As my 3rd year curtains draw to a close, I thought it would be a fine time to reflect on some of the most interesting theorems derivations examples doodles of the term. Even in my mathiest courses I find it irresistible to doodle in the margins of my notes. I like to think of it as balancing the left and right sides of my brain but that's just sugar coating my short attention span.

So, check out my Flickr gallery of this terms highlights. I may even scan my previous years of doodles so you can see how much I've improved as an artist by studying Physics!

My torpid blogmate Kieran and I often partake in the act of blowing our feeble minds with science. You too can share in this simple pleasure as I touch on one of life's under appreciated wonders: the reflection of light.

Here's la grande illusion: light doesn't actually "bounce" off mirrors like a ball bounces off a wall. The incident light that hits the mirror is actually completely different than the reflected light that you see!

People gaze upon their mirrored visage at least once a day but are too self-centered to notice anything but themselves. The mirror is a glorious example of photon and electron interaction but everyone seems to be concerned with trivial matters such as make-up, pimples and facial hair.

Thanks to advances in internet technology we now know how mirrors are created. (Pro tip: It's just a sheet of aluminum/silver with glass in front).

To effectively blow your mind, you need to know the following:

• light is made of photons
• photons vibrate at different frequencies
• stuff, such as sheets of aluminum, are made of atoms
• atoms have electrons
• electrons absorb or emit photons

You can sort of guess where I'm going with this. Glazing over some quantum-level details, here's a finer description of what's going on while you're busy poppin' zits in the mirror.

You start out by flipping on the bathroom light. Photons leave the bulb and hit your face. Your skin cells, which are made of various organic compounds, which have electrons, absorb most of the light and your face heats up slightly. The portion of the light not absorbed causes the electrons to move to an excited state. The excited state causes the electron to eventually "get tired" and fall back to normal energy state but in the process it releases a brand new photon of the skin-tone variety.

The photon flies out of your face at 300 000 km/sec at the aluminum in your mirror. Aluminum was a good choice because, as most metals, it doesn't absorb very many of the frequencies of light we care about, like skin-tone photons. In a process exactly like I described in your face, the electrons in the aluminum get excited and vibrate. Who wouldn't be excited after meeting a photon that got to touch your beautiful face? They eventually drop back to normal energy levels and emit a new photon based on the vibration caused by the skin-tone photon.

Thus, the brand new photon created by the electrons in the aluminum leaves the mirror at an angle equal to the angle of incidence. The photon flies through the air avoiding dangerous dust particles and gets absorbed by photo receptors in the back of your eye which register as an image in your brain. Now repeat this process for as long as necessary, for every single photon in your field of view, and congratulate yourself on successfully popping your zit.

Tell me your mind isn't blown!

Of course, there are many unanswered questions. Like, where did the photon actually come from? If it's a brand new photon then why does it have to come out exactly at the angle it came in as? Why is it that some photons can pass through glass and some can't? What about those pretty multicolored reflections I get off the pools of gasoline on my driveway?

There could be serious zombie consequences if I attempted to answer any of the questions posed above. If you're at all interested, I highly recommend you go directly to the source and read Feynman's QED which was written for the general audience!

Also, most of what I said above is outlined in greater detail here.

Oh wow, does it ever take those LHC scientists a long time to get their particle collider up and running. Even after months of data crunching on my part, last April 1st I heard that the project was going to be delayed for 3 years! What can one do?

Well, it's easy to see how logic and reason have their place in massive engineering feats like the LHC, but sometimes all a scientist needs is a bit of luck. Help the LHC scientists get a healthy serving of lucky charms by finding 11 rowdy leprechauns causing a ruckus in the ATLAS detector! 

(Click to enlarge) 

The first to find them all wins a shiny new god particle. 

It isn't the first time he's acted in a moving picture, but I can't wait for his latest appearance in "The Fall"! Check out the movie trailer below to see who I'm referring to...

Scientists can dance if they want to. They can get other people to leave their friends behind?

It seems counterproductive to be gaming when you have a pelican's beak full of assignments each week like I do. And it is, but when a problem set or a pelican is getting you down, in the long run a good gaming session can do wonders for your counter-counterproductivity. So, Kieran and I have compiled a list of our favorite video game scientists and the ways they inspire us to succeed!

