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Chapter 47 - Psychic Vigilante

Back at school after the holiday, Tamara felt that her rhythm was off—she had just three days back at school and then she’d be gallivanting off again on yet another trip. She spent a lot of hours working on the RF generator field calculations to work out the most efficient coil circuit layout geometry. She also consulted her work on the coil design which had produced the powerful repulsive/magnetic field she had observed; she didn’t want to inadvertently use a coil geometry which would produce a similar effect. Her calculations were completed by early afternoon on Thursday and she closed up her computer to go to her quantum engineering class. This was an essential class for her; she had been working with mesoscopic systems for two years now and this class would help her in learning how the mathematics which described quantum electrodynamics applied to the physical world where engineers would be designing working equipment.

When the class was over, she and Peter rushed home to finish packing. Barbara had put together a list of things that they needed to bring and her apartment, being larger, was the staging area. Besides, as Tamara pointed out with a smirk, much of her living room was presently occupied by this Faraday cage thingie...

Terence had also brought his things over too. Fortunately, they were going to a nudist event and wouldn’t need a lot of clothes—for a weekend, anyway. Barbara’s car was a small SUV so it had a good cargo capacity; they planned to stop for the food and consumable supplies when they got close to the destination. Peter and Terence were also drivers so they planned to split that chore, and to save time, they packed meals to eat while on the road. On Thursday evening, they packed the car, went to dinner together, and went back to Barbara’s apartment. Terence would be staying over at Barbara’s but Tamara had some more work she needed to finish before the trip, so she went back to her apartment. An email had arrived from her patent attorney group while she was in class and she needed to answer it; the records she needed to refer to were in her apartment.

She also was still trying to decide whether to take her EMP device, her masers, or both. She rarely went anywhere without those masers and now that the power supply was so small, they were much easier to carry. Deciding that being prepared was the better choice, everything went into her backpack, along with what Peter had called her “whole frikkin’ electronics shop.”

The next morning the group got together for breakfast and while Tamara and Barbara made their lunches, the guys stowed the remaining articles in the car. After everyone did a quick check of their emails, it was time to go. Barbara had been texting Stacy and found out that their team had been duly registered that morning; everyone on both teams, except themselves, was there and waiting for their arrival.

The trip was long but uneventful. After a fast food stop for dinner and a grocery trip, they arrived at the resort and registered. Then someone from the club helped them find the rest of the team. They got the car parked and the team members welcomed them with happy greetings. They had wanted to enter a competitive women’s team for years and Tamara and Barbara had made doing that possible.

There were eight women on the team now. Of the original six, Stacy was the captain, a solid “B” player and an excellent setter, while Robin played defense. She was also ranked as a “B” player. Her usual role was libero or defensive specialist but her 5 foot-3 inch height limited her offensive effectiveness. Anne was another “B” player and was good all around, particularly at the net. Judy and Rosa were good at defense but were poor blockers and couldn’t reliably place spikes, while Carla was barely a “C” level player but had a powerful serve. Tamara and Barbara would bring a strong offensive capability to the team, and because half of the team members were “B” players, they had registered as a “B” team.

The opening ceremonies, which Tamara found to be really interesting, featured a spirited welcome for everyone and a quick review of the tournament’s ground rules; then the prior year’s championship teams were recognized. Then the dance began. Since play was to begin at 8 a.m., no one from the team stayed late but they could hear revelers partying into the wee hours.

The following morning, everyone was up early because their first games were scheduled to be at 8 a.m. The team had decided to move Barbara and Tamara around in their offensive roles because they were so versatile. This would keep the other team guessing about how their opponents would attack the ball. The new team members didn’t disappoint the veterans either; they made some particularly memorable plays. For the first set’s beginning serve, Tamara’s team was in service-receive and Tamara was playing middle blocker. Stacy, in Zone 1 at the right back court, had called for a quick set play. When the ball was served, Stacy ran up to the right-side net, Zone 2, to prepare for taking the pass. Barbara was playing outside hitter and she began to run in to the net’s center as Stacy began to set the pass from Zone 2, drawing the defensive blockers to the center, but Tamara came in behind Stacy as she set the ball, and as soon as it cleared the net, Tamara leaped and put away the kill, spiking it behind the opposing blockers.

