I'm not Keith, but from what I've read about such systems, this isn't a concern: when they hit the Earth's surface, the microwave beam is very large so it wouldn't have a fatal effect on anyone or anything that happened to cross through it, though it might warm you up a bit. Also, the frequency is pretty important; microwave ovens work because they're tuned to the resonant frequency of water, which most of our food is largely composed of, so it excites the water molecules and makes them heat up. If the be
... microwave ovens work because they're tuned to the resonant frequency of water...
Bzzt. Microwave ovens use 2.4GHz because there's an ISM band [wikipedia.org] there. There is no resonance at 2.4 GHz for water [flitetest.com]. If there was your food would explode in the oven.
by Anonymous Coward writes:
on Monday August 17, 2015 @04:41PM (#50334571)
Boy is that a hard myth to dispel. I have no idea how it started but microwaves work on simple induced eddy currents in the "load", ie, your meal.
Anyone who thinks a microwave oven is tuned is encouraged to show me the stabilized power supply and PLL lock to a stable reference... Guess what? The frequency output of a magnetron is all over the place, because it doesn't matter. It would work just as well at 3GHz too.
Microwaving power to Earth from space (Score:1)
Re: (Score:4, Informative)
I'm not Keith, but from what I've read about such systems, this isn't a concern: when they hit the Earth's surface, the microwave beam is very large so it wouldn't have a fatal effect on anyone or anything that happened to cross through it, though it might warm you up a bit. Also, the frequency is pretty important; microwave ovens work because they're tuned to the resonant frequency of water, which most of our food is largely composed of, so it excites the water molecules and makes them heat up. If the be
Re: (Score:4, Informative)
Bzzt. Microwave ovens use 2.4GHz because there's an ISM band [wikipedia.org] there. There is no resonance at 2.4 GHz for water [flitetest.com]. If there was your food would explode in the oven.
Re:Microwaving power to Earth from space (Score:0)
Boy is that a hard myth to dispel. I have no idea how it started but microwaves work on simple induced eddy currents in the "load", ie, your meal.
Anyone who thinks a microwave oven is tuned is encouraged to show me the stabilized power supply and PLL lock to a stable reference... Guess what? The frequency output of a magnetron is all over the place, because it doesn't matter. It would work just as well at 3GHz too.