[HN Gopher] The extraordinary shelf life of the deep sea sandwiches
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       The extraordinary shelf life of the deep sea sandwiches
        
       Author : zdw
       Score  : 25 points
       Date   : 2022-12-12 03:11 UTC (19 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.wired.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.wired.com)
        
       | montecarl wrote:
       | Avoid paywall: https://archive.vn/9xs6M
        
       | dr_dshiv wrote:
       | Sounds like a lot more science is needed. I wish ocean science
       | was funded at a greater level -- and I wish it were easier to do
       | research (incredibly expensive and regulatory).
        
       | andrewmutz wrote:
       | If high pressure slows down the spoilage, can I use a pressure
       | chamber to preserve food, rather than a refrigerator?
        
         | pazimzadeh wrote:
         | What happens if you combine both?
        
           | Nzen wrote:
           | PV = nRT [0]. The (P)ressure is directly correlated with the
           | (T)emperature. You would need to use a small (V)olume to
           | balance the equation.
           | 
           | [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideal_gas_law
        
             | s1artibartfast wrote:
             | poor application of the gas law. There is no reason to
             | treat the situation as adiabatic. Theoretical assumptions
             | are important!
        
         | droopyEyelids wrote:
         | Yes absolutely. It's really cool.
         | 
         | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascalization
        
         | FredPret wrote:
         | Good luck peeking in the fridge every 5 mins like some do!
         | 
         | Maybe a pressure hatch is the answer to snacking
        
         | traverseda wrote:
         | It's called high pressure processing or pascalization.
        
       | unwind wrote:
       | Very interesting, and daring of them to taste food having spent
       | 10 months in the ocean! That must have been an epic "for
       | science!" moment, for sure.
       | 
       | Semi-meta: as a non-native speaker, does the expression "a
       | handful of apples" feel natural? Is that, like, 4-5 apples, or
       | whatever you feel a handful corresponds to?
       | 
       | I mean, most people will struggle actually holding more than one
       | or two apples in a single hand, but perhaps that part is so
       | idiomatic that the literal meaning of the words don't matter?
       | Would you say "a handful of aircraft carriers"?
        
         | jfengel wrote:
         | Yes, that's fine. English speakers regularly use "handful" to
         | mean "about five".
         | 
         | As a random example I googled "handful of buildings" and got
         | >700,000 hits, e.g. "Charnley-Persky House is one of a handful
         | of buildings that display the combined talents of Louis
         | Sullivan and Frank Lloyd Wright".
         | 
         | You can even have "a handful" of non-physical things: "a
         | handful of ideas" gets almost 5 million hits on Google, e.g.
         | "We started with a handful of ideas that sprung out of our
         | collective experiences on social media."
        
           | lotsofpulp wrote:
           | As an American English speaker, I have never come across
           | context where a handful means about five. Handful has meant a
           | relatively small amount, with the actual quantity always
           | depending on the context of the item being discussed.
        
           | jmkb wrote:
           | To me (native English a la USA) apples are in a sort of
           | uncanny valley between things that could in fact be measured
           | by the physical handful, like peanuts, and things that
           | couldn't -- buildings being way off the charts, obviously.
        
             | thaumasiotes wrote:
             | Context will make the difference. If you say "grab a
             | handful of apples", no one will believe you meant to say
             | it, because that doesn't make any sense.
             | 
             | " _There are_ a handful of apples " is a different usage,
             | which people will accept.
        
             | [deleted]
        
           | unwind wrote:
           | Cool, thanks!
        
           | zdw wrote:
           | Never really thought about this, but I wonder whether
           | "handful" also is roughly equivalent to "number you can count
           | on one hand" (ie, around 4 or 5 if counting with fingers).
        
         | eschneider wrote:
         | More like putting out a platter of "Free Food!" for grad
         | students.
        
         | glxxyz wrote:
         | A handful means either the amount you can hold in your hand
         | "add a handful of salt", or a small number so "Country X only
         | has a handful of aircraft carriers" is fine.
         | 
         | I think with apples it would be the second meaning but it's a
         | grey area. With something smaller like "a handful of cherries"
         | I'd go with the amount that can be held.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2022-12-12 23:00 UTC)