Two rallies later, Stacy called for a “4-set” fake and took the pass from Robin, the libero. She lofted a high arc set toward Zone 4, the left side of the net, and Barbara charged toward the ball and jumped, swinging at the ball and drawing three blockers on defense, who all leaped, arms raised, right in front of her. Suddenly, Barbara ducked out of the way and Tamara was there, racing in from the right, and lefty, slammed the ball to the opposite side of the defenders.

After several more points, Stacy called for an “X play” and Barbara and Tamara both charged the net from two different directions as Stacy did a low set to Tamara in the middle. She faked a spike with her right as the blockers were drawn in that direction but hit the ball with her left, away from them.

When the score was 11-3 in favor of Tamara’s team, the rotation now put her in Zone 2 and she’d play opposite hitter for the rotation. On receiving the service, the pass from Rosa, who took the serve, was off and it drew Stacy well out of position. Stacy managed to get to the ball and put it up in a very high set but it went toward the right antenna, back about five feet from the net. Tamara was facing Stacy and instantly saw where the ball would fall; it would be too far for Barbara, playing middle, to reach it, and Tamara was facing in the wrong direction for a spike. She leaped for the ball as it dropped and executed what in basketball would be a perfect hook shot. It was a backward slam over the net, a reverse spike, and caught the defense completely by surprise—the only possible recovery shot from that kind of bad set, after all, would be a high arc over the net to keep the rally going. Instead, Tamara had a kill. The spectators who were watching erupted in shouts of surprise and delight and suddenly Tamara had become the player to watch.

Her teammates gathered around her in congratulation while members of the opposing team complained to the referee.

“She’s sandbagging,” several of the defenders complained. “Look at her plays; she’s way better than a ‘B.’”

The referee called Tamara over and Stacy, the captain, came with her.

“Miss, what’s your playing level?” the referee asked.

“Huh?” Tamara said, confused.

“He means your skill level,” Stacy clarified. “We’re a ‘B’ level team. You told us you never competed before, right?”

“That’s right,” Tamara answered. Then to the referee, “This is my first competition anywhere. I learned to play in high school gym class and then had some lessons at my resort last month.”

“Really?” he asked. “You’ve never played organized volleyball before? Your play does seem better than ‘B’ level.”

“Never played. In high school, the teacher said that I was very good and should be on their team, but I didn’t have the time to do sports then.”

The referee turned to the players who had complained.

“I’m taking her word for her playing experience. She’s got a natural talent and we can’t assign her to a level until she’s played in a tournament.”

There was some annoyed muttering from the complainers but the referee got the game going again. Tamara’s team won the first set 25-6 and meanwhile, word of her play, and Barbara’s too, had spread, so by the end of the match, there was a fairly large crowd of watchers. Barbara was also showing herself to be a good player; she was a powerhouse at the net and had a wicked serve. Her serves were very deceptive; they didn’t have lots of power; she hit overhand floaters with no spin at all, so when the ball began to drop on the other side of the net, it seemed to weave, flutter, and swerve and dip unpredictably. She served five aces until the receivers figured out how to get a good pass to their setter. They won the next set with a closer score, 25-18.

Since this was a round-robin tournament and there were twelve “B” teams competing, the amount of time available allowed teams to advance by winning just two sets out of three instead of the typical three out of five. Tamara’s team did extremely well and even the team’s lesser-skilled members made strong contributions.

In the finals on the following day, they came in second in the “B”s, losing by the scores of 25-23, 22-25, and 29-27, to a very experienced Canadian team, every one a strong “B” player. Tamara’s group stayed for several hours after their own finals to watch the featured finals, the men’s and women’s “A” and “AA” finals, And when the awards were presented, Tamara and Barbara were told by the officials’ group that their play level was judged to be upper intermediate, or “BB,” and they could continue to compete at the “B” level until their skills were re-evaluated.

