capacitor, Kirchoff's Laws, Ohm's Law

Other lectures from the same course

Galileo the Scientific Parrot

On the surface of Earth all objects accelerate downwards at the same rate - at least, they're supposed to. But we all know dust, pieces of paper, and feathers fall slower. This is of course due to the influence of air resistance. In this experiment we use an evacuated cylinder to test whether a coin and feather really do accelerate at the same rate.

Other Veritasium videos

Sunday 1 January 2012

Reynolds Number - Sixty Symbols

Wind blowing over volcanoes, planes flying through air and Jupiter's Great Red Spot. A Reynolds Number plays a role in all of them.

Other Sixty Symbols videos


Debate: Does the world need nuclear energy?

Nuclear power: the energy crisis has even die-hard environmentalists reconsidering it. In this first-ever TED debate, Stewart Brand and Mark Z. Jacobson square off over the pros and cons. A discussion that'll make you think -- and might even change your mind.

Other TED Talks