User blog:TMScientist/The Science of RWBY

This blog is to compare the world of RWBY to real-life science, covering so far; the semblances of team RWBY and team JNPR and eventually Dust. When I first made all these science videos on RWBY, I made mistakes, so I'll be correcting them on this blog.

Semblances Team RWBY Ruby Rose Semblance: Speed

Ruby's semblance of speed is first shown in the Volume 1 "Red" trailer. The best case of her fastest speed that is calculatable is at the end of the Food Fight scene in Volume 2, Chapter 1 "Best Day Ever". To find Ruby's "top" speed (by measurable means), I first thought I needed to work backwards from speed aka linear velocity to angular velocity to Ruby's RPS and shoulder width. But upon further examination of the scene I found an easier way of calculating Ruby's speed.

The part of the scene I found was when Ruby flies past Jaune and Ren in four frames and when multiplied by Ruby's height (157.48cm x 4/30s) equals 21m/s (75.6 km/h). By her proximity to Ren and Jaune when she passes them means her height would be accurate if she were to be standing with Jaune and Ren and doubly confirms my calculation.

Weiss Schnee Semblance: Glyphs

I need to rework this one a bit, but mostly this one I tried to match each of Weiss' Glyphs with something in real-life. Will update soon.

Blake Belladonna Semblance: Shadow Clones

First time we see Blake's semblance of a shadow clone is when Blake is accidentally knocked off the bridge in Volume 1, Chapter 8 "Pieces and Players". When she uses it, it was used as an extra boost to reach the Nevermore, which means Blake's "shadow" is more than shadow. Fast-forward to Volume 3, Chapter 11 "Heroes and Monsters" and Blake can not only make of herself but also of other people. Then mid-boat trip in Volume 4, Chapter 3 "Of Runaways and Stowaways" her shadow clone is much less of a shadow clone and more of an actual being and gives Blake more power from her clone.

So how does this relate to real life? Blake's shadow clone is based on an advanced form of light objects. In fact, right now scientists have created basic light objects like a small shield.

Yang Xiao Long Semblance: Damage Absorption and Return

Ruby explains Yang's semblance in Volume 2, Chapter 4 "Painting the Town..." as being able to absorb and return damage in a fight. With this in mind, there was two scenes I wanted to look at; the shot with the watermelon hammer (for fun) and the Paladin fight.

Watermelon Hammer Shot At first, this problem would seem easy, just calculate the angular velocity and then the linear velocity, right? Wrong! We can't do that because Nora's hammer doesn't follow a circular arc. But we can work backwards from when Yang falls through the roof to the ground.

Starting at that point, Yang took 62 frames to fall from the roof to the floor. This is important since the Terminal Velocity equation can be used to calculate Yang's falling speed, then from there Yang's acceleration can be found. To find terminal velocity, I needed to find Yang's weight, the drag co-efficient of Yang against the air and the area of Yang's back, along with the knowledge of gravity and the density of air (1.225kg/m^3).

Terminal Velocity Math Yang's Weight Using the BMI equation (BMI = Weight/Height^2), Yang's weight can be calculated by BMI x Height^2. Yang's official height is 1.73m and assuming that her BMI is 23, the weight I calculated is 68.8kg (23 x 1.73^2). Factoring in other variables like Yang's hair and breasts, the total weight comes to 69.6kg.

The Drag Co-efficient The drag co-efficient of Yang is essentially the same of a skydiver, between 1.0 and 1.4.

Surface Area As seen in the video, Yang falls back first through the roof and to the floor. Using a picture of Yang for scale, Yang's shoulder width is 28.3cm and her back is 47.5cm long. Hence the area of Yang's back is 1.34m^2.

Terminal Velocity Equation Terminal Velocity(v) = $$(2mg/dAC)^1/2$$ = $$(2*69.6kg*9.8m/s^2/1.225kg/m^3*1.34m^2*1)^1/2$$ = 28.82m/s (103.78km/h)

Now with the terminal velocity found, Yang's acceleration can be calculated and hence the force Yang's body slammed into both the roof and floor.

