Scott Waitukaitis

I see.

But that cocktail you get, it's really variable because you're picking up trace molecules that depend on the room you're in, the humidity, whether or not someone's eating a hamburger in there, whether or not there's a power plant nearby, whether or not you're on Mars versus a vacuum system on Earth.

And so the main idea is it's actually those trace molecules on the surface that make everything different and are driving the effect.

Exactly.

And in fact, we can take two samples.

So the thing that, of course, clued us into this is what matters is we have a way to remove all of the molecules.

So for a brief moment, they're clean.

The objects really, truly clean on their surface.

But because you're always in some kind of environment, the molecules start slowly redepositing.

Yeah.

But when we remove all of these molecules from two identical oxide surfaces, they really stop charging.

So kind of what you're saying is true.

Why?

Oh, that's a great question.

So there are so many things.

I'll give you a kind of a physicist fundamental lofty answer and then an application answer.

Okay.

So the lofty thing that keeps me excited is there are so many things in nature that depend on this effect.

So like I said, you know, it is thought that the chemistry of life was made by sparks from static electricity.

So if we don't understand how static electricity is generated, you know, we don't understand how the first amino acids came to be.