When the two resort teams met after their playoffs, Barbara and Tamara were the center of attention. Stacy was very vocal in her praise.

“Guys,” she announced, “For an inexperienced player, Tamara has more ball sense than most players I’ve ever seen. That reverse spike she pulled off in our very first game—that was the prettiest play that I’ve ever seen.”

“And Barbara’s serve was crazy,” Robin told the others. “Indoors, it wouldn’t be a hard one to handle. But outdoors, that ball was all over the place. A tiny breeze would push it and the receiver would miss it, misplay it, or shank it. Five aces in a row, wow!”

“We’re sorry we couldn’t get to see your games,” Rick told them. “But we did hear a lot of chatter from the watchers about some really good players on a gals’ ‘B’ team. Do tell, what were they talking about? And what magic did Tamara pull off? We heard about a gal who pulled off an impossible play; that must have been the reverse spike you mentioned.”

Rick’s team had been third in their own “B” matches.

To Tamara’s and Barbara’s embarrassment, their teammates recited almost a blow-by-blow description of their more interesting plays.

“Yeah, but you guys are ignoring your own great plays,” Tamara retorted. “That one where you threw yourself almost flat on the ground, Robin, and got the ball to bounce off your hand... I saw how you scratched your chest, ouch!”

“That’s called a ‘pancake,’ Tamara,” Robin grinned. “And we liberos are used to bruises and scratches.”

Then the guys related their own game exploits and all of the regular team members agreed that this outing had been their resort’s best Superbowl performance ever. Even though it was getting late and they were still pumped up and excited from the tournament, Tamara’s group reluctantly began to pack up to head home.

On the ride home, Tamara decided to see if she had gotten any email on Friday, so she kept her backpack with her to get to her laptop as they traveled. They had gotten a late start; they wouldn’t arrive home until around 11:30 p.m. Peter was driving and Barbara decided that she wanted him to stop for gas as they reached the Baltimore outskirts. They pulled off the highway and Peter drove into a station. There was a single car there, parked next to the convenience store door.

Something touched Tamara’s premonition sense—it was a strong warning of danger. She looked at the car in the station and then into the store as Peter slowly approached the pumps.

“Peter!” she called. “Quick! Get out of here! Go slow; don’t speed; just drive out.”

“Huh,” Peter grunted and began to drive away as a guy jumped out of the idling car, and Tamara saw him pointing a pistol in their direction.

“Call 911,” Tamara told Barbara. “There’s a holdup back there. Peter, make a u-turn here and stop.”

“Whatta you doing?” he began as he stopped but Tamara was out of the car as soon as it stopped.

Making herself “small,” Tamara dashed the hundred yards back to the station, staying in the shadows, and hid behind a gas pump as a guy ran out of the convenience shop and jumped into the waiting car. Tamara had taken both her EMP device and one of her masers with her and aimed them as the car began to move away from the building. She had both on full power and kept the maser pointed at the car. She triggered the EMP unit over and over, a half dozen times, as the driver tried to accelerate but the car didn’t respond. With a clatter, the car’s engine stopped and the car rolled into some bollards in front of a row of parking spaces. The hood popped and steam rose from under the engine. Then she gave the car a ten-second-long final EMP burst at full power and saw smoke rising from the underside of the car. She saw the guys in the car moving around inside as if they were trying to get out as she slipped away, moving back into the shadows, and then ran back to Barbara’s car. Just as she got into it, a police car zipped past them, lights flashing, and drove into the station.

“What the hell was that about?” Peter demanded as she got into the car.

“Drive away. I’ll tell you,” Tamara said as she picked up her pack, put her devices away, and got her cell phone out. “I’ve got a police scanner app on my cell. Let’s see what we pick up.”

She opened the app, found Baltimore, and selected the county’s sheriff’s department.

“...10-4. Just one vehicle, appears disabled. Backup requested.”

“Unit 32, 10-4, two units responding; advise three minutes.”

“10-4. Uh oh, suspects in vehicle appear to be breaking a window? What?”

“32, not understood. Say again.”

