Transcription of 'Tangled' physics
1 ' tangled ' physics24 November 2010, By Chris GorskiDisney's new movie, " tangled ," features thefamiliar fairy tale character of rapunzel . The newfilm promises many twists on the beloved tale, buther long locks will remain prominently featured. In the Brothers Grimm story of rapunzel , a witchholds a beautiful young woman captive in a is blessed with a lovely singing voice andlong, long blond hair. One day, her voice enchants a prince passingthrough a nearby forest. They fall in love,and rapunzel lets down her hair so that the princemay use it to climb the tower to meet her. Thischain of events may lead curious readers to ask aquestion. Can human hair support the weight ofanother person? On average, one strand of hair can support justunder 100 grams, or about the weight of two candybars. Strands of darker hair are generally thicker,and therefore stronger, thanblond hair. But alas, rapunzel must make do withblond locks. Given that blondes generally haveabout 140,000 hairs on their heads, rapunzel 'shair should easily support the weight of manyclimbing princes.
2 However, there is more to this rapunzel simply let down her hair and the princestarted climbing immediately, her hair would notbreak, but it might rip out. Also, the rest of herbody might not be able to support the , there are strategies that she can use tohelp reduce the strain on her head and Harshman, a physicist at AmericanUniversity in Washington, suggested Rapunzelwould be safer and more secure if she tied her hairaround something before lowering it. "The whole idea is that you can use the friction ofthe hair against itself in the knot, and whatever it istied around will support the weight of the prince,"Harshman said. That seems to be a much betteridea than making rapunzel 's scalp the anchor point. Provided by Inside Science News Service 1 / 2 APA citation: ' tangled ' physics (2010, November 24) retrieved 30 October 2020 from document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, nopart may be reproduced without the written permission.
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