• Question: Chemistry or physics?

    Asked by anon-198929 to Srinath, Natasha, Nana, Luisa, Gautam, Alex on 12 Mar 2019.
    • Photo: Natasha Dowey

      Natasha Dowey answered on 12 Mar 2019:

      Physics is awesome, because it unlocks our understanding of space and the universe, and allows to understand how we are literally keeping our feet stuck to this planet and not just flying off into the sky!
      But personally, I’m a big fan of chemistry. By analysing the chemistry of the rocks around us (by shooting them with lasers or X-rays for example!) we can start to unpick so much about the Earth’s evolution. For example, the chemistry of a bit of ash flung from a volcano can give us important clues about the magma chamber and how the eruption happened, and how it may happen again. Chemistry also allows to ‘fingerprint’ rocks, allowing us to match them up across countries- for example, material from volcanic eruptions can be found halfway around the world, and if we can match them to their parent volcano we start to understand how big these eruptions were and whether society would be in danger if they happened again.

    • Photo: Srinath Kasturirangan

      Srinath Kasturirangan answered on 12 Mar 2019:

      Chemistry! More specifically – Organic Chemistry!! Any day or night!!! I still wake up in the middle of the night having nightmares about my physics exams!

    • Photo: Alexander Allen

      Alexander Allen answered on 12 Mar 2019:

      I’m a nanoscientist which means mostly looking at both chemical and physical properties of things. But I have to come down on the side of physics on this one. Chemistry has so many cool things to explore but it’s a lot about how electrons like to pair up together.

      In physics you get to explore the quantum world and why things can pass through walls if given the right energies.

      You get to see why you age a lot slower if you travel close to the speed of light.

      You get to work out trajectories if you want to make weapons.

      You get to look at space and the universe and atoms at the very small level. You get to see why gravity bends light and how everything can collapse into a gravity producing monster of a black hole.

      Where we came from and where we’re going… It’s all physics!

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