10 - Professor Oak, Behavioral Scientist, made famous by Pokemon.

Lead researcher at the Oak Pokemon Research Laboratory in Pallet Town, Professor Oak studies the behavior of various Pokemon in their natural environments. Professor Oaks is known for his generous public outreach intitiative. You can't go wrong with a selection of a free water turtle, free fire lizard or free plant dinosaur. His field of research is pretty interesting but not even 439 pokemans can measure up to the waterfall of gaming joy that lies ahead in this list.

9 - Mortimer Goth, Retired Mad Scientist, made famous by The Sims.

More commonly known as "the guy in The Sims whose wife you tried to seduce when you lived as a bachelor". In Sims 2, where his wife is mysteriously missing (due to an alleged alien abduction), we see an older retired Mortimer enjoying the wealth he accumulated at the top of his Science career class as an esteemed Mad Scientist (§1000/day). His fame and fortune serve as inspiration to Sims and real-life humans alike pursuing a similar career path.

8 - Dr. Mario, Physician, made famous by Dr. Mario.

Very little is known about where or when Mario received his medical training. However, based on Mario's innovative method of treating disease (haphazardly combining a random stream of pills in his patient's bodies), it was probably somewhere prestigious. Nonetheless, true gamers always take medicine the Dr. Mario way: as long as the colors match, the virus disappears!

7 - Lester Chaykin, Physicist, made famous by Out of This World.

It's hard being a particle physicist on an alien planet. The laws of physics still apply but weakly kicking and laser-blasting aliens isn't exactly what you are bargaining for on a late night at the lab. Everything was going great the night he drove his Ferrari to the local synchrotron to get in some after hours particle collider time. But due to an unfortunate lightning strike, his research had to be put on hold until some serious puzzle-solving and alien-killing could be done. Download for PC here!

6 - Tie! - Professor Hojo, Biomedical Engineer, made famous by Final Fantasy VII.

Not exactly the most likable scientist on the list, Professor Hojo disregarded the ethical research regulations at the Shinra Science Department and conducted his experiments on unwilling human subjects. Ever passionate about his mad science, he chose to inject cells of an alien entity into his unborn child in the womb of his wife, which ultimately led to one of the finest video game stories ever told!

6 - Tie! - Professor William Birkin, Virologist, made famous by Resident Evil.
Professor Birkin had the privilege of starting his job at the Umbrella Corporation at the tender age of 15. Shortly after getting the job he and his colleagues suceeded in creating the T-Virus "through synthesis of the Progenitor-Ebola virus and leech DNA". Let's read what Wikipedia has to say about it:

[The T-Virus] has the abilities to animate dead tissue, to substantially mutate its host, and to infect nearly any tissue in any type of host [...] by killing and replacing any mitochondria in infected cells, and then combining with these cells to produce enough energy for motor and lower brain functions.

By doing this, most of the bodies systems, such as the circulatory or respiratory systems, are made redundant. However, this process has the drawback of severe necrosis in the host, and produces the distinctive rotted appearance of the hosts.

As a side effect of the virus's cannibalization of its host, specifically its digestion of the host's frontal lobes, all hosts suffer from greatly increased aggressiveness. In previously living hosts, the virus also damages the hypothalamus, which results in a flood of neurotransmitters, enzymes, and hormones which induce a psychotic rage and hunger in the host.

Which, translated from science speak to gamer speak, means "survival horror zombie video game". Bottom line, shouldn't have gone into industry.

5 - Dr. Fred Edison, Mad Scientist, made famous by Day of the Tentacle.

Dr. Fred Edison is a scientist with ideas. In D.O.T.T, one of my finest memories of gaming, we immediately see his work in tentacle-engineering go awry, and are subsequently forced to travel through time to prevent the mishap. Thankfully, Dr. Edison (descendant of Thomas Edison) allows the use of his Chron-O-John, which successfully combines high-tech time traveling technology with low-brow comedy. Why time travel in something as ridiculous as a DeLorean with gull-wing doors when you could travel in a series of port-o-potty's powered by a diamond?

4 - Dr. Light, Roboticist, made famous by Megaman.

