Microwave Experiments Cause Sponge Disasters

gollum123 writes "Reports about a study that found microwave ovens can be used to sterilize kitchen sponges sent people hurrying to test the idea this week — with sometimes disastrous results. A team at the University of Florida found that two minutes in the microwave at full power could kill a range of bacteria, viruses and parasites on kitchen sponges. They described how they soaked the sponges in wastewater and then zapped them. But several experimenters evidently left out the crucial step of wetting the sponge. "Just wanted you to know that your article on microwaving sponges and scrubbers aroused my interest. However, when I put my sponge/scrubber into the microwave, it caught fire, smoked up the house, ruined my microwave, and pissed me off," one correspondent wrote in an e-mail to Reuters."

Incoming lawsuits in:

[by Anonymous Coward]

3
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Re:Incoming lawsuits in:

[Aglassis (10161)]

Incoming lawsuits in: 3..2..1..

Actually it should be the opposite. Anyone who convinces the stupid to sterilize themselves or remove themselves from the gene pool through other means certainly deserves our hearty congratulations. In fact, they should be allowed to sue the stupid bastards they convinced to kill themselves.

I can see it now, billboards with signs saying: "a microwave is a great way to get a tan," "a blowtorch is a great way to thaw frozen pipes," and of course "it is cool to operate power tools--in the nude! Buy Budweiser!"

Truly, we need the stupid to start killing themselves again. With the advent of birth control, human evolution is starting to go backwards. In 100 years they will talk about the benevolent reign of George Bush the Wise.

Re:Incoming lawsuits in:

[Skrynesaver (994435)]

Truly, we need the stupid to start killing themselves again. With the advent of birth control, human evolution is starting to go backwards. In 100 years they will talk about the benevolent reign of George Bush the Wise.

You raise a very interesting point, those who take advantage of the opportunities presented to them in western society tend to reproduce at a much lower rate than those who get hammered and start breeding while the more capable are still in education.

The fact that educated women want to establish a career before becoming mothers means that they start a family in their late thirties and consequently have fewer kids, sometimes they have no family at all as it is too late for treatment when they discover infertility issues. Basically the smart people aren't replacing themselves.

Fuck, I sound like some Eugenics Nazi but really stop running yourselves down, have a shower and go out and breed people!

Re:Incoming lawsuits in:

[LordVader717 (888547)]

Anyone who convinces the stupid to sterilize themselves or remove themselves from the gene pool through other means certainly deserves our hearty congratulations

Perhaps, if they're clever, they could sterilize themselves with their microwave.

Re:Incoming lawsuits in:

[kitsunewarlock (971818)]

The "zero" in your score makes me laugh. Super patriotism of others for the win. But seriously, joining the military is quite interesting...on one hand you have the people who obviously have all the right reasons: nuclear technicians without enough money or high school GPA (which doesn't mean your dumb by the way...the fact I was 11th in my class means nothing) to get education from a decent college, people down on their luck because they got laid off and can no longer afford schooling, etc...etc... In both cases, and many others, a good reason for military conscription is in fact a lack of college. Which isn't saying your too stupid or poor to get into the college mind you. A good example would be my own father-in-law: extremely smart man. Never graduated high-school and dropped out after reading every decent book they had in their library (never went to class and the principle didn't know what to do with him; took him a good year and a half to read everything that interested him). Yet he joined the military AND went to college (3 PHDs and more masters and Bachelors than I can count). On the other hand, you have gang members who want a legal excuse to shoot people. I know, that sounds horrible, and my karma will hurt after this post. But, honestly its true. My father was in the military, and my best friend is in bootcamp right now, and they'll agree with me. Gangs since the beginning of war have been formed after wars were over by soldiers with too much extra aggression... Why am I replying to a "0" scored post? I dunno, perhaps I wanted to talk about my dad. Perhaps I'm waiting for a virus scan to end on my laptop before driving out to the lab to get some late-night work done. Or perhaps I felt that the moderation system of slashdot is such that one ticked off guy who copies and pastes: "I for one..." into every biology post can turn your essay into troll-bait. And so I say "farewell to karma..."

