Earth's coldest spot identified: -93.2 Celsius, -135.8 Fahrenheit [video]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-25312652

by antimora • 13 years ago

17 14 13 years ago

bbc.co.uk

Crito• 13 years ago

To be pedantic, the coldest place on earth is in a laboratory (I don't know who actually has the record right now). In fact, the coldest known places in the universe are in these laboratories. The Boomerang Nebula is the coldest non-laboratory place that we know of in the universe, at 1K.

This University of Nottingham video on laser cooling is pretty cool, and accessible: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drnq_6ffTbo

Hrodban• 13 years ago

Awww, it's just audio, no video. disappointed

Interesting nonetheless.

sliverstorm• 13 years ago

Damn. I was sure they were going to say somewhere in Wyoming.

DigitalJack• 13 years ago

from the article:

"But he said scientists do routinely make naked 100 degree below zero dashes outside in the South Pole..."

emphasis mine. Gotta love science ;)

eru• 13 years ago

It's the thing to do after Finnish sauna.

Sharlin• 13 years ago

The 300 Fahrenheit club: from a 200 °F sauna to the -100 °F outdoors and back.

yitchelle• 13 years ago

Here is the corresponding article for those who wants to read it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-25287806

For contrast, the article mentioned the hottest measured place on earth was in Iran at 70.7degC, and one of the craters on the moon was measured at -238degC.

throwaway_yy2Di• 13 years ago

Note the article disclaims that these satellite measurements are surface temperatures (the ground itself), where other instruments measure air temperature. Wikipedia describes that Iran desert as a "large plateau covered in dark lava" [0], so I imagine it's analogous to how hot asphalt roads get, rather than the meteorological temperature.

edit: The wiki article references this paper [1]:

The satellite-based land surface temperature (LST) measures the radiation emitted by the top of the land surface (i.e., radiometric LST) and can be likened to skin temperature, or the temperature a person would feel if touching the land surface. It measures directly where the highest temperatures on Earth’s surface manifest, on the ground. By comparison, standard weather station air temperature is measured 1.5 m above the ground level with sensors protected from radiation and adequately ventilated. Because air is such a poor heat conductor, the radiometric LST in midsummer can be 30°–50°C higher than the air temperature. Imagine the searing heat of beach sand (i.e., LST) on a hot summer day, when standing in shade or water is the only way to avoid burning your feet, compared to the air temperature 1.5 m above the sand.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dasht-e_Lut

[1] http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/pdf/10.1175/2011BAMS3067.1

enupten• 13 years ago

I wonder what hapenned to pesky old CO_2 there :)

phaemon• 13 years ago

It becomes "dry ice": CO2's melting point is -78C.

chime• 13 years ago

Superconductivity has been observed with transition temperatures as high as 138 K (−135 °C) [1]. I doubt the Earth's surface is getting any colder or that we'll discover much colder surface temperatures. We've gone from requiring 4K for superconductivity to 138K in a century. Even if we don't find room-temperature superconductors, going from 138K to 180K means it could be possible to have superconductors in natural environment for short periods of time. As the range is raised to 200K - 220K, we could have outdoors superconductors in the far North.

If we don't have to cool them manually, is there a limit to how large we can make them? Mini train-track sized maybe? Come to Alaska and ride the levitating train! Someday...

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-temperature_superconductiv...

darkmighty• 13 years ago

Or more like "Come install your supercomputers in our facility!"

colechristensen• 13 years ago

Neglecting lack of infrastructure, could viable economic gains be had by putting fossil fuel or nuclear power plants in these super-cold areas resulting from the increased efficiency due to larger temperature difference?

evan_• 13 years ago

For fossil fuels at least there would probably be a point of diminishing returns, oil gets thicker as it gets colder so more energy would have to be spent warming the fuel and lubrication.

Earth's coldest spot identified: -93.2 Celsius, -135.8 Fahrenheit [video]

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