Theory of Water by Gerald Pollock

I salute you for your perseverance. I tried to watch it, but my attention span is too short.

Anybody want to give a synopsis?

Thanks from a lazy bum.

Sorry Lynlyn, I should have at least provided an outline of the lecture. What Gerald Pollock is saying is that in certain environments such as next to gels or Nafion and extending outwards for about 200 µM there is an exclusion zone (EZ) where the water does not behave as the water we commonly know. He has determined that the EZ is highly negative and that the area in the water next to the EZ becomes highly positive. A natural battery if you please. He was able to measure the current created by the battery at about 200 Ma.

This phenomenon helps to explain why clouds form instead of viewing evaporation as being uniform across a sunny ocean. Pollock uses the information to explain photosynthesis, cloud formation, and to provide a few engineering potential uses. He is working on a flow of water through a Nafion tube (about 52'20" on the tape) and by forcing the "like-likes-like" particles in the water away from the edges of the Nafion and into the center of the water flow stream. By inserting a smaller diameter pipe, he can then separate the particles in the water from the main stream (see the video at the time indicated). It seems a very effective and cheap way to treat water. It smacks of innovation. With several passes it may beat the heck out of normal filtration.

Also he has measure the electrical charge created by the battery these gels and polymers create near the water at about 200 Ma. A potential for engineered energy may be realized from such a battery formed by this phenomenon.

There is more to the EZ but I think Pollock's theory explains many things. It is so novel to me, that I was not sure it was for real. It sounds like a system that yearns out for an enterprising engineer to invest some time and effort. It sure looks simple and innovative in the end.

hey Kev,

I don't have time to watch the video but I did find a print interview with Pollock online to read.

The idea of a gel state of water is interesting. But that is tempered by the fact that I know relatively nothing about it, so I think, why not.

But I was quickly disappointed with the comments on photosynthesis in this article. "Why don't we photosynthesize? And the answer is, probably we do. It may not be the main mechanism for getting energy, but it certainly could be one of them."

This is utter hogswallow. We don't have the necessary pigments and structures for photosynthesis. The suggestion that humans/animals are getting some energy from photosynthesis is completely ignorant. Anyone who would venture to comment on photosynthesis without even reading what is already known is not a science professional, but a dreamer.

I must admit that great and useful ideas often come across disciplines, because something is perceptible from the outside that is harder to see from the inside. But there is also the potential for big bloopers that simply show how ignorant you are. That doesn't mean I am sure there are no real ideas here - I know I don't know. But when it comes to photosynthesis he is out to lunch, and that makes me doubtful about the rest.

He has been known for controversy so I accept your opinion based on photosynthesis. Part of it does seem feasible with regard to the separation of particles by the like-likes-like clustering and charges. It is the potential water treatment system that intrigues me the most. If the physics is correct then this type of system is possible. I have always looked to see what is becoming interesting in water and I came across this lecture on the research channel on cable TV. I am interested in knowing how far it can be taken to a practical level. That is when you will know if it is real or not or just too difficult to make work. His final 5 minutes or so indicated his research was good to go. I guess we will see. Sometimes it is good to share some things even if they may be wrong. It is always the way of new ideas to be critical. But sometimes they do work. Leading edge or over the top??

Hey I do like the explanation of cloud formation as those fluffy things in the sky and not just a gradual graying till it rains.

I don't deny that his theory about the gel state is interesting and I would not be too surprised if something came of it. The recent work on nanomaterials is showing that materials can behave very differently at the nanoscale. Using the naflon tube to confine the flow of water and manipulate the thin layer of "gel state" is similar to these concepts...

Artsmith; you might want to be less disparaging of those 'dreamers', who failed your criteria to be scientists (for not being up to date with reading what is known about photosynthesis before making statements about photosynthesis). You may be more similar to a 'dreamer' than you realize.

If idea that humans/animals photosynthesize is 'hogwash', then 'hogwash' might be some very valid stuff.

