Skip to content

Ian Tregillis

Writer. Scientist. Thoroughly Disappointing Flesh Muppet.

Menu
  • Home
  • Ian’s Writing
  • Blog / News / Appearances
  • About Ian
  • Slang Glossary
Menu

Turning Cards, Collapsing Waves, and Lagrangian Mechanics

Posted on January 26, 2023January 26, 2023 by eidolon

I recently wrote the third post in a slowly evolving series of extremely nerdy blog entries for the Wild Cards website. Over the course of these posts, spread years apart, I’ve been very slowly deriving a sequence of toy models, based on physics and applied math, to explain the behavior of the fictional Wild Card virus (aka xenovirus Takis-A).

In the latest one, I boil it all down to a problem in Lagrangian mechanics. Which, I suppose, is a bit like using an H-bomb to swat a fly. I won’t lie, though. I’m pretty proud of how far I’ve taken this stupid, time-wasting idea.

But, hey, at least the plots are pretty.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

©2023 Ian Tregillis | Built using WordPress and Responsive Blogily theme by Superb