“Roger, dispatch. Suspects in the vehicle must be trapped inside. Ah, firearm discharged. Advise responding units to proceed with caution. Active shooter.”

“10-4, 32. Active shooter. Advising.”

There was about a 30-second silence, then, “Dispatch, backup arrived. Going open mike.”

Tamara and her friends heard the deputy use his loudspeaker to demand that the occupants exit the vehicle; then there was a hurried conversation between the deputy and someone else; it appeared that the perps couldn’t get the door open and had tried shooting at the lock. They had also tried breaking the windows but couldn’t get enough of the glass out of the way to squeeze through. They heard someone call an order to drop their weapons out of the window and put their hands on the top of the dashboard. Then it became difficult to understand; they couldn’t hear much more since the sound was too confused and noisy, so Tamara shut the app down..

“Okay now, Wonder Woman,” Peter said, somewhat annoyed. “We have an idea what you did. Oh, and thanks for the warning—I don’t wanna think of what coulda happened if we stopped there. But why did you get involved?”

Tamara sighed. “I’m not sure. Something like that happened to me once before and I felt compelled... oh, right, those guys then were rapists...”

“What do you mean, ‘those guys’?” Barbara asked. “At the gas station?”

“No, not there. Before, when this happened. At the beach in Miami, some guys were bothering the girls I was with. Something pushed me to interfere then. Then the cops got there and handled it and I found out later that they had raped someone.”

Terence had been quiet until now, but he spoke up. “Y’all, it’s goin’ on eleven now; y’think that’ll be on the news?”

Barbara grunted, “Oh sure—with that much of a police response, yeah. Let’s get the local news on.”

She got the radio tuned into a news/talk programming station. In about ten minutes, the event was mentioned.

The reporter was introduced, and then she said, “It appears that the recent string of gas station robberies might be broken, according to a spokesman from the state police. Less than a half-hour ago, sheriff’s deputies and state police units had responded to a report that the Jiffy Gas Station here in West Friendship in Howard County had a hold-up in progress. A 911 call had come in and when the first deputy responded, he found an extremely strange situation. I spoke to Lieutenant Marby of the state police several minutes ago and here’s what he had to say.”

Reporter: “You said this was an unusual situation.”

Marby: “Exactly. When the first deputy arrived at the scene, there was a single vehicle here and it had crashed into a parking barrier near the building. Its occupants seemed to be trapped inside, they even discharged a firearm inside to try to get out, after attempts to break out enough of a window failed for them.”

Reporter: “Why couldn’t they get out?”

Marby: “This is what we can’t understand. The vehicle is completely dead. All of its electronic systems are damaged, including the electric locks and windows. Somehow, even the mechanical parts were affected—their plastic parts appear to be melted and fused in the locked position. We had to use hydraulic shears to cut a door open.”

Reporter: “I also understand that you suspect that these persons may have been involved in similar crimes.”

Marby: “Yes indeed, we do. I can’t say any more on this topic except that it’s likely that this string of robberies may be ended.”

Reporter: “An attendant in one of the past incidents died of a gunshot wound inflicted during a similar robbery about two months ago. We heard that police have security tapes from that incident. Does the vehicle used in that robbery, as seen in the tapes from that site, match this vehicle?”

Marby: “I can’t comment on that, miss.”

Reporter: “Thank you, Lt. Marby.”

“There you have it, Jane. A robbery and a capture of two hold-up suspects, thanks to a tip from an alert citizen.”

“Goddamn,” Terence sighed. “Probable killers too. Tamara, are y’all psychic or something?”

She laughed. “Or something. Maybe a psychic vigilante. That explains why I was pushed into intervening; once to catch rapists, now to catch killers. Who knows; I sure don’t. I didn’t even plan on taking those gadgets, but at the last second I changed my mind and packed them. Hey, come to think about it... Barbara, why did you tell Peter we had to stop to get gas? We’re just about home and we still have more than a half-tank?”

“Well... um... shit, I don’t know... The thought just popped into my mind. Damn.”