Re:Eugenics on Slashdot

[Gr8Apes (679165)]

The Nazis practiced genocide and encouraged eugenics. The fact that the distasteful former has so completely colored the latter to the point of tainting its meaning is obvious in your case.

Eugenics is practiced with every prenatal screening, gene screening to discover genetic abnormalities prior to conception, and with almost every in-vitro process. Do you consider those "horrible"?

This is merely encouraging a subset to remove themselves from the gene pool. There's a major difference between showing someone cliff-diving and describing its wonders vs forcibly shoving someone off a cliff.

Or do you hold that the Darwin Awards website [darwinawards.com] is an abomination as well?

Re:Eugenics on Slashdot

[Gr8Apes (679165)]

Argh, I'm replying to an anon on a touchy subject....

The Nazis performed eugenics to an extreme degree. I think that eliminating "stupid" people (using an arbitrary definition of "stupid") by encouraging them to kill themselves would qualify as a moderate-to-extreme form of eugenics.

Once they started incarcerating political prisoners, gypsys, and in general bad people in concentration camps in the early 30s, it quickly became easier in germany to add other groups the general population didn't like, such as anyone unable or unwilling to "contribute" or "fit in" to society. Don't forget that Germany, and in fact, most of Europe, were horribly xenophobic at the time. The concentration camps quickly devolved to slave camps and then execution camps, which is a perfect example of the "slippery slope" concept in action.

Eugenics is practiced with every prenatal screening, gene screening to discover genetic abnormalities prior to conception, and with almost every in-vitro process. Do you consider those "horrible"?

These are controversial ethical debates. Some people, especially the disabled community, do not believe that those who are born disabled should be screened out. Of course, the definition of "disability" and "disease" varies greatly.

I agree there's much debate on this topic. In a contrary view, there was a story in the insert in my Sunday paper this past weekend about a married dwarf couple wanting to ensure their child was born a dwarf. This would be intentionally producing a child with what is considered a genetic abnormality by, at a rough guess, 95+% of the population. Personally, I feel that intentionally disadvantaging a child in this manner, because they will be at a disadvantage in today's society, is not unlike unnecessarily amputating a new born's legs or arms at birth. The story also made mention of intentionally selecting deafness for a deaf couple. I feel the same way about that.

This is merely encouraging a subset to remove themselves from the gene pool.

Deliberately encouraging people to kill themselves would... land you in a fair bit of trouble, I think.

Or do you hold that the Darwin Awards website is an abomination as well?

More like insensitivity to loved ones.

Telling someone to "drop dead" if you will, is not punishable. As an example of how stupid our society has become as a whole, I was by pure happenstance viewing an ad on TV this morning. It was of the new Lexus IS, and they had one on a runway racing against an IS dropped from a helicopter across the drop target. The ground based IS squeaks right under the falling IS in classic thrilling escaped by a hair style.

What makes this germane to this discussion is the text that was apparently felt by someone that needed to be included in the ad. Underneath, it stated first off, "all ariel sequences were simulated", followed by "Professional driver on closed course. Do not attempt."

Now, if you have to tell someone that measuring out 4000 feet on a runway and racing a car dropped from a helicopter @ 4000 feet is something you shouldn't attempt, I'd say that anyone so tempted should be allowed to go ahead and potentially remove themselves from the gene pool.

Re:Incoming lawsuits in:

[Elm Tree (17570)]

I used to work for an environmental engineering company, where one of my co-workers had a clipping from a 1960's Popular Mechanics article suggesting the the best way to dispose of used motor oil was to pour it into a hole in the ground. I'm not sure if it was up there to show the difference in how we view things over time, or to give clients ideas so as to drum up more business, but either way I found it amusing.

Re:Incoming lawsuits in:

[Oxygen99 (634999)]

*Ping*

Re:Incoming lawsuits in:

[Brummund (447393)]

Actually, this is Darwin's theory hard at work, doing its best to keep the gene pool strong. Watch out for the next Reuter article "The oven, gasoline and you!"

Re:Incoming lawsuits in:

[indifferent children (842621)]

I call BS. Darwin's theory of purging the gene pool requires that people lack common sense.

