/sci/ - Science & Math

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3069999]

/sci/

I want to be like Mendeleev.

If I take the Americium from smoke detectors and plant them with seeds of fruit bearing plants, will there be enough radiation to have cool new plant species form?

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070002]

>>3069999

holy fuck that was a nice get

[Anonymous No.3070007]

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070009]

>>3070007

Are you telling me there won't be enough radiation for mutant plants then?

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070017]

I'm being dead serious by the way.

I'm thinking that I'll leave the Americium in with the seed until they begin to sprout and then remove them.

how many smoke detectors will I need to have good results?

[Anonymous No.3070026]

>>3070017
Define "good results"

because more then likely the seeds will die as the DNA will be destroyed by the radiaton

[Anonymous No.3070027]

>>3070009
>implying that radiation always leads to speciation

>>3069999
>implying that Mendeleev studied radiation or botany

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070030]

nobody is willing to help?

any information at all would be greatly appreciated

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070043]

>>3070026

I don't think that the radiation in smoke detectors is enough to kill the seed, but I could be wrong about it. That's why I came here to you guys, will smoke detector radiation kill the seed?

what kind of plants are naturally resistant to radiation?

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070055]

>>3070027

I expect there to be many retarded offspring from the radiation, but I will take plants that have cool mutations and breed them with each other to make super awesome plants.

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070070]

>>3070026

by good results I mean,

I want yellow strawberries, or eggplants that are shaped like footballs.

pic semi-related

[Anonymous No.3070075]

>>3070043
OP, you just went full retard.
In order to cause mutations, you'd need to damage the seed's DNA. If not all the cells in the seed are damaged in exactly the same way, you'll end up with mosaicism. And most (about 99.9%) of the seeds will probably die due to lethal mutations.
And if you do get a viable, non-chimeric/mosaic mutant, it won't be a crazy new kind of plant. It'll just be the same plant as before, only with one or two weird traits which probably won't be visible on a macroscopic level.

[Anonymous No.3070081]

>>3070043
the beta radiation will most likely destroy the seed

and if any of them survive the chances of the mutation being positive is VERY small

also, you will probably have cancer by the end of the experiment

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070098]

>>3070075

> the same plant as before, only with one or two weird traits which probably won't be visible on a macroscopic level.

See this is what I want to have happen. I'd keep breeding mutants until they had some cool new adaptation.

I'm sure given enough trials, I would have one plant that survives the radiation.

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070101]

>>3070081

how the fuck would I get cancer from a smoke detector?

seems highly improbable

[Anonymous No.3070109]

>cool new plant species

yes

[Anonymous No.3070120]

>>3070101
the Americium gets into the air and you breath small amounts of it in as dust

and in the same way that polonium-210 causes cancer in smokers you slowly die from lung cancer or wherever the Americium decides to go in your body

[Anonymous No.3070131]

>>3070120
A small amount of contained americium exposed to the inside of a smoke detector ionization chamber is quite a bit different than inhaling polonium-ridden ash.

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070139]

>>3070120

ok, i'll just wear a respirator and do the experiment outside.

the pic attached is a rough sketch of how I think I will do the plant setup.

any tips are greatly appreciated

[Anonymous No.3070142]

>>3070131
oh really? because Po-210 is only a trace element in tobacco while he is dealing with PURE Americium in the detectors

1 smoke detector probably has more Americium then Po-210 a pack a day smoker inhales over his/her lifetime

[Nuka-cola my cool trip doesn't understand radiotoxicity No.3070147]

>>3070101
alpha particle emitter. normally they hit your skin and do nothing
eat some and they'll damage cells all the way down your digestive tract. i don't think americium bioaccumulates though. but seriously don't do it without lots of geiger counters

[Anonymous No.3070153]

OK, OP, enjoy dumping radioactive material into the soil with nothing to show for it.
I guarantee--GUARANTEE--you, you will not get any viable plants with interesting mutant phenotypes.

[Anonymous No.3070155]

haha. americum

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070158]

maybe i'll do it like this

[Anonymous No.3070164]

>>3070139
metals can also be absorbed through the skin, the dust lands on your skin and gets dissolved into the sweat on you skin, which facilitates the transfer into your body

if you don't believe me then ask anyone who works at a lead recycling center, they wear masks and respirators but still have VERY high levels of lead in their bodies

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070172]

>>3070142

americium can't be all that dangerous if we have it hanging from our ceilings and homes.

plus i'll have lead clothing and a respirator

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070187]

>>3070147

what do I have to be afraid of?

why do I need gieger counters?

captcha semi-related

[Anonymous No.3070196]

>>3070172
We have mercury vapor in fluorescent lights all over the place, but mercury will fuck your shit up.
See, it's possible to seal dangerous substances in a secure container and not have to worry so much, you dumbass. As soon as you open up the container, however, all bets are off.