Yang's Acceleration and Force Acceleration (a) = $$velocity(v)/time(t)$$ = $$28.82m/s/(62/30)s$$ = 13.95m/s^2

Force (F) = $$mass(m) x acceleration(a)$$ = $$69.6kg x 13.95m/s^2$$ = 970.9 Newtons

So Yang destroys part of the roof and hits the floor with a force of 970.9 Newtons each, but that is only half the problem.

The First Part To solve the first part of the problem, I need to utilise the Distance = Speed x Time (D=ST).

Using S=28.82m/s and T=(62/30)s: Distance (D) = $$Speed (S) x Time (T)$$ = $$28.82m/s x (62/30)$$ = 59.6m

The distance of 59.6m is the height of the Grand Hall and is important to find Yang's launching speed. Yang covers the height of the building in 27 frames so using D=59.6m and T=(27/30)s:

Speed (S) = $$Distance (D)/Time (T)$$ = $$59.6m/(27/30)s$$ = 66.2m/s

To finally calculate the rest of the forces, I need to first calculate acceleration and then force.

Using v=66.2m/s and t=(27/30)s: Acceleration (a) = $$Velocity (v)/time (t)$$ = $$66.2m/s/(27/30)$$ = 73.6m/s^2

Using m=69.6kg and a=73.6m/s^2: Force (F) = $$mass (m) x acceleration (a)$$ = $$69.6kg x 73.6m/s^2$$ = 5122.6 Newtons

Assuming that's both the force of the hammer and the roof in the upward hit are same:

Total Force = $$970.9 x 2 + 5122.6 x 2$$ = 12187 Newtons

Not factoring in Yang's punching strength and the power of Yang's shotgun gauntlets, Yang would be able to punch with at least 12,000 Newtons of force and if Taiyang is telling the truth about Yang's semblance and she deals back double damage, Yang could throw a punch that is at least 24,000 Newtons.

The Paladin Fight In Volume 2, Chapter 4 "Painting the Town" there is one point of the Paladin fight where Yang jumps onto the Paladin and punches it multiple times in the head. Roman Torchwick returns the favour by jumping backwards through two pillars and half of a third one, making Yang the meat in this weird sandwich of metal and concrete. Then Roman punches Yang through the rest of the pillar to the ground.

To solve this problem I need to know the weight of the Atlesian Paladin-240. Using the BMI equation of BMI = Weight/Height^2 and a picture of both Roman and the Paladin, the height of the Paladin is 4.81m and the weight of the Paladin-human equivalent (using an assumed BMI of 19) is 439.6kg. Converting from the density of a human to the density of metal, which is between 7,480kg/m^3 and 8,000kg/m^3, the true weight of the Paladin is 18,380kg. I also need to reduce the weight of the Paladin by one arm which for a human is 6.5% of the weight. Therefore, since the weight of the Paladin arm is 1,195kg, the final weight of the Paladin is 17,185kg.

Examining the time between the first and second pillars and the second and third pillars, they are respectively 4 frames and 5 frames. I am not 100% sure, but the distance between the pillars are 3.9m and the pillars are 900mm x 900mm, based on Yang's height. Using the equation D=ST, the speed for before and after the second pillar are 23.4m/s and 29.25m/s respectively.

Knowing the weight of the Paladin and the speed before and after the second pillar, I can use the Impulse equation to calculate the breaking force of the concrete pillars.

Impulse Force (F) = $$(mv-mu)/t$$ = $$(17,185kg x 23.4m/s - 17,185kg x 29.5m/s)/(1/30)s$$ = -3,144,855 Newtons = 3.14 million Newtons

Since two and a half pillars are smashed in the backwards jump, the total force is 7.85 million Newtons (3.14 million Newtons x 2.5). I can also double this number since that force is also the total force required to stop the robot, therefore the final total force of the backward jump is 15.7 million Newtons (7.85 million Newtons x 2).

