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the international space station is a

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place that's getting us ready to go to

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mars in the future it's also a place

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where science is being done that's

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leading to some benefits for people who

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are on earth right now

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one of those experiments that hopes to

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make good on that second category is

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called advanced colloids experiment

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microscopy

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dr matthew lynch who is a principal

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scientist at procter gamble in

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cincinnati is the principal investigator

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for ace m m-1 he joins us this morning

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to talk about his research

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dr lynch your experiment is studying the

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coarsening of colloids with an eye

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toward making better and longer lasting

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products i've got to start by asking you

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to tell us what you're talking about

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what's a colloid and what is coarsening

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thanks pat great to be with you

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let me just describe just real briefly

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the problem that we have so as a company

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we make a lot of products are liquids

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you know tied

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fabric enhancers for example shampoos

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and if you think about it we put a lot

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of

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small drops actives into those into

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those liquids and much in the same way

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as if we put a beach ball in water it

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will pop back up all the products we

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make have a tendency to do that as well

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so what colloids are are they really

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very very very small particles i can't

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see them by eye you have to put them

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under a microscope to see them imagine

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that they fit on the head of a pin say

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for example

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and what we try to do then is change

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those little colloidal particles we put

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them inside the liquids that we want to

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uh inside the products

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and we change the chemistry or the

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physics of the on the surface of those

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colors to make them attractive

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and so the idea is when we put them in

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those fluids they assemble up they form

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little structures maybe not unlike a

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house or cards that we might think about

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and holds all of those drops in place

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and so those where collards are and they

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begin to change naturally in time those

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structures change much in the same way

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as that same analogy we'd pull the cards

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out of that house of card structure

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they'll fall down that becomes

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problematic for stability of a product

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and so fundamentally we just want to

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learn about how to structure with

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colloids and the coarsening how those

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change in time to make the products go

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unstable

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are you able to learn more about that or

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something different about that by

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studying them in weightlessness as

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opposed to on earth or or even doing a

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computer simulation

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yeah actually it's really important to

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do in weightless environments and the

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reason is this if i think about um if i

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think about these drops these drops have

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a tendency to change and move through

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the fluid very very fast

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and the time scales by which they

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coarsen these colloids that are meant to

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hold them coarsen is very very slow and

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so on experiments on earth

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everything switches and changes so fast

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i can't discover anything about how the

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colloids course and how they move

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that changes in zero gravity i put them

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in zero gravity now the the rates by

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which they separate are very slow

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and now i can begin to examine the

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coursing process of these small

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colloidal particles

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so yeah is that just the gravity itself

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because there's no gravity the

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separation is slower

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exactly exactly so we basically turn off

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gravity separations are very slow now i

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can begin to understand the coarsening

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behaviors and processes uh in our in our

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structure and so in our in our products

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what is it that that

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happens inside the the experiment

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apparatus on the station what goes on in

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there and and are what are the

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astronauts doing

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yeah so as i told you before these

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particles are very very small so we do

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unearth we we make these mixtures that

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represent what we find in our products

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all of that goes up to the nasa glenn

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research center and they they put them

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in little cells little holders for us

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all those are up masked onto station and

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then what a

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what the astronaut will do at the

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appropriate time is mix them all up so

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here's my imagine that i have a a bunch

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of colloids i'm going to randomize them

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again to restart an experiment that's

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what the astronaut kind of puts together

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for us and he loads it into a microscope

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and these things again are so small i

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can't see them so i put them in a

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microscope so then we can begin to

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visualize how they change over time

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all that work is done up with nasa glenn

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we go up we spend time at mission

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control up there and help them work the

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experiments and and to understand the

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science going forward from that point on

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so you have the opportunity to talk with

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them directly and and

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can they give you feedback at the time

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yeah

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past uh we actually call up the station

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maybe the last questions talk to the

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astronauts directly and be able to

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provide some feedback about how they're

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stirring and how they're mixing and if

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things are positioned properly so it's

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actually a really fun and exciting kind

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of time to do that as you might imagine

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now have you been able to get results so

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far or are you still waiting for are you

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waiting for samples to come back

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oh no um all the results come down off

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station by by you know by by

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transmission um and so we've learned a

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lot of interesting things actually we

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the colloids that we use are kind of

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mixtures of big and small things that's

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kind of replicating a commercial mixture

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of things that we might actually use

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and we find that not all colors are

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created equal so ones that are a little

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bit bigger behave a little different

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than ones are a little bit smaller and

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it's provide us a unique opportunity to

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start thinking about how we design

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mixtures of big and small to do the

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kinds of things that we want

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you're learning about the

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the microscopic behavior of these

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particles presumably because that

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that teaches you about how they

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behave

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on earth when there is gravity exactly

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exactly so you know in a sense what

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we're doing is you can imagine a number

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of things happen

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simultaneously and we're going to remove

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one of those processes so that we can

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study the other processes independent of

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that all of it happens again on earth

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you know what what causes these

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colleagues of course and is thermal

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energy that's the heat

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that he is here on earth as well as it

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is up on station as well so

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the process is all the same

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and you're doing this with an eye toward

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building well better products better in

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what way

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exactly so well you know you think about

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it this way we make products that really

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um uh improve the lives of people and

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when they fail

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we no longer can improve the lives of

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people right i mean that's the idea so

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um

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where we have problems is where things

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separate out that causes failure and

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that causes our inability then to

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deliver something of value to them to

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people

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so what's your next step in in this

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experiment

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well so

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we have the facilities on station right

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now uh are fantastic it gives us some

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really some really good insights where

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to go further uh what we really would

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like to do though there's a next set of

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experiments coming along that use a

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slightly different facility gives us a

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lot more fidelity in terms of

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understanding where our particles are

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seeing those particles understanding how

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they move measuring three-dimensional

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structures that we just can't do right

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now so we're going to learn from these

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past experiments we're going to design

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other experiments that help us

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to get better resolution better fidelity

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of our experiments and go push that

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science even further at the same time

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we're working with a group of cases

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in and cases is providing us the ability

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to measure not simply microscopic

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properties

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kind of connect the big and the small

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together under the same set of

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environments with the same system so

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that's going to be very powerful i think

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you have a timetable for when that new

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uh facility new hardware is going to fly

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i i believe it's about two years about

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two years uh 2016. i think we're second

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on the manifest so we're excited about

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uh being able to use that new facility

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all right well good luck uh as you apply

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your findings and uh and on the the

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future experiments and thank you for for

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taking the time to talk with us about it

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today