1. How is this a discovery? Was Paul Chaikin the first person to notice this phenomenon?
2. Is this really that cool of a phenomenon? It seems pretty logical to me that oblate spheroids would pack in tigher because they're flatter. Maybe I just don't have a good enough grasp of the physical sciences in all their complexity.
3. What's it going to take for a fifty-five gallon drum of M&Ms to show up in my office?
Posted by Robespierre (Member # 5779) on :
How much of this is the "science of M&M's" and how much is the "science of Oblate Spheroids"? I mean seriously...
Or maybe in an alternate universe, we could be all be privy to the "Science of Skittles"
No one will ever know.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
M&Ms and Skittles have distinctly different edges, I think. Don't they?
Posted by Da_Goat (Member # 5529) on :
I don't think so, but I do think M&Ms are a little thicker.
Posted by Tstorm (Member # 1871) on :
If a 50 gallon drum of M&Ms showed up on my premises, bound for consumption by me, I would obsessively divide them up by color, then proceed to eat them in the following order:
Black (brown ) Yellow Orange Green Red Blue
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
Spheres have the highest volume to surface area ratio. However, in packing one has to take into account the negative space excluded by the sphere.
If you think of a cube, as most man made containers are, the maximum usable area will strike a balance somewhere between the spere and the cube shape. What I wonder is how I can get the 125 pounds of almond M&Ms and how they pack in.
So how many of you would buy whoppers instead of milk duds if the price/weight were the same, just because the box is bigger?
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
AHA! But what if you got a barrel full of the new black and white ones Tstorm?
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
Anyone remember light brown m&m's? I think they did away with them when they re-introduced red. Did they have them back before they stopped making red?
Posted by JonnyNotSoBravo (Member # 5715) on :
Perhaps we should point out that these were not peanut M&Ms, but the plain chocolate ones. Reese's Pieces could have worked just as well, but Skittles would have produced a different result because they're fatter around the mid-section.
The article wasn't terribly descriptive about how this was a breakthrough. Are they saying that the atoms in the highly dense ceramics are going to be "stretched" until they're oblate?
Posted by fiazko (Member # 5812) on :
I think M&Ms are exempt to my obssessive-compulsive tendencies. I pretty much just shovel them into my mouth, color be damned.
Btw, Tstorm, where would you put 50 gallons worth of sorted M&Ms?
Posted by JonnyNotSoBravo (Member # 5715) on :
and for Whoppers vs. Milk duds, I usually price them according to weight - and the fact that I hate milk duds and like Whoppers.
Posted by Papa Moose (Member # 1992) on :
I prefer Whoppers to Milk Duds, but I'd take Junior Mints over either one.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
I don't eat Skittles, so their dimensions I don't know. But Reese's and M&Ms definitely are (slightly) differently shaped.
And the trouble with the nut M&Ms is irregularity is high.
Posted by Ela (Member # 1365) on :
Wants some M&Ms now!!!! Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
<-- has some
Can't eat them for another hour!
Posted by sndrake (Member # 4941) on :
quote:And the trouble with the nut M&Ms is irregularity is high.
Rivka, my advice is to chow down on a piece of Ex-lax between the nutty M&Ms. That should take care of the irregularity problem.
**Not a fan of peanut M&Ms. Prefer peanuts, the natural way - roasted and salted.**
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
*snicker*
Posted by Primal Curve (Member # 3587) on :
pooka, caramel is significantly more dense than malted milk. Not to mention the air pockets.
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
But I would guess that a plain M&M shape is going to form a denser pack than a peanut butter M&M. I want to use the word asymptotic, but I don't know how to spell it or exactly where I would go with it. Do you think the dimensions favor a hexagonal pattern to the particle arrangement? If so, I would think the plain M&M is superior to both the skittle and the pb M&M.
I like peanut M&M's best then almond then plain then pb. I don't like the crispy.
