Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2021 January 16

= January 16 =

Chest x-rays
Are chest x-rays part of routine physical checkups in the US? Wondering due to this whether unusual amounts of them are showing damaged lungs, and if this is likely to be published somewhere. tx. 2601:648:8202:96B0:0:0:0:313A (talk) 01:02, 16 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Our article Physical examination claims it may be part of a more comprehensive or "executive" physical examination although lacks a proper source. (It has one source which establish an initials can is taken as part of one executive physical, with followups only in certain situations, hopefully informed by science [//www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/annual-chest-x-rays-dont-cut-lung-cancer-deaths] [//www.annalsofoncology.org/article/S0923-7534(19)63772-5/fulltext].) These sources suggest it was more common in the past particularly the 1960s to 1980s [//sciencebasedmedicine.org/re-thinking-the-annual-physical/] [//acsearch.acr.org/docs/69451/Narrative/]  [//njmonthly.com/articles/top-doctors/to-test-or-not-to-test/] [//bcaction.org/2009/06/21/x-rays-are-we-overexposed/], and apparently may still be demanded by some patients [//www.nytimes.com/2003/08/12/health/annual-physical-checkup-may-be-an-empty-ritual.html] (although that's fairly old by now and perhaps those who are used to routine chest x-rays are fewer). From what I can tell, although TB was more prevalent in the US then and testing options more limited, but there's still great question over their utility/wisdom.  I found another executive physical which does seem to use them routinely although I think only from 40 years [//www.emoryhealthcare.org/centers-programs/executive-health-center/comprehensive-physical.html], and only every 2 years not annually. I'm not sure how common such fancy physicals are, this [//hbr.org/2009/09/executive-physicals-whats-the-roi] mentions 22% of Fortune 500 companies offer them to their CEOs which actually doesn't sound that many when you think about it. But this doesn't really tell us how common they are for smaller companies and for other positions, or paid for personally or by insurance. And that is talking about CT scans of the heart or even the full body so people may still get slightly more "comprehensive" physical examinations which do include chest x-rays but aren't so extreme.  Per one of the earlier sources and others [//www.aafp.org/afp/recommendations/viewRecommendation.htm?recommendationId=81] [//www.jacr.org/article/S1546-1440(16)31336-9/pdf] [//journals.lww.com/ejanaesthesiology/Fulltext/2012/06001/Usefulness_of_routine_chest_X_ray_in_preoperative.52.aspx], it also seems that routine or almost routine (i.e. without a real reason why it may be useful) chest x-rays on hospital admission or pre-surgery may still be hardly uncommon although the only sources [//pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23770954/]  I could find discussing frequency were from outside the US. (But I didn't look that carefully.)  Nil Einne (talk) 13:16, 16 January 2021 (UTC)

How many OPEN questions Spitzer Space Telescope did solve?
I want to know how many Open unsolved physics questions Spitzer Space Telescope did solve? Rizosome (talk) 16:03, 16 January 2021 (UTC)


 * By definition, "open" question and "unsolved" question mean the same: a question to which the answer is not (yet) known. The concept is too vague to quantify it. The telescope was designed to make observations, not to solve physics questions. It made many important observations that may help to increase our understanding of the universe, and did some surprising discoveries, as described in the article. --Lambiam 00:07, 17 January 2021 (UTC)


 * In fact, the observation, made by the Spitzer Space Telescope, that most older stars in the Galaxy are concentrated in two of the arms, has raised a new unsolved question: Why is this so? Why are the older stars not equally distributed over all arms? A deeper understanding of the evolutionary dynamics of the Galaxy than we have today is needed to answer that question. --Lambiam 00:18, 17 January 2021 (UTC)

what does "arms" mean in space telescope context? Rizosome (talk) 03:17, 17 January 2021 (UTC)


 * Those would be the spiral arms of this galaxy. --142.112.149.107 (talk) 03:54, 17 January 2021 (UTC)
 * See also . --Lambiam 08:45, 17 January 2021 (UTC)

Cupron cell
Can you help creating a section or article about the Cupron-cell? This battery type has an air recharging option what made it popular around 1910 - also can be base of modern constructions. I found references (below). This thing yet mentioned neither in the Template:Galvanic_cells nor galvanic cell. My English not good enough to reach the needed quality level of articles. There is a Hungarian article hu:Cupron-elem from 2007 too.


 * https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.893.9405&rep=rep1&type=pdf
 * https://patents.google.com/patent/US1624845

--Rodrigo (talk) 21:14, 16 January 2021 (UTC)
 * This does not seem to be notable. Ruslik_ Zero 20:12, 17 January 2021 (UTC)