“And Peter?” Tamara asked. “Why that station? We passed two others before you turned in there.”

“Well, it... um... I... I don’t know? Are you saying that we all were influenced somehow?”

“Hey, not me,” Terence objected. “Ah don’t do spirits too well.”

The others chuckled and then Barbara commented, “So it looks like as long as we hang out with Tamara, we’ve gotta expect weird stuff happening. Only, Tamara, please, please, keep your vigilantism to less dangerous subjects, okay?”

“I’ll try, I really will,” she answered humbly. “And don’t ask me why that happened. I honestly don’t know.”

They had arrived at the apartment building and Peter pulled into the garage under it. They decided to just leave their camping stuff in it, and after hugs all around, left to go to their apartments.

~~~~

The following day, Tamara got a voice mail while she was in class, so she returned the call when she was free.

“Hi, Sarge Lynch; what’s up?” she asked when he answered.

“You,” he laughed. “Over in Howard County last night. That has ‘Tamara’ fingerprints all over it, figuratively, am I correct? The only thing I know that can do that to a vehicle is your ray gun.”

“It was your own idea, remember?” Tamara reminded him. “I just saw a way to do it without causing collateral damage. I saw one guy had a gun but I didn’t know those creeps had killed before.”

“Yeah, there’s strong physical evidence linking them to those other robberies. Say, there’s a big reward for evidence leading to their capture and...”

“Um, no, I don’t need it. Oh, the family of the person killed—they could really use it, right? It can’t bring back the person, but... Could you figure out how to arrange that? I could prove that I saw their car; the exact time... oh, the cell phone call to 911 was on Peter’s phone.”

“That’s really generous, Tamara. Sure, I’ll get that going for you. Now you are giving that ray gun to the feds, right?”

“Sure; I called my contact at DARPA last week and she’s coming by tomorrow to meet with me to collect it, together with my development notes for it. This is a case where you really want to read the manual before you operate the thing, right?”

He laughed. “Very good, Tamara. Just keep doing good stuff, okay? You’re quite an interesting young woman and I expect to be hearing more good things about you from Ron, Peter, and the resort folks.”

They both wished each other a good week and disconnected.

~~~~

When Tamara met with Tarmson on Tuesday, she didn’t expect that she would bring a general officer along with her. Or two scientists from her department. She called to tell Tamara that she’d meet her in a meeting room that she’d reserved in the JH Club.

Everyone was understandably impressed with the device when they heard Tamara’s story of how she had disabled the robbers’ car. She had gotten them to sign NDAs before she told them that story, however. She had the unit’s performance fully documented, thanks to a testing session she had drafted Peter for, out in the natural area of the resort, She presented graphs of distances versus field strength at 50 and 100 percent power at various pulse lengths and intervals.

“So you don’t plan on patenting any of this, Tamara? Some of those ideas are new,” Tarmson asked.

“No, nothing there is useful commercially, that I can visualize. It has much more utility as a weapon or countermeasure. I got the idea when I was working on my MRI coil designs and did the work using my own time, money, and apartment, so the university has no involvement.” She laughed. “You should see the Faraday cage in my living room.”

The others laughed.

“So I will get in touch with our attorneys to work out how to compensate you for this development—you believe this is useful, General Baker?” Tarmson asked.

“Absolutely. Miss Alexandre, this is an impressive device, quite unlike anything we’ve been able to build. And its utility in helping us devise a protective shield against EMP attacks is invaluable, so the Defense Department is indebted to you for your work. Dr Tarmson told me how she’s repeatedly made job offers to you...”

Tarmson interrupted, “... but she says that she needs to get a real education before getting a real job.”

They laughed again.

“Now if I could just convince you to give the U.S. government exclusive rights to your accumulator,” the general began.

“Nope. Not possible, sorry,” Tamara grinned. “Now that, perhaps that has some commercial value.”

Another laugh, and Tarmson said, “Very true, my dear. You’re changing the world. I’m excited to see what you come up with next.”