No, common sense is not part of Darwin's theory. Natural selection is based on an organism's fitness to its environment. Since these people live in an environment that includes microwave ovens, sponges, and Reuters, their ability to interact with these elements without removing themselves from the gene pool is part of being 'fit' for their environment.

As they say

[by Anonymous Coward]

However, when I put my sponge/scrubber into the microwave, it caught fire, smoked up the house, ruined my microwave, and pissed me off.

The stupid shall be punished.

A bit silly?

[Ckwop (707653)]

How else did they expect it to work? Of course you need the god-damn water in the sponge. Microwaves have a wave length measured in the centimetre. The size of a bacterial spore is a couple of orders of magnitude smaller The size of a bateria is a lot smaller than this again.

This means that if you wanted to destroy the blighters with radiation alone you have to choose a frequency a lot higher than microwaves, otherwise there will be areas in the minima of the standing wave that won't heat sufficently to kill the microbes.

The mechanism for steralisation is through the formation of steam that kills the majority of the nasties - not the microwave energy itself.

Simon

You're being naive/optimistic

[246o1 (914193)]

People do not understand microwaves. Berating them for not using their understanding of microwaves is like watching a Spiderman movie and saying "Why doesn't he just fly out of there?"

Re:You're being naive/optimistic

[Aqua OS X (458522)]

I think that analogy needs a bit of polishing.

Re:You're being naive/optimistic

[246o1 (914193)]

It's all about expecting people to use abilities they don't have, like the ability to fly, or the ability to understand something complex they know nothing about. But just for you, I'll do a political version:

People don't understand microwaves. Expecting them to use their understanding of microwaves would be like asking President Bush to use his understanding of diplomacy.

Re:You're being naive/optimistic

[kestasjk (933987)]

Berating them for not using their understanding of microwaves is like watching a Spiderman movie and saying "Why doesn't he just fly out of there?"

Could this be the worst analogy on /. , ever?

Re:You're being naive/optimistic

[jrumney (197329)]

People may not understand microwaves, but the original article I saw gave the following advice:

• Wet the sponge first. Dry sponges will not heat evenly and may catch fire.
• Keep an eye on the sponge while it is in the microwave and stop the microwave immediately if there is any sparking.
• 2 minutes should be enough for most bacteria, but never microwave your sponge for longer than 10 minutes.

Maybe some news sources edited the article down to a short filler piece and left out some of these crucial details.

ironic for slashdot

[fantomas (94850)]

... but maybe some of the people didn't read the article :-)

Conversion error.

[cuzco (998069)]

We Americans measure our bacteria as fractions of an inch so the sponge fires were no doubt caused when people, in their germ kill potential calculations, screwed up while converting centimeter length microwaves to inches. Honest mistake.

But do _you_ understand?

[KnightTristan (882222)]

... how else did _you_ expect it to work?

A simple question for you: water molecules, are they larger or smaller than the bacteria and spores to be killed?

Last time I've checked, the wavelength used in the microwave is about 12.5 cm. Sure, the bacteria are much smaller than that, but is it at all relevant?

KnightTristan

Re:A bit silly?

[mlk (18543)]

Taking just that one line

Writing in the Journal of Environmental Health, Bitton and colleagues said they soaked sponges and scrubbing pads in raw wastewater containing fecal bacteria such as E. coli, viruses, protozoan parasites and bacterial spores. ".

You could easily read that as if the soaking in wastewater was just to add some nasties to zap.

lets be clear about this

[macadamia_harold (947445)]

However, when I put my sponge/scrubber into the microwave, it caught fire, smoked up the house, ruined my microwave, and pissed me off,

He wasn't using one of those Sony battery-operated microwaves, was he?

Stupid People, Stupid Method

[StarWreck (695075)]

The microwave steralizes the wet sponge because it makes the water hot enough to kill anything living. The same effect can be had by dunking the sponge in a pot of boiling water.

Re:Stupid People, Stupid Method

[geminidomino (614729)]

Using a microwave uses less energy and probably carries less risk of personal injury.

Unless you're a putz who forgets to wet the sponge and burns your frelling house down, that is...