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070202]

>>3070153

how are you so sure of that I won't have results?

[Anonymous No.3070216]

>>3070172
that's because the dust doesn't form when its just sitting there, it forms when you try and remove it, when the sharp edges of the holder or tools scrape bits off it

also, a lot of smoke detectors don't use ionization anymore, its either lasers or air sampling

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070219]

>>3070196

so what can I do to protect myself from radiation?

[Nuka-cola my cool trip is something something No.3070217]

>>3070172
that's because it's buried way deep in the smoke detector such that very very little can escape.
you're talking about exposing it to the air and powerder-izing it. not a good idea

i'm not saying it's impossible, i'm saying you should be taking the setup more seriously (masks, bunny suits, air-filtered habitats, ect)

also, as others have said. almost all mutations are not visual in nature assuming the plant doesn't just die from it.

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070232]

>>3070217

where can I find a bunny suit for cheap?

if I bury the plants outside in my local park will it be cool? I don't think there will be enough radiation to fuck up the ecosystem.

[Nuka-cola my cool trip needs to read some books about radiotoxicity No.3070248]

>>3070219
>>3070232
and i thought i was being careless with my LFTR idea.

for the love of christ do not plant this shit outside where people are. bunny suits are cheap, use ebay. but tittyfucking christ get an airtight greenhouse enclosure and rid some geiger counters to the air filters (And get air filters which are rated for particulates that small)

[Anonymous No.3070251]

>>3070202
In my genetics class, we irradiated yeast. A petri dish containing perhaps 100,000 yeast cells was whittled down to maybe 500, and of those 500, only three to five had a mutation on one of the six genes we were assaying for.
Yeast are much simpler, morphologically and genetically. Saccharomyces cerevisiae has 5,770 genes. Fragaria vesca has 34,809. The former is a hardy single-celled microbe, while the latter is a specialized multicellular vascular plant.
Basically, since strawberries are so much more complex then yeast, there's a lot more that can go fatally wrong. If you hit them with enough radiation to cause interesting mutations, you will kill almost all of them, and most of the survivors won't have mutations that cause any interesting phenotypes.

[Anonymous No.3070253]

>>3070219
an hero

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070270]

>>3070248

How important on a scale of 1-10 is the airtight enclosure with geiger counters. This shit can't be as dangerous as you say it is.

[Anonymous No.3070282]

>>3070270
>This shit can't be as dangerous as you say it is.
Famous last words. Don't fuck with radioactive shit.

[Anonymous No.3070287]

>>3070270
That's what they said about Fukushima.

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070291]

>>3070251
Perhaps I will plant the seeds all around the americium with a large radius so that I can get plants that don't die and see what the distance of life is.

[Nuka-cola my cool trip is something something No.3070309]

>>3070270
like 6.
i mean, it's not THAT bad. but you're approaching this way more carelessly than you should be. always always overengineer when dealing with radioactive materials

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070317]

>>3070309

Its not like I'm dealing with highly enriched plutonium here. This shit is safe enough for your house and there isn't that much of it so I'm pretty sure you guys are trolling me when you say I need to be uber careful and have gieger Counters and all this shit

[Anonymous No.3070330]

>>3070317
You're free to try this with no safety precautions, of course. I wouldn't, though.

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070360]

>>3070330

After all this talk of crazy safety bullshit I'm going to need to do more research and might not do the experiment. I just came here to see how feasible it was.

Thanks everybody!

[Anonymous No.3070391]

>>3070360
wtf guys. This man coulda won a darwin award, and you have to go and ruin his chances.

>I am disappoint.dmg

[Anonymous No.3070406]

>>3070360
Fuck safety, OP. If people survived hiroshima you can survive a smoke detector. Some tips though:

- If you're afraid the radiation might kill some of the plants, plant them at varying distances from the radiation source. You'll probably need to keep them quite close, though, since americium-241 produces mostly alpha and beta particles, which can't travel far, especially through dirt.

- If you want quicker results, try this experiment with something that reproduces more quickly than plants; maybe some kind of microorganism that you can see with a microscope, if you have one.

Good luck, OP. Seems like a cool experiment.

