Evening morning

@RoryAlsop ive become you for the evening

Apparently, this XKCD plugin works here too: chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/xkcd-substitutions/… :D

@TildalWave not working

(auto=autorickshaw=a three wheeler cab-like entity held together by chewing gum and prayers)

!!are you there?

Hmm, no bot here

I'm going to try and summon one here

@ManishEarth Really? Interesting, it works for me.

@vedantchandra Nice, but please resist asking for upvotes and accepts in the comments, at least not this early on when OP didn't even have a chance to check your sources. I suggest you don't at all, I'm personally asking of members to go through their questions and their answers to see if they can accept some and finalize the thread, but they're not really required to, of course.

@TildalWave I'm really sorry, I'm new here.. I'll edit my comment asap :)

@vedantchandra No need to, I've already deleted both ;) The request for links that you obliged to is also obsolete now

@TildalWave Thank you, but why did you delete the asker's comment? It seemed valid

@vedantchandra Because it is obsolete, you've edited in links to your sources

Comments are transient, and if they no longer apply they can and should be deleted to keep the Q&A clean and serve its purpose (leaving, well, Question & Answers)

Requests for clarification are fine of course, or any other similar comments, but once they're addressed the comment itself serves no further use really

@TildalWave Thanks a lot for the clarification

No problem ;) All in a day's work :)

Also, I'm looking forward to the Soyuz de-orbit :D

We'll be discussing it here, I gather?

Yup, I usually post links to live streams and then whoever wants to join us and chat about it, all are welcome... if there's enough interest it can even be fun, but depends on the day, hour, e.t.c.

The livestream for the launch is nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/index.html

Deorbit burn commences at 8:55 ET

Yup I've already added an announcement, a.k.a. a chat event... it should display your local time for it: chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/info/9682/the-pod-bay?tab=schedule

And yes, the stream locations are often the same

It'll probably be on NASA Public HD too

Could you add links to official resources (NASA etc). the current link looks to be your personal page

What happens if the link goes dead?

The link will not go dead, I added the bitly bundle as I do not have sufficient reputation to write multiple links.

I'd be interested in direct NASA, USGS etc links, you have one in your bitly collection - but it refers to the non-volcanic gypsum deposition - all are from a source Wikipedia page here while being a non-official resource, has some information and links. Also, to clarify, it is best the links themselves form part of the answer.

Some more of my sources pastebin.com/FjArK8fi

@UV-D, I understand your query, but was my answer satisfying?

I just need to read and verify some of the answer, particularly the 'Useful Materials' section.

@UV-D

@TildalWave I helped keep the comments clean, I hope you're proud of me xD

chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/11435/…

Migrated to chat

@Manish Awake, lad?

yep

Got a chem-sort-of question; ask here if that works for you?

Didn't wake you, did I?

sure

Is mercury oxide a by-product of charcoal combustion?

rather, any mercury/mercurial compound?

dunno

There is mercury in charcoal sometimes so I assume so

mercury in charcoal? eh?

wait no there isn't

at least, not much

Plants use a teensy amount of mercury iirc

fractions of ppm? whole multiples of ppm?

no clue

I'm no chemist

Or biologist

Eh?

But thou art a God on Chem.SEx

no, I art a Mod on Chem.SE

I rest my case q+:

(including the empty whisky ones) q+:

Would it be a reasonable question over on the Chem.SE?

@Everyone Maybe Bio is better? Not that good a question. On topic, but not that good

Wouldn't it be totally off on Bio?

Here's a Mercury in Charcoal equation: probability that fish live in wood * chance these fish once swam in mercury polluted waters

@Everyone The Drake Polluted Lake equation?

You could try squeezing large chunks of charcoal and see how much mercury comes out :)

'o @Tilda

How large?

large

What if I expose the charcoal to vacuum instead?

keep eating charcoal till you die

wouldn't you first forget how much of it you ate?

I actually bit into a piece of charcoal that somehow made it's way into some food the other day

might have been plain coal too; wouldn't know

nothing wrong with eating charcoal as long as it's not polluted with mercury :D

@Everyone Probably was coal. No doubt you attempt to run sudo on systems where you don't have root access.

ouch

seriously tho, it would totally depend on how the charcoal was made, but this is one technique to estimate metal contents of the soil the tree grows over... there should be some recent studies out suggesting this with Eucalyptus trees and gold

must be about a week ago

Eucalyptus trees? Why Eucalyptus?

@Tilda This

Because it was suggested they're relatively easy to establish gold contents in soil they grow over even through leaves... something like that, but it could also be that they like to grow on land with higher gold contents, it wouldn't be the first plant to have been suggested to have preferred areas with higher contents of some metals

So Tolkien was right... There was a Laurelin

yup that but I'm not sure how descriptive that NG article is

On a serious note, one wonders whether there are any trees that have such affinity for active minerals ... and whether such trees suffer/repel mutation

I haven't a clue

Me either

well, actually we did study in some high school project growth rate on different soils, but not of eucalyptus LOL

Eucalyptus are exceptionally good with water; if you're ever prospecting for water - take a eucalyptus sapling with you

and I had pretty good success with my herbs in coconut fiber and vermiculite mixture, but it's difficult to say if that's because it doesn't harbour pests as good as normal soil does ... it definitely makes for a good soil substitute tho

@Everyone if I'd pick one tree for that that also grows here, I'd probably choose the persimmon tree

weeping willows should be pretty good too

Just how sensitive are these plants/saplings to the presence of water anyway?

Dunno, each seed differently? It depends on so many factors that it's really tricky to attribute it to a single source, probably impossible anyway

well, how do they recognize the presence of water?

sure, you can make it dry out or rot with too little or too much,but a lot of it depends on the soil too

yep; same question - those roots don't go straight down; they go straight to the source of water

@Everyone most seeds have hygroscopic skin that cracks open with longer contact with moist surface

and the starches stored also activate with water, producing sugars that the shoots need to grow

That's stem upwards in the plant isn't it?

Ugh. I have to go; my eyes are beginning to ache again

bbl

well that comes later, but yes the plant will try to orient itself root down stem up ... but they don't even require gravity for the roots to grow in the opposite direction to the stem... I think the cell division and specialisation does that well enough, and the rest is then cellulose keeping it strong enough

@TildalWave I... You... Deleted something without me getting a helpful flag off of it!

@Tildal You got a 50 rep bump :D

@Manish Awake?

Ooh looky what the m.SO tools turned up today!

The most negatively voted one scares me the most.

@Undo hehe sorry

@Undo Cheers! I'll look which answer to award it to