What is he whining about?

[Squapper (787068)]

If the sponge caugth fire, the microbes are probably dead by now. Right?

This just in...

[Bin_jammin (684517)]

holding your breath underwater for 5 minutes cures stupidity. I take full responsibility for all results of home trials.

Re:This just in...

[Patrik_AKA_RedX (624423)]

No it means he missed a '0'. 5 minutes cures only some forms of stupidity. 50 minutes cures all forms.

Why funny things are modded Informative

[Digz (90264)]

From the FAQ:

"Note that being moderated Funny doesn't help your karma."

Thus the reason that people will mod a Funny post Informative.

Sounds like....

[by Anonymous Coward]

Lots of smoke? Smells like burning tires? Really pissed off? These people sound like Linux users trying to get their sound cards to work.

Class Action Suit

[freedom_india (780002)]

Prepare for a Class Action Suit filed against Reuters, the Scientists who did this and news papers that carried it for the damages caused by the fires.

Out of the $100 million that will be awarded, $80 million will go the lawyers, $10 million towards court fees, etc., and the class action plaintiffs awarded a $15 coupon each that can be redeemed for a Microwave at Wal-mart.
 

Re:Class Action Suit

[TheVoice900 (467327)]

No, they'll get a $0.50 coupon redeemable for a new sponge.

No matter what you do...

[dtmos (447842)]

Note that even the original University of Florida press release [ufl.edu] begins

PLEASE NOTE: To guard against the risk of fire, people who wish to sterilize their sponges at home must ensure the sponge is completely wet. Two minutes of microwaving is sufficient for most sterilization. Sponges should also have no metallic content. Last, people should be careful when removing the sponge from the microwave as it will be hot.

*sigh*

Re:No matter what you do...

[by Anonymous Coward]

Simple. Ban all sponges. They are clearly dangerous.

That bloody squarepants thing should be locked up too.

Re:No matter what you do...

[rsidd (6328)]

From last paragraph of TFA --that's not the original release, that's the advisory the university issued after all these people burned their sponges.

People are just too damn stupid for their own good

[OlivierB (709839)]

Back in good old days, many centuries ago, there wasn't any kind of this Politically Correct stuff and neither was there protection of the idiots. There was one rule: survival of the fittest.
If you made mistakes dumb enough to kill you , you didn't get anybody to pull you out and nature did its thing and eliminated the "idiot's" gene.
Of course this had nothing to do with real accidents, but in the long term idiots would dissapear.
Nowadays there is no personal responsibility. People do their own mistakes and blame it on somebody else.
This idiot should have had at least his genitals burned so we wouldn't have anymore kids.

Mind you, I am all about protecting and subsidising the weakest, the handicapped, the sick and al. I just believe that dumb people that bring it upon themselves deserve no attention and no compassion whatsoever.

Re:People are just too damn stupid for their own g

[Bromskloss (750445)]

Mind you, I am all about protecting and subsidising the weakest, the handicapped, the sick and al.

Puh, thanks.
-Al

Sterilising Baby's bottles

[REBloomfield (550182)]

of course, those of us with children and bottle sterlisers know that placing water and objects in a microwave leads to the steam cleaning them... "well duh" was my reaction when i saw this "news" item yesterday....

If all else fails, read the instructions.

[xav_jones (612754)]

"Just wanted you to know that your article on nuclear fusion reactors aroused my interest. However, when I put my reactor into operation, it caught fire, levelled the neighbourhood, stained my carpet, and pissed me off."

Perhaps if you can't follow all the instructions there are some things you really shouldn't be doing.

ROSPA has it right

[CmdrGravy (645153)]

They had this on the BBC yesterday too, I think in the morning they had suggested everyone microwave their sponges and then in the evening news they had a man with a ginger mustache from ROSPA who said that he wouldn't advise microwaving sponges because there is no setting on microwaves for sponges and that he for one didn't have the faintest idea what would happen if you did microwave a sponge except that whatever it was which happened would probably be unsafe and might cause an accident.

I found it very reassuring that ROSPA ( Royal Society For The Prevention Of Accidents ) does its research so thoroughly before making announcements.