Posted by sarcasticmuppet (Member # 5035) on :
*LOVES peanut butter*
Posted by NicoleValentine (Member # 6206) on :
The peanut ones are my favourite. I, too, divide them by colour. I would, however, divide them by the handful. I eat red, then orange, then yellow, then green, then brown, then blue.
Posted by Tstorm (Member # 1871) on :
Storage would be a minor problem...
quote: AHA! But what if you got a barrel full of the new black and white ones Tstorm?
Black first, then white. Talk about blande, though...
I'm not alone, there are other people out there who sort their M&M's (or just eat them in a particular color order). By the way, I normally don't explain this to people, I just do it. It's too weird for understanding, outside of Hatrack. Posted by zgator (Member # 3833) on :
How much effort is required to get them into the highest density. The highest density would require them to all have the same orientation.
I might have to buy some and try this.
Posted by PSI Teleport (Member # 5545) on :
quote: Anyone remember light brown m&m's?
They killed them off when introducing the blue ones. I remember it very well. I miss them.
And you can't call the brown ones black, because they sell black and they're very different. At the Arizona Mills Mall they have like every color you could imagine.
I bought a bag of Valentine m&m's (red, white, pink) and was not as satisfied as I am with a regular bag. However, the Christmas ones often leave me More satified. Hmmmm.... Plus the Christmas ones with mint are exquisite too, especially in ice cream. *drools*
Posted by PSI Teleport (Member # 5545) on :
quote: Writing in Friday's issue of the journal Science, they said they found that oblate spheroids -- such as plain M&M's -- pack surprisingly more densely than regular spheres when poured randomly and shaken.
I don't understand why this is surprising. Shouldn't a shape pack more tightly the more you flatten it out? If you made little m&m discs they'd lay perfectly on top of each other, so what is the big deal? There'd still be space in between but not as much.
I'm not a physicist...it just seems like common sense.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
I also separate my M&Ms by color, Tstorm; you're not alone. Posted by Mike (Member # 55) on :
quote:How much effort is required to get them into the highest density. The highest density would require them to all have the same orientation.
quote:Shouldn't a shape pack more tightly the more you flatten it out?
Imagine a container filled with spheres. Now scale it down (both the container and the spheres) so that it is half as tall and the spheres become oblate. The volume taken up by the ellipsoids is now half of what they took up before, but the empty space is also half of what it was. So if you don't rearrange the spheres, the ratio stays the same.
The surprising result is that the optimal packing requires the ellipsoids not to have the same orientation.
Oh, and: *drools*
Posted by MidnightBlue (Member # 6146) on :
If someone put a 55-gallon drum of M&Ms in my office, I would want to know if people had been touching them and if they were actually safe to eat. Then I would eat them.
Posted by jehovoid (Member # 2014) on :
Now if they can only get a handle on the physics of the "melts-in-your-mouth-not-in-your-hand" technology, then they'd really have something.
Posted by Annie (Member # 295) on :
The best are the m&ms baking chips - not just because they're miniature, but because they're semisweet chocolate. Mmmm, boy!
Posted by zgator (Member # 3833) on :
quote:The surprising result is that the optimal packing requires the ellipsoids not to have the same orientation.
That I find very interesting. As a soils engineer, one of the things I learned about was optimal packing like this as it relates to soil density.
PSI, the problem is that things don't naturally fall into the right place when you "pour" them in. You could easily say that the optimal shape could be a cube, but that only works if you get them all into the correct positions.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
You guys are getting the order all wrong! It's brown, orange, yellow, red, green, blue.
And I'm still waiting for the answer to my third question.
Posted by zgator (Member # 3833) on :
Your credit card number.
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
The phase out of the light brown color and its subsequent replaclement with blue was a tragedy, imo. The beauty of the orignial M&M colors is that they all were warm (except for the green which is semi-warm ), fall, leaf-inspired colors. This led to a sort of folksy, heimlich feel. The blue (which is a cool color) throws that scheme all out of whack.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
So how many M&Ms fit inside one of these?
