Tag: iron

Technology Provided by the Iron Age

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Iron was favored over bronze throughout history because it could be formed into thin and detailed structures which could not be achieved when casting bronze. This is important because it meant that iron blades could be worked and therefore sharpened to a much more refined degree than bronze which was brittle. Iron is also more readily found, a metal which could be found locally around the world and did not depend upon an immense, trading network. By 400 B.C., iron tools and iron objects became ubiquitous throughout various civilizations with the effects of this new technology felt upon the cutting edge of agricultural technology. Iron is more practical than bronze as bronze needs to be melted down and recast if broken in opposition to iron which could be taken to a fire, hit with a hard object, and repaired to the point at which it becomes functional once again. These aspects helped iron to gain favor worldwide as the metal of choice for building and advancing society. As the Iron Age progressed, knowledge about where iron deposits are found became better understood with more and more iron becoming available upon the open market. This is important because the more readily available a particular type of artifact is, the younger the item typically presents as. As time progressed, iron became akin to plastic of the modern day, being cost effective and readily available to manufacture virtually anywhere. Iron tipped wooden plows allowed for more difficult soils to be farmed, which meant that more land could be cultivated making iron truly an agricultural and commercial revolution in the ancient world. Despite lasting for a period of 1000 years, the Bronze Age was quickly replaced with the more effective and efficient Iron Age. The issue of total replacement is complicated as bronze was not only used for tool making, it also helped to create an elite class and was used for spiritual and ceremonial objects as well as visual displays of prestige and wealth. Iron tools several hundred years later, failed to achieve the same intrinsic value within society that bronze once had as it was less rare and precious and therefore less valuable. Iron tools however were highly practical unlike their bronze counterparts, a feature which plagued agriculture and society as a whole

The Link Between Dementia and Iron

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Measuring iron in the brain is the best known way to confirm dementia without performing an autopsy after death. The brain naturally creates tiny bits of iron referred to as “magnetite”. As a human being ages, more and more iron accumulates within the brain. Too much iron however, is a hallmark of dementia. It is theorized that this overproduction of iron is actually due to external factors like pollution rather than naturally occurring phenomena. Dr. Barbara Marr, a world renowned expert and authority in respect to the measurement of metal in incredibly small particles, took thin tissue sections of affected brains obtained during autopsy and observed them under a highly resolved transmission electronmicroscope to review the particles within the neurons of the brain and found 2 different shapes of particle. The magnetite particles are beautifully crystalline, regular and geometric, whilst the opposing particles were rounded in shape, referred to as “spherls” (pronounced “sfare-alls”) or “nanospheres”, rounded in shape because they were originally molten droplets. For every 1 biologically manufactured magnetite, 100 artificially implanted foreign particles of iron are found within the brains of those affected by this condition as confirmed by a study which took place in Mexico City, Mexico. Although not definitely proven, the shape of these secondary particles is remarkably similar to that of airborne pollution, which suggests to scientists that there is a discernible correlation between the 2 types

Effects of the Atomic Bomb Dropped Upon Nagasaki, Japan During World War II

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The atomic bomb dropped upon Nagasaki, Japan on August 6, 1945 was detonated a few thousand feet above the ground as the bomb would have primarily been absorbed by the Earth if it were permitted to touch down. Because the detonation occurred within the air, the force of the first and second blast waves flattened everything within its path. The blast was so bright that atomic shadows were left from anything casting a shadow during the detonation as the light and heat which were the primary components given off during detonation, did not shine as brightly upon the shadows as they did upon everything else. For a few short seconds, the highly enriched uranium created temperatures of tens of millions of degrees Celsius, as if reaching into the core of the sun and dropping that power into the Earth’s atmosphere for a brief moment. The blast emitted was hot enough to melt and fuse anything in touched including granite, steel, iron, glass, clay, and tile

The Rationale For the Iconic Green Color of the U.S. Military 

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The decision of the United States military to design equipment with its iconic green shade was made during the 19th century. It was during this time that European chemists developed a new type of paint which could rustproof iron. This new creation happened to be green which is why the U.S. military continues to use that particular shade. Technology has long allowed for the advent of rustproofing materials in any color imaginable but because the color originally used works well with camouflage, it is still in use

The Reason Dark Spots Appear Upon Antique Documents

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When brown color changes and dark spots appear on old documents and the pages of old books, these blemishes are referred to as “foxing”. The term “foxing” is based upon the term “ferrous oxide” borrowing the letter “f” in “ferrous” and the letters “ox” in “oxide”. Foxing occurs when paper becomes exposed to humidity and as part of the oxidation process when iron, copper, or other metallic substances within the pulp from which the paper was made are exposed to oxygen to form iron oxide which is rust