The group left with the EMP device after the transfer forms were signed by the parties involved. Tamara was relieved when they left but also had a feeling of loss—one of her babies was leaving home. But now she could concentrate on the two big projects facing her: the MRI external coil design and the origin of the anomalous magnetic force.

Emma’s APL engineering techs were all back at work now and soon would have several sets of the scaled-up chips ready for intensive testing. The strong magnetic field which Tamara had produced in her 4-millimeter coil could be replicated with coils up to about 2 centimeters where the effect suddenly disappeared in a true threshold effect. She had some insight about why that had happened, but again, it was an intuitive feeling, so she was cautious enough to explore her reasoning using mathematics rather than her gut feeling.

Her other project seemed to her to be more accessible; she had plenty of experience in designing external coils and tiny RF generating circuits. She had shown both mathematically and experimentally that the SET-based RF emitters she had designed produced fields which could energize protons sufficiently to change their spin axes in a constant magnetic field; the challenge was to quickly damp the RF pulse so that the return signal could be clearly detected—a signal-to-noise ratio situation. With the degree of miniaturization she had accomplished in the coil circuits, not only quantum circuit effects needed to be considered, but also the electrical noise contributed by normal molecular motion.

The design she had chosen to build was analogous to increasing the number of pixels in a television screen: the higher the pixel count, the greater the image resolution. Her difficulty was that her RF coils needed to work bidirectionally, with the activating signal going out and the returned signal coming back. All of this happens in an MRI scan during a period of a few tenths of a second to a few seconds. The activating pulse lasts for several hundred milliseconds, exciting the protons, and as the excited protons’ energy decays, the energy released is emitted for a period of up to a few seconds. The strength of the activating pulse is chosen based upon the densities of the tissue to be imaged, and is cycled through a series of strengths to image the varying densities; the computer separates out the results for display. Tamara’s problem was to account for these variables in how her emitters were fired to “strobe” the tissue study region and then go quiescent to receive the return signal. Theoretically, her design should produce images with extremely high spatial resolutions.

Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore: mid October

Tamara was midway through her work on the filtering circuits, busy at Emma’s lab on campus, during the second week in October, when Emma burst into the lab, clearly excited.

“This is blindin’ brilliant!” she called out as she came in. “Got a ring from the National Academy of Engineering; just got off with them. They’ve chosen us—you and me—to receive the Charles Stark Draper Prize. Be awarded during National Engineers Week in February. They said they called you...”

“Oh my god... wow, no... I heard a call come in on my cell but I was too busy.” She looked at her phone. “Went to voice mail. What’s that prize?”

“A major engineering award, like the Nobel Prize, but for engineering achievement,” Emma said. “For your work in developing the accumulator and mine in the theory underlying the concept. Let’s check the Academy’s site and see about it, then.”

They read about the award on the U.S. NAE site. Emma read the description aloud.

The Charles Stark Draper Prize is awarded biennially for specific engineering achievements that have significantly affected modern society by improving the quality of life, providing the ability to live freely and comfortably, and/or permitting access to information. ...

“They didn’t tell me this, but look: The award is a gold medal and $500,000,” Emma said in awe. “There’s to be a presentation in February.”

“Jeez, I don’t know what to say. Um, does that mean that the press will be hounding us?”

Emma laughed. “It’s nothing like the publicity that the Nobel Prize gets, I assure you. But this award is supposed to be one of the top engineering prizes, innit.”

Tamara couldn’t do any more work after that news, so Emma took her and a few other faculty members to the JH Club to celebrate.

Early November

During the two months she was back at work, Tamara had spent some of her time in refining the filtering circuits until she achieved a good balance between rejecting extraneous noise and retaining the true signals. She had actually been working on possible circuit designs for two years, mostly by mentally visualizing the circuits needed and contemplating their likely performance. Her final coil circuit design was based on the use of an array of SETs in the RF generator circuits, and with her noise filtering circuits operating, the superconducting coil/transmitter/antenna of the external coil assembly was able to reliably detect proton relaxation signals for regions emitting about 6×10¹³ photons for each discrete coil circuit per activating RF pulse. This number represented roughly the number of free hydrogen nuclei in a cell. In terms of the MRI’s spatial resolution, this equated to the system’s ability to visualize anatomical regions consisting of about ten to fifty cells, depending on cell type, which was about a million-fold increase in the MRI’s current spatial-resolution capabilities.