I recently came across an article about wasps that harvest sunlight photoelectically. A few months back I read about photosynthetic sea slugs.

When you made your statements about photosynthesis, had you taken the time to read what we know about photosynthesis? If so, how could you have forgotten what we know about photosynthesis in flatworm, jellyfish and salamanders?

Perhaps you were just dreaming when school covered our understanding that humans photosynthesize vitamin D in the dermis.

Don't be so hard on those who make statements that you suspect portray their of a lack of common knowledge.... or at least be sure your own ideas are on more solid ground than those of which you are so critical.

Guest,

Fair enough to chide me for unfairly disparaging 'dreamers' and also to charge that I am a "dreamer" myself on occasion - no doubt providing a source of amusement to others who know more about a given subject, and who distinguish (and point out) the obvious impossibilities or errors in my thinking, for which I thank them. Tolerance of dreamers is a good thing, but factual errors should be pointed out all the same.

In the same vein, your support for the notion that humans probably get some energy from photosynthesis is still hogswallow (call it "nonsense" if that's more politically correct - I don't mean to be rough).

Yes it's true that the term photosynthesis is used in "photosynthesis of vitamin D", but this is not an energy-generating process as is implied by the general term photosynthesis, and wrongly suggested by Pollock in the interview.

The three examples of salamander, jellyfish, and flatworms are all cases where the photosynthesis is carried out by algae: by ordinary green or bluegreen photosynthetic organisms which are endosymbionts of these animals, not by the animals themselves. Interesting stuff, granted, but far removed from any likely symbiosis in a land-dwelling animal.

The case of the wasp's yellow stripe is, by professional reasoning, still to be investigated, and while the "emerald green sea slug" is a proven case of photosynthesis in an animal, this is not a sound basis for the speculation that there is photosynthetic energy capture in humans - unless you know of humans who are blue-green, green or at the very least, bright yellow.

The emerald green sea slug is pretty amazing as an example of evolutionary plasticity, on the same level as the development of eukaryotic cells with mitochondrial endosymbionts. (thanks for the interesting read - I had missed this one). One could speculate on the probability of further evolution in land mammals vis a vis obligate or important endosymbiotic organisms - the bacteria that break down cellulose in ruminants, for example, could eventually have their useful genes incorporated into the animal DNA. However, afaik we have no endosymbionts that are photosynthetic, and unless we spend a few millenia lurking and feeding in tubs of algae it seems unlikely that our evolution will proceed in that direction. IMHO.

Had to down load from utube to watch it, and that took some time, but worth it. I was interested in his statement about clouds, as a young engineer at sea I was intrigued by the behaviour of the clouds.

Looking up into a clear sky from the ships deck I could watch a small cloud slowly developed from nowhere, then just as slowly dissolve, if you looked closely you could see a thin stream of the cloud running across the sky and into a larger cloud. So when one thinks about the electrical charges involved, and like likes like, perhaps it makes a bit of sense.

Regards JD.

Photosynthesis in plants as a means to generate stored energy is as old as life itself. Phytoplankton, possibly our real ancestors or at least the source of our mitochondria, were among the first living 'beings'.

I remember back in the very early 70's that we didn't even know what the energy storage mechanism was for the Kreb's Cycle was. Then we came across stereo inversion in molecules.

It was as simple as those little metal frog toys that came in a Cracker Jacks box that had a thin metal plate on the bottom that was normally convex, but when you pushed it concave with your thumb and held it until it heated up to body temperature it would stay until it cooled. You could set the warm frog down on a flat surface and when it cooled sufficiently the metal bottom plate would instantly go convex and the frog would jump.

We could probably harness solar energy mechanically if someone would invent a solar heat driven 'frog' wheel that would ratchet a cog wheel and spin a stator.

It would work perfectly in outerspace where the temp differences facing the sun and on the dark side of the same object are extremely large. Having no gravity would unload all the moving parts and you could send it back to earth using the new microwave beams being tested now.