Posted by Lissande (Member # 350) on :
I don't understand - when y'all say you eat M&Ms in a particular color order, do you mean 1) you eat all the browns, then all the blues, etc, or 2) you eat one brown, one blue, one red, etc until you come back around to brown? Just want to make sure I picture the neurosis correctly. Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
All the browns, then all the oranges, then all the yellows. . . . At least, that's how I do it. Obsessive-compulsive behavior manifests itself in different ways. Posted by Dan_raven (Member # 3383) on :
M&M question.
I recently had some of the colorless ones. They tasted flat. Is that me or has anyone else noticed this?
Oh, have to add, you never eat Green M&M's. You give them to your signifigant other.
Posted by lcarus (Member # 4395) on :
I ate all the tans, then all the browns, then the yellows, followed by the oranges, and finally, the kings of the M&Ms bag, the Greens. Greens, as anybody of my generation knows, result in homeruns.
The introduction of red and blue has played havoc with my system, because rather than being a lively, bright red, it's a dull, slightly dried blood red. And the blue is also not as bright as the Green and orange are. This leads to confusion on the part of my subconscious, but no matter what else I do, I still save the Greens for last.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
Introduction of red? I thought there had always been a red. Was this before my time? Or have I been grossly inattentive?
Posted by lcarus (Member # 4395) on :
Red? Maybe ten years ago. I'm sure somebody will dredge up a link to M&M history.
There was an election, as there was with blue.
I voted for purple both times. Posted by PSI Teleport (Member # 5545) on :
No, there was red originally, but they got rid of it because it turned out the red dye was dangerous for consumption. Then several years later (10 to 15 years ago) they reintroduced red m&m's made with a newer dye.
This isn't very complete....but there was no election for red. You're thinking of the recent election (after blue) where the choices were pink, purple, and aqua. Whatever happened after that must not have made Mars happy because whichever won wasn't included in the bag. (My guess is that they were hoping for pink or purple and aqua won, which wasn't far enough removed from blue.) They temporarily sold bags of M&M's with either aqua, pink, or purple included in the bags. (This was only a couple of years ago.) It's easy to forget because we never saw the results from it. (I don't think most people cared in the first place because it wasn't really a new idea anymore, to vote for colors.)
[ February 18, 2004, 11:44 AM: Message edited by: PSI Teleport ]
Posted by Happy Camper (Member # 5076) on :
That's odd. I don't remember the discontinuation (and subsequent reintroduction) of the red ones. I must not have been eating M&Ms at all at the time. Guess I learned my something new for today.
*edit* so I guess the reds were discontinued in 1976 and reintroduced in 1987, when I was 8. Funny, I can't believe I don't remember not having red M&Ms before I was 8.
[ February 18, 2004, 03:00 PM: Message edited by: Happy Camper ]
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
I guess I was only six when red was brought back, so that's probably why I don't remember its absence.
And just the other day, I was remembering the recent aqua/pink/purple vote. There was a vote, wasn't there? Did they just decide not to add a new color after all?
Posted by Tstorm (Member # 1871) on :
Yah, there was a vote, and I seem to remember Purple won by nearly a landslide. The new marketing gimmick obviously takes priority.
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
getting back to the shape issue, I think most of us are aware the a hexagon is the shape malleable items take when equal pressure is applied from all sides.
But a diamond shape (picture either two isosceles triangles abutting or a regular hexagon divided in thirds) is probably the most packable shape for non-malleable solids because the pieces can generally fit in the hexagonal formation except at the edges, where they can fill in.
So a shape that is nearly diamond in both footprint and cross section would be the most ideal. Or a rounded form with lines asymptotic to a diamond. Very like an almond M&M might be. Also many varieties of fish are shaped like this, and stone aged arrow heads. It's aerodynamic as well as packable.
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