At least those were the resolution numbers she had achieved when using an artificial hydrogel brain phantom model. This was an anatomical model which employs a brain shape filled with a gel whose density matched that of the brain’s neuronal tissues. The gel was doped with contrast agent to try to mimic the blood vessels and the brain’s gyri and sulci were simulated by using a combination of casted and molded flexible silicone molds. Tamara had gotten the brain phantom from NIST, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, which was a pioneer agency in developing tissue models for use in imaging studies.

The university’s human subjects committee had cleared her experimental protocol and Tamara also now had a volunteer radiologist on call; he was intrigued with the idea of an ultra-high-resolution MRI and was delighted with the results he had seen with images using the phantom. For her needed subjects, the Psychology Department and the medical school had helped her to recruit a few volunteers. The project she had designed would use neurofeedback techniques with the fMRI to allow the subject to train him/herself to distinguish between the tastes and odors of grape, strawberry, and cherry when they were presented together with certain sense-confusing stimuli. This project would allow Tamara to directly visualize the capillary blood flow in the subjects’ midbrains and olfactory tracts. The student volunteers would get research participation credit; they were to learn what the MRI study was to accomplish and, using a copy of the primary data collected, were to write a short paper discussing the results.

December

By early December, Tamara had finished designing the filtering circuit and built a chip prototype to test. After a few adjustments, she was ready to have the necessary number of chips printed to install into her latest MRI coil; Emma’s techs would be doing that job. Any more work on the MRI would need to wait, since the end of the fall term had arrived. Tamara had decided that she wouldn’t go to visit her parents in Miami this year, since they would be coming to Baltimore during the holidays in two weeks. Besides, she still had pressing work on the magnetic force effect she had discovered back in the early summer.

For this other research problem of hers, the magnetic force anomaly, Tamara had visualized a potential solution to overcome the limiting size of the coil in the RF emitter circuit which had produced what appeared to be a monopole, albeit a massive one, or possibly a conglomeration of similar monopoles—but how was it possible for so many particles of a similar polarity exist so closely without them mutually repelling? She wondered about that problem and then thought that the answer might be analogous to how protons are packed into nuclei without having their similar charges mutually repel.

That, she recalled, was a function of the proton’s structure. She reviewed the physics of the atom in her mind. Protons are made up of quarks, and gluons, the carriers of the strong force exchanging between quarks, she recalled, was what keeps the three quarks which comprise the protons and neutrons—the hadrons—together. And this inter-quark interaction of gluons inside hadrons also exerts a residual strong force on the adjacent hadrons, and that is what holds the nuclei together. This residual strong force, which operates at a very close range—the size of an atomic nucleus—is considerably stronger than the electrostatic Coulomb repulsive force—about a hundred times stronger. So the nuclei stay intact.

Perhaps the monopole had an associated set of fundamental particles analogous to quarks and a corresponding new family of force-carrying particles? She decided that these questions needed further study; she’d have to decide how to do some calculations to work out a possible monopole theory. Paul Dirac’s statement concerning how the quantization of electric charge could be explained by the existence of magnetic monopoles was intriguing and it gave her a possible starting point.

However, she still was considering her new idea about a way to scale up her magnetic field coil without running into its size threshold, and she didn’t need to do calculations to see that it should work; it was her intuition guiding her again. Increasing the coil diameter caused the scale-up problem, but that was for a single coil. What about making a coil of coils? A super-coil, as it were. This idea, in order to be mathematically expressed, needed a modification or extension of the Biot-Savart law, so Tamara spent several days working on the math and used computer simulations to test the new super-coil geometry she envisioned. The math showed that the new geometry should indeed enhance the magnetic field strength when normal currents were put through the sub-coils. But unusual things always seemed to happen when she used superconducting circuit components.

And that’s when she got another of her intuitive inspirations.

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