The punch at the end of the sequence does not give me enough information to calculate the strength of the punch. The least I can say is that the punch is at least 1.6 million Newtons strong. As for sending Yang flying let's add 500,000 Newtons? Doing the additions of force for the backwards jump, the punch through the pillar and the Paladin's last punch, the total force of the whole sequence is 19.9 million Newtons (15.7 million + 1.6 million + 1.6 million + 2 x 500,000 Newtons).

No wonder the reminding Paladin arm exploded.

Team JNPR Jaune Arc Semblance: Aura Amplification

Aura is a coloured emanation enclosed with a human body or an animal or objects. Pyrrha herself explains Aura to Jaune in Volume 1, Chapter 6 "The Emerald Forest", with Rooster Teeth taking the definition and expanding upon it. However, aura amplification is not proven to be an actual thing to happen in real-life.

Nora Valkyrie Semblance: Electricity

She first discovered her semblance after being struck with lightning. This is a natural occurrence, albeit unlucky, with the world record for the most lightning strikes to one person in their life being 7 lightning strikes. Controlling electricity in real-life is also possible with static electricity. However, for Nora-levels of control over electricity what you need is electric eel DNA as they can produce electricity from their own bodies and a scientist that has an understanding called CRISPR. CRISPR stands for Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats and can be used to fuse parts from two different DNA together, much like what happened to Luke Cage when his DNA was fused with abalone DNA to give him unbreakable skin, for example.

Pyrrha Nikos Semblance: Polarity

We first learn of Pyrrha's semblance of polarity in Volume 1, Chapter 14 "Forever Fall, Part 2". The real-life science related to her polarity is bioelectromagnetism, which is the study between electromagnetic fields and biological beings. In bioelectromagnetism, there are six types of magnetic forces. These are:

1. Diamagnetism 2. Paramagnetism 3. Ferromagnetism 4. Anti-ferromagnetism 5. Ferrimagnetism 6. Superparamagnetism

Since the first introduction of Pyrrha's polarity we have seen it used to move Jaune's shield, levitate and throw soda cans, bring her weapons to her hands, repel Mercury's boot, force Jaune up against the wall, break off a pod door, lift an elevator with her on it and use giant clock cogs to hit Cinder and eventually try to crush Cinder. Each situation had objects made of the ferromagnetic material, iron, except for the soda cans which are made of aluminium, which is a paramagnetic material, and maybe the pod door as well.

So her polarity is most likely a combination of ferromagnetic and paramagnetic, but magnetism naturally controlled by people is not yet possible.

Lie Ren Semblance: Neutralising Negative Emotions

During Volume 4, Chapter 10 "Kuroyuri", we learn how Ren's semblance manifested from the fear of dying in the Nuckelavee attack on Kuroyuri. So how do we achieve what Ren has when his semblance was unlocked?

The first part is controlling one's emotions and Ren understands this, as we see Ren mediating in Volume 5, Chapter 4 "Lighting the Fire". The second part, however, is obviously not possible.

Dust Crystals I am currently working on research to compare Dust crystals to real-life. So far, the most likely crystal I have found to fit the profile of Dust the best is Elbaite, second place being Beryl. But I'm not the best with gems and crystals so I'm not 100% sure on this.

Dust Types Outside of this research, one hot debate is what is Cyan dust.

So here is what each of the dust types are (in my opinion):

White - Wind (Since Volume 3) Red - Fire (Since Volume 1) Blue - Water (Since Volume 1) Yellow - Lightning (Since Volume 1) Light Blue - Ice (Since Volume 6 Adam Character Short) Purple - Steam (Combination of Red and Blue, Fire and Water) Black - Gravity (First seen in "Red" Trailer) Grey or Green - Earth (Grey dust has been shown in one picture and Blake's stone clone is grey. Green dust used to be Wind but could of been changed to Earth.) Bright Orange - Lava (Used by Cinder to create obsidian weapons) Cyan - Light (The Amity Stadium barrier is not seen until Coco accidentally shoots it)