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070468]

>>3070406

This is exactly my reasoning.
Fucking marie curie worked with radiation for a fuckton longer than I will.

Xray technicians live long lives.
I highly doubt a smoke detector is going to do shit to me esp since its going in the ground and I"l only be touching it for a few minutes at most

[Anonymous No.3070475]

>>3069999

Op got quads, he's clearly some sort of god and therefore immune to radiation

[Anonymous No.3070477]

OP, you can achieve a similar result using X-rays. They're pretty easy to make with a simple low-wattage light bulb and some high voltage.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=af8wnm2eGWw

[Anonymous No.3070481]

>>3070468

I don't think radiation works the way you think it does.

Just get some simple safety gear, and act like a boss.

[Anonymous No.3070483]

>will there be enough radiation to have cool new plant species form?
Enough to give your plant cancer lol

[Anonymous No.3070485]

>>3070468

Also, Marie Curie died a horrible death.

[Anonymous No.3070492]

no need to fear, OP. i doubt the manufacturer would even put dangerous amounts of radioactive material in a smoke detector. you'll get more radiation from cosmic rays in a airplane ride than from that tiny amount of radioactive material.

[Anonymous No.3070493]

>>3070477

Fuck xrays.
The benefit of americium is that there is a constant source of radiation

[Anonymous No.3070510]

>>3069999
why don't you just do selective breeding YEESH

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070508]

>>3070492

This sounds actually reasonable. Houses that burn down don't become uninhabitable wastelands because of their fire detectors.

Also, the government wouldn't let home depot sell highly radioactive shit that could be used to make weapons or be a weapon

[Nuka-cola my cool trip is something something No.3070504]

>>3070391
i'm as much a DIY nuke guy as anyone, but the problem was that op seemed to think he could do this in a public park and not give a fuck, which is gernally a bad state of mind when dealing with radioactive materials

[Anonymous No.3070502]

>>3070483
actually it'd be interesting to see if a plant can get cancer
Would it develop some sort of plant tumors?

[Anonymous No.3070503]

there other products that contain radioactive material

http://www.blackcatsystems.com/science/radprod.html

[OP !BmPkDhDVz6 No.3070517]

>>3070510

Ill do selective breeding... Of the mutants.
Then ill feed the mutant strawberries to rats after I grow a few generations radiation free.

[Anonymous No.3070526]

>>3070517

Feed the radiated strawberries to the rats, op.

[Anonymous No.3070541]

>>3069999
I'm almost 100% sure you mean Mendel, not Mendeleev.

[Anonymous No.3070554]

>>3070541

I think you may be right, in that case, who the fuck is mendeleev?

[Anonymous No.3070555]

>>3070554
he made the first periodic table.

[Anonymous No.3070558]

>>3070554

periodic table

[Anonymous No.3070570]

Op, you are a fucking retard and would make a horrible scientist. You probably learn your science from cartoons and scifi shows.

[Anonymous No.3070579]

>>3070570

Someone's obviously insecure about themself.

[Anonymous No.3070583]

This is the most retarded experiment I've ever heard of.

YOUR CHANCES OF GAINING SOMETHING OF VALUE FROM THIS EXPERIMENT ARE (arbitrarily high number):1.

How about you go down to Chernobyl and see what cool new "plant species" are growing there? That's pretty much what your experiment will get you.

[Anonymous No.3070604]

>>3070583

THe problem with chernobyl is too much radiation.

With smoke detector, radiation will be low enough to cause slight mutations (faster rate than normal).

[Anonymous No.3070605]

The amount of Americium in smoke detectors is to small to do anything to anything, you could eat it from several and you would be fine.

[Anonymous No.3070622]

>>3070583

Peoplee win the lottery sometimes

[Anonymous No.3070665]

This thread is yet another example where the people screaming "fucking retard" are the retards themselves.

Mutation breeding via exposure to ionizing radiation is a long-established technique in the creation of plant cultivars.

The technique proposed by the OP would be an inefficient technique for it, but if you brought the americium into direct contact with the seed and left it for a time, it probably would work to induce mutations.

Note that the viability of the seed will be reduced. When this is done in commercial plant breeding, they expose a lot of seed at a time, usually to gamma rays, on the understanding that only a small amount of the seed will remain viable.

Basically, you shouldn't expect dramatic results, but it's not totally futile nor "fucking retarded."

[Anonymous No.3070685]

>>3070665
sure is circle-jerking here

[Anonymous No.3070741]

>>3070685

You obv mad that you're an aforementioned retard