Don't you hate it when you win a Nobel Prize and all your colleagues get all jealous and bitter? Then, once you think things are back to normal, they procede to go insane with jealousy and copy all of your work but use it for evil?

That happened to Dr. Light when he was recognized for creating Megaman! Dr. Light met Dr. Wily after graduation and they formed Light Labs. They toyed with robotic automata and even robots capable of independent thought, but when Dr. Wily grew tired of living in the shadow of Dr. Light he decided to shoot for world domination instead. Can't blame him!

3 - Lucca, Inventor, made famous by Chrono Trigger.

Wait, a female scientist/engineer? Basically unheard of in a video game, but that's not why Lucca made the list... it's just that we have so much in common! Her living room (above) is littered with random textbooks and strange webs of cables connecting mysterious power cylinders much like my own room (but replace the power cylinders with beer cylinders).

If you've played Chrono Trigger you'll also note Lucca's admirable motivation to study science, which jerks tears at the thought. In a way, it's also similar to my original motivation to study science to get cash, which also causes me to jerk tears. Did I mention she made a time machine and a fighting robot? She's like the best of Dr. Light and Dr. Fred Edison combined!

2 - Dr. Hal Emmerich AKA "Otacon", Weapons Researcher, made famous by Metal Gear Solid.

Everyone needs a scientist on speed dial, especially if you're Solid Snake and you have an arsenal of high-tech weapons and computer systems working against you in your daily life. Otacon is a weapons research expert by trade but he's a deft hand at mourning Solid Snake's various and frequent deaths ("Snake? Snaaaaaaaake!").

However, Otacon is not just a brilliant scientist and a compassionate friend. After he realizes that his invention Metal Gear will be used for evil, he turns the tables on the bad guys and uses his scientific know-how to undermine international nuclear proliferation! For sparing the world from nuclear holocaust using science, we salute you Otacon.

1 - Gordon Freeman, Physicist, made famous by Half-Life.

It should be no surprise that we awarded the Gaming Nobel Prize for Excellence in Science to Dr. Freeman. Often research projects don't quite go as planned, and it's the responsibility of the scientist to fix the problem using whatever means necessary. In Gordan's case, that project was "scanning beam analysis", the problem was an interdimensional time rift teeming with aliens, and the means to fix said problem was a crowbar! When push comes to shove with alien oppressors, Gordon isn't afraid to use a Zero-Point Energy Field Manipulator to get the job done. Here's a little background information on his prestigious career from the Half Life 2 Prima Game Guide. Congratulations Dr. Freeman!

While a visiting student at the University of Innsbruck in the late 1990's, Gordon Freeman observed a series of seminal teleportation experiments conducted by the Institute for Experimental Physics (see Bowemeester, Pan, Mattle, Eibl, Weinfurter, Zeilinger, "Experimental Quantum Teleportation" Nature, 11 December 1997). Practical applications for teleportation became his obsession. In 1999, Freeman received his doctorate from M.I.T. with a thesis paper entitled: "Observation of Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Entanglement on Supraquantum Structures By Induction through Nonlinear Transuranic Crystal of Extremely Long Wavelength (ELW) Pulse from Mode-Locked Source Array".

Disappointed with the slow pace and poor funding of academic research, and with tenure a distant dream, Gordon cast about for a job in private industry. As fortune would have it, his mentor at M.I.T., Professor Alex Kleiner, had taken charge of a research project being conducted at a decommissioned missile base in Black Mesa, New Mexico. Kleiner was looking for a few bright associates, and Gordon was his first choice.

Considering the source and amount of funds available to the Black Mesa Labs, Gordon suspected that he would be involved in some sort of weapons research; but in the hopes that practical civilian applications would arise (in areas of quantum computing and astrophysics), he accepted Kleiner's offer. Apart from a butane-powered tennis ball cannon he constructed at age 6, Gordon had never handled a weapon of any sort-or needed to... until now.

Dr. Freeman with the Black Mesa Research Team

Runners-up Great Scientists of Gaming

• Alkor the alchemist from Diablo II
• Dr. Andonuts from Earthbound
• Dr. Robotnik from Sonic the Hedgehog
• Citan from Xenogears
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