Super Troopers For the Win!

This year has been Jacob's senior year in high school. It has been a wonderful experience for him and he has learned so much. This fall he will be at Virginia Tech and our house will no longer be quite so full.

 As his high school career has been coming to a close he had one big final project, the hover car. The class was divided into teams with the assignment to build a hover craft. An integral part was to have a theme for the creation, not just for the car but for the team members as well. After some hard lobbying by Jacob's two team mates, they settled on the movie "Super Troopers." I found some "trooper shirts" at Party City and the guys used yellow duct tape for the stripe along the pant leg. Aviator sunglasses and a big old fake mustache for Jacob rounded out the look.

Today was the big competition for all the hover crafts. Team Super Troopers had created a very quick and nimble car, It passed the maneuverability portion with great style and speed. The team's driver, the other Jacob, was able to swing around the car and come to a very impressive stop at the end of the course. The next portion was the timed races. They didn't have the fastest car, the Duck Dynasty entry went off like a shot, but it's maneuverability won the day. They ended up winning the competition by a two second margin.

Jacob at one point observed that today they proved that a '93 Crown Victoria was faster than the USS Enterprise.

Scientific Brownies

Scientific Brownies, a photo by Teckelcar on Flickr.

Today two of Rebecca's classmates came over to work on their STEM/science fair project. They were tasked with making a device that would allow an uncooked egg survive an approximately 8 foot fall without using a parachutes. They had created an initial prototype a couple of weeks ago and came to our house to test using the second floor area that overlooks the great room.

They worked away and came up with a second design and decided to test it. An egg was procured, placed in the device, and dropped over the railing. The shell cracked, but the membrane remained intact, this counted as a success However just to be sure they tested two more times, each time with a new egg. Meanwhile Rebecca asked what she should do with the cracked eggs. I told her to set them aside, I would come up with a use for them.

As they discussed more testing I cut them off. I envisioned my remaining eggs being destroyed and that was not an option. I told them to weigh an egg and use something else as the test subject. Rebecca had some modeling clay and it was perfect for the job. As for the cracked eggs, well it turns out my brownie recipe uses three eggs.

Artist of the Week: Ecosystem Cube

Max in blue, a photo by Teckelcar on Flickr.

Well I tried to post last night, but it was a huge struggle just getting the pictures up and I just plain threw in the towel and went to bed.

Anyway, Max is the artist in all his wrapping paper glory. I don't exactly remember why he was wearing the wrapper paper, possibly a disguise featuring a beard? All I can do is put it down to the mysteries of the eleven year old mind. The end result, however, is a very silly picture and the wrapping paper really brings out the blue in his eyes.

As for the art, it was a school project focusing on an ecosystem. Each side would detail a different aspect of  the ecosystem, from adaptations, life cycles, human impact, and so on. Each side has illustrations depicting the various aspects and a few lines of text.

cube, a photo by Teckelcar on Flickr.

Max's cube is all about swamps.

I've always loved swamps. I found them to be fascinating places teeming with life. Across the road from our house there was a smallish pond chock full of frogs that was bordered by a swamp. I spent hours in there scrambling along the downed trees. So I can certainly understand why he picked a swamp, that and the whole turtle thing.

Max did some very nice illustrations and put a great deal of thought into the project. I didn't know it was to become a cube until the day he brought the finished project home. He got a solid B, mostly due to the fact he forgot to add a couple of elements. I think next time he will read the rubric a little more carefully.

The Feynman Series - Beauty

Richard Feynman on beauty and science.

Fun With Science

What a recipe for fun- liquid nitrogen, a tightly closed bottle, and 1,500 ping pong balls. This gives the Mentos and Diet Coke stuff a run for the money. Hat tip to the lovely Laura at Fetch My Flying Monkeys.

We're NASA and We Know It (Mars Curiosity)

Cause this is how I roll.

Awesome HD Slinky Slow-Mo

The first minute and a half are mesmerizing. The rest of the video attempts to explain why the slinky behaves the way it does.

Well I Tried It

And I think I turned out okay.

I saw this today and I just had to share it. A fair number of people out there are intimidated by science, which is ridiculous.  Science can hard, but it can also be fun. Just observing the world around you is science. Heck, when you really look closely cooking is chemistry.Baking is an art and a science, you have to follow the recipe to get the desired result just as you would follow protocols when doing an experiment.

To do science you only have to pay attention and stay curious. As a result the world is a far more interesting place.

So I hope more people try science and get hooked on it.

Schrödinger's Cat

In honor of last week's Pi day, a little fun with physics.
Turns out there is a whole host of mini physic lectures by the same person.

Artist of the Week: Science Fair, A Bridge too Many

Nate, a photo by Teckelcar on Flickr.

This week's artist is Nate, caught here in a snowball fight with his co-conspirator.

