Cleaning up oil spills with magnets?!

I attended a speech on Wednesday this week, so I was absent in my club course. However, I still saw an interesting news on Cnn which can share with you~~:)

resource:http://edition.cnn.com/2012/09/21/tech/oil-spill-magnets/index.html?hpt=hp_bn7


As you can see, the topic is about oil spills from container ships or offshore platforms. Oil spilling has always been a troublesome problems to every countries, but now scientists have offered an "unexpected" solution, "Can magnets really clean up those oil spills?", this is also the same question sprang up my mind while I saw the title like you. And below is the reason why the "miracle" happens~


"On it's own, oil is not magnetic, but MIT researchers say that when mixed with water-repellent nanoparticles that contain iron, the oil can be magnetically separated from the water.
The nanoparticles can later be removed to enable the re-use of the oil."

Then, I started to marvel at this technology, if it can really popularize in the future, this will save us a lot of problems and efforts on restoring the area which is polluted.




You can check out this one, too. It is the robot that detect oil spills~
However, there are still drawbacks of this technology. Dr Susan Shaw claimed that "on a small scale maybe an excellent system but I don't think it will work at sea in such a challenging environment". 

Though it might faces several barriers in the future, I still hold bright faith toward it. 
"Technology indeed owes ecology an apology", and it's time for us to make up for our mistakes by developing the environmental-friendly high-tech!

First class experience~

    Youth Association of  International Conference (YAIC) is an international  club in which the member discuss about the hot issues that is happening on earth recently. It aims to train students' speaking skills and thinking ability by letting them play the roles of delegates in Model United Nations (MUN). I had attended the MUN once since I was in senior high school, so I got interested in this club when I first saw it on the club performing day. I registered immediately with my friend partly because I hope I can be more sensitive about the global issues by immersing myself in the world breaking news everyday and partly because, considering the club fee-they had discount (10% off) on that day!

    I have attended the club class once so far, unsurprisingly, there was a ice breaking time for everyone to make a brief introduction,  then we were divided into small groups based on the recognizing spots of photos from worldwide and they were broke into several pieces while we received as we entered the classroom. Soon, everyone teamed up and seated together with those new faces partners. Again we introduced ourselves and got prepared for the next section.

    Two groups were invited to the stage each time, and the host asked us questions about the geography. We had to respond immediately; otherwise, we loss the point even if we were right. This game was testing how fast was our reaction and our ability to face the "chaotic situation", because there were often noises while you were answering. (To be honest, I forgot most of them :P)

    Although that was an "torturing" game which killed most of my brain cells, I still had a good time. I believe there will be more exciting and fabulous courses in the future!