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The physics of dancing peanuts in beer

In Argentina, some people add peanuts to their beer. Once immersed, the peanuts initially sink part way down into the beer before bubbles nucleate and grow on the peanut surfaces and remain attached. The peanuts move up and down within the beer glass in many repeating cycles. In this work, we propos...

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Autores principales: Pereira, Luiz, Wadsworth, Fabian B., Vasseur, Jérémie, Schmid, Markus, Thivet, Simon, Nuernberg, Rafael B., Dingwell, Donald B.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The Royal Society 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10265002/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37325590
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.230376
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author Pereira, Luiz
Wadsworth, Fabian B.
Vasseur, Jérémie
Schmid, Markus
Thivet, Simon
Nuernberg, Rafael B.
Dingwell, Donald B.
author_facet Pereira, Luiz
Wadsworth, Fabian B.
Vasseur, Jérémie
Schmid, Markus
Thivet, Simon
Nuernberg, Rafael B.
Dingwell, Donald B.
author_sort Pereira, Luiz
collection PubMed
description In Argentina, some people add peanuts to their beer. Once immersed, the peanuts initially sink part way down into the beer before bubbles nucleate and grow on the peanut surfaces and remain attached. The peanuts move up and down within the beer glass in many repeating cycles. In this work, we propose a physical description of this dancing peanuts spectacle. We break down the problem into component physical phenomena, providing empirical constraint of each: (i) heterogeneous bubble nucleation occurs on peanut surfaces and this is energetically preferential to nucleation on the beer glass surfaces; (ii) peanuts enshrouded in attached bubbles are positively buoyant in beer above a critical attached gas volume; (iii) at the beer top surface, bubbles detach and pop, facilitated by peanut rotations and rearrangements; (iv) peanuts containing fewer bubbles are then negatively buoyant in beer and sink; and (v) the process repeats so long as the beer remains sufficiently supersaturated in the gas phase for continued nucleation. We used laboratory experiments and calculations to support this description, including constraint of the densities and wetting properties of the beer–gas–peanut system. We draw analogies between this peanut dance cyclicity and industrial and natural processes of wide interest, ultimately concluding that this bar-side phenomenon can be a vehicle for understanding more complex, applied systems of general interest and utility.
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spelling pubmed-102650022023-06-15 The physics of dancing peanuts in beer Pereira, Luiz Wadsworth, Fabian B. Vasseur, Jérémie Schmid, Markus Thivet, Simon Nuernberg, Rafael B. Dingwell, Donald B. R Soc Open Sci Physics and Biophysics In Argentina, some people add peanuts to their beer. Once immersed, the peanuts initially sink part way down into the beer before bubbles nucleate and grow on the peanut surfaces and remain attached. The peanuts move up and down within the beer glass in many repeating cycles. In this work, we propose a physical description of this dancing peanuts spectacle. We break down the problem into component physical phenomena, providing empirical constraint of each: (i) heterogeneous bubble nucleation occurs on peanut surfaces and this is energetically preferential to nucleation on the beer glass surfaces; (ii) peanuts enshrouded in attached bubbles are positively buoyant in beer above a critical attached gas volume; (iii) at the beer top surface, bubbles detach and pop, facilitated by peanut rotations and rearrangements; (iv) peanuts containing fewer bubbles are then negatively buoyant in beer and sink; and (v) the process repeats so long as the beer remains sufficiently supersaturated in the gas phase for continued nucleation. We used laboratory experiments and calculations to support this description, including constraint of the densities and wetting properties of the beer–gas–peanut system. We draw analogies between this peanut dance cyclicity and industrial and natural processes of wide interest, ultimately concluding that this bar-side phenomenon can be a vehicle for understanding more complex, applied systems of general interest and utility. The Royal Society 2023-06-14 /pmc/articles/PMC10265002/ /pubmed/37325590 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.230376 Text en © 2023 The Authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Published by the Royal Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Physics and Biophysics
Pereira, Luiz
Wadsworth, Fabian B.
Vasseur, Jérémie
Schmid, Markus
Thivet, Simon
Nuernberg, Rafael B.
Dingwell, Donald B.
The physics of dancing peanuts in beer
title The physics of dancing peanuts in beer
title_full The physics of dancing peanuts in beer
title_fullStr The physics of dancing peanuts in beer
title_full_unstemmed The physics of dancing peanuts in beer
title_short The physics of dancing peanuts in beer
title_sort physics of dancing peanuts in beer
topic Physics and Biophysics
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10265002/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37325590
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.230376
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