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Sadly, not as exciting as it might first appear.
You may have heard of the piezoelectric effect, where certain types of crystal, when squeezed, produce an electric current. You've probably made use of at one time or another-- some cigarette lighters and those spark wands for lighting the gas use a 'pill' of piezoelectric material, which is compressed to create a spark.
Now, if you flip the system around and put a piezoelectric crystal in an oscillating electrical field, you find that the crystal vibrates. This is called the reverse piezoelectric effect.
Clocks that run on electricity use the reverse piezoelectric effect to keep accurate time. The crystal vibrates at a very specific frequency, making it more accurate than a mechanical movement... until something goes amiss with the frequency of the oscillating electrical field, as has happened in Venezuela.
I'm not sure I've explained this very well, so here's the Wikipedia entry for piezoelectricity, and also The Tartan - How Stuff Works: The piezoelectric effect |
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