Blowing Bubbles

Physicists in France have figured out a way to extend the short lifespan of bubbles. The typical bathtub or dish detergent bubble lasts just moments before popping due to the ‘gravity-induced drainage and/or the evaporation of the liquid’ inside the sphere, according to the University of Lille researchers. But when researchers formed bubbles with a high concentration of glycerol — a compound commonly used in a host of foods and medicines — the compound was highly effective in staving off the sphere’s inevitable death by pop. One bubble apparently lasted for 465 days. While the French bubble achievement could seem needless to a layperson, a New York maths professor said there could be some very real applications to be drawn from it.