Surface/Volume: How Geometry Explains Why Grain Elevators Explode, Hummingbirds Hover, and Asteroids Are Colder Than Ice

by Alan E. Rubin

This book explains that diffusion, osmosis, dissolution, evaporation, and heat loss all preferentially affect small bodies due to their high surface/volume ratios. Because surface area increases as the square of length, but volume (and mass) increase as the cube, large objects have low surface/volume ratios and small objects have high surface/volume ratios. This simple physical constraint governs much of the physical world. It accounts for why the...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 303123748X
• ISBN13: 9783031237485
• Release Date: March 2023
• Publisher: Springer
• Length: 182 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 5.8" x 9.0"