Ignorance != Stupidity

[Capt'n Hector (650760)]

Calling these people stuipd only makes you look like an arrogant asshole. For most people, a microwave is a black box contraption in their kitchen that makes food hot. Sure, they also know that you shouldn't put a fork or knife in, but have no idea why. This isn't because they're stupid, it's because they're ignorant about the inner workings of that particular machine in their kitchen.

Oh, but you say, taking things as fact without questioning why is a folly committed only by stupid people, thus making them ignorant. The two are really the same. I would then ask you why light is both a particle and a wave and why electrons jump to a different energy level when hit by the right frequencey of light. There's probably less than 1,000 people on the planet who can give a good answer to these questions, and unless you're one of them, you've committed the same folly as your average suburban mom - you still don't truly know why a microwave works.

Re:Ignorance != Stupidity

[Pikoro (844299)]

You put a dry sponge into your microwave didn't you?

Not only sponges: a microwave will melt metal

[viking80 (697716)]

One exceptional feature of a microwave is that it will keep heating at full effect no matter how hot the target gets. The only limit how you design your target.

You can for example melt and cast most metals:
http://net127.com/2005/01/24/melting-metals-in-a-d omestic-microwave-oven/ [net127.com]

With some research, you may even be able to use your kitchen microwave to generate some fusion reactions.

Sounds like a college prank

[Dekortage (697532)]

When I was in college, someone took one of my coffee mugs, filled it up with Hershey's chocolate syrup, and put it in the microwave for 90 minutes. Then they left. As best as we can tell, the syrup first boiled over and filled up the bottom of the microwave. Eventually it hardened into a black crust and caught fire. That's when the fire alarm woke us up, you know -- it was three o'clock in the morning.

The microwave was ruined, and there was some damage to the cabinet. And I lost my favorite coffee mug too. But it's probably the best use for Hershey's chocolate syrup that I could think of (since it's pretty awful stuff).

In defense of fools...

[Combuchan (123208)]

from the article:

But several experimenters evidently left out the crucial step of wetting the sponge.

This was not mentioned at all in the original Reuter's article to begin with, but all other details (how long, power setting) were included. The bureau made the mistake, but instead of apologising, they chastise their readers.

People read the original article and played dumb for a bit, temporarily throwing out conventional wisdom regarding non-food objects in the microwave as they followed Reuter's authoritative instructions.

But, hey, this is slashdot and people don't play, rather, they are dumb, and we all have a good laugh at their misfortune while we're glad it was somebody else who ruined their microwave and not us.

And yes, I did make a whole bunch of toxic smoke years ago by forgetting to put the bowl of water while nuking a CD. :P

The Weird Thing...

[RexRhino (769423)]

The weird things isn't that people forgot to wet the sponge so it wouldn't catch on fire...

The weird thing is that people are so afraid of bacteria that they are going be microwaving their sponges!! Not only that, I see they sell anti-bacteria material sponges pre-made at the store... and anti-bacterial soap... and anti-bacterial air-sprays (don't worry about lung cancer from breathing that crap!). Anti-bacterial teething rings... anti-bacterial towels... anti-bacterial shaving cream...

When did people get paranoid about bacteria all of a sudden? You gotta admit, bacteria isn't a significant problem for most people in the industrialized world, even without all the extreme anti bacteria tactics people are using.

Re:cat

[lahvak (69490)]

Did you soak the cat in water first?

Re:stupidity

[StarWreck (695075)]

it would seam desirable that stupidity should kill

Then it would "seam" time to meet your maker.

Re:Clearly, evolution as a system has failed...

[by Anonymous Coward]

In case of human IQ, the evolution feedback works in the wrong direction.
Generally, the more intelligent, well-educated and well-established couples get children at a later age, and get fewer of them.
The "dumber" and lower-class people reproduce faster, and there will be more and more of them.

This effect is clearly visible both on a global scale (developed/developing countries) and locally (lower/upper class).

Re:Clearly, evolution as a system has failed...

[xoyoyo (949672)]

": the more intelligent, well-educated people will be more at the top,"

I presume you're not an American?