Nate decided this year to team up with his very good friend N for the science project. Which was good and bad. The two of them were able to get things done with little or no nagging from their respective parents, BUT it meant quite a bit of chauffeuring them back and forth at 20 minutes per one way. I joke about us being in the boonies, but N's family has us beat by many, many miles. Fortunately they are considerate boys and scheduled their times together wisely. Hence N sleeping over the night of the big snow storm. It was a Sunday night, but it was a school holiday on Monday and N's parents could swing by when doing something else with N's big brother.

bridges, a photo by Teckelcar on Flickr.

Anyhoodle, they had to finish building their 15 (!) bridges and then destroy them. Originally it was going to be 25 bridges, but sanity returned and they decided that three bridge types  (flat, trestle, and suspension) was more than enough. For a month they had been chipping away, first making the 15 bases, essentially the flat bridges, and designing the the other two.

For the final assembly Nate wanted me to buy a boatload of small clamps. Being the queen of improvisation I said no and instead pulled out some 1 inch binder clips. I would be happy to buy those in bulk, particularly since 1 clamp costs as much as a dozen binder clips. As the glue dried the boys stacked the bridges, it got to be a fairly impressive sight.

Then it was time to have fun. The boys, again, wanted me to go out a buy materials. This time it would be weights for the bridge busting. The weather was getting serious at this point with the snow and again I demurred. I told them to use a bucket and water. They didn't think it would work, that is until they picked up the 5 gallon bucket and realized just how heavy water is. I sent then out to the driveway with the bucket, some rope, a large measuring cup, and two sawhorses. They had a great time and got some good data.

poster board, a photo by Teckelcar on Flickr.

As the snow continued to blow they knocked off before the suspension bridges. A few of those still needed to dry and it was getting unpleasant out in the driveway. In the morning they were all set to bust their remaining bridges when I asked an important question, did they photograph the bridges?

Oops.

Luckily they had an extra flat bridge and they were able to cobble together another suspension bridge. I was able to get some nice pictures of all three bridge types plus the underside. Then it was back to breaking bridges.

N did the data analysis and Nate wrote up the experiment. It really was a joint effort. So often one kid does the bulk of the work, but these do fairly split the tasks. I helped out with the poster board by trimming up the printouts and gluing them together. For whatever reason Nate never seems to be able to glue things down, everything always drops off the next day. The whole mess got turned in last week and it'll be a while until we know what happens. They made some lovely bridges, and did a good job with the write-up.

GTCA

This week I'm letting my inner nerd loose. I love this YMCA parody celebrating DNA enzymes. The whole thing is a hoot. I have my friend Paul from way back in my lab tech days to thank. He posted a related video from the same company and from there I found this gem.

Artist of the Week: Beans and Worms

maybe Nate
Originally uploaded by Teckelcar

This week's artist is El Bandito Nate. And yes, he and his friends drew a mustache on Nate's face while riding home on the bus just the other day.

It started off as a sort of truth or dare thing. The original mustache was rather small, but Nate decided it looked stupid and figured bigger was better. So for the rest of the day I felt like I had a short crazed bandit running around the house. Fortunately no permanent markers were available on the bus and it pretty much washed off with just a bit of scrubbing.

I think the best comment about Nate's new look came from Jake, "... you like the first person that fell asleep at a party." As for my reaction, I figured the less said the better. I thought the whole thing was very funny and I was glad it was not done with a sharpie.

Nate's science fair project
Originally uploaded by Teckelcar

With all the silliness that is Nate there is also a serious and academically motivated side. Like Jake in 6th grade, Nate had to do a science fair project this year. He chose a project not too dissimilar from Jake's first project. Instead of fertilizer though, Nate chose worms and their effect on plant growth.

Nate's project was a bit more modest in scope than Jake's, however I had to buy worms. 500 red wigglers to be exact. I've never aspired to be a vermiculturist, but then again parenthood is full of surprising turns. The good news once spring is really here I can dump the whole lot into the lawn. So far the little beasties are hanging in there. They did seem to help the plants along and on the whole the project was a success. Hopefully next I won't have to buy any more critters.

Get Along Little Wormy

I have now officially become a vermiculturist.

It's science fair season and Nate has decided to use worms in his science fair project. To whit: he is testing the effect of worm presence on plant growth.

Which means we had to order some earthworms.

And we got not just any old worms, oh no we are the proud owners of red wigglers, the Cadillac of worms*. Today our Worm Hobby Kit arrived from Uncle Jim's Worm Farm. In the kit there is food, bedding, a nice plastic container, burlap, and 500 red wigglers. That's right 500 worms.

The worms weren't very wiggly at first, they were more like red torpids. But they seem to be reviving from their long and very cold journey. And honestly we could lose over half and still have far more worms than we really need. Nate only needs 30, the rest I'll have to baby along until spring when I can let them loose on the yard.

So now I get to add worm farmer to my Curriculum Vitae.

*Spot the quote

The Elements song in Japanese

In honor of my twins' recent birthday I present to you a quirky Japanese translation of Tom Leher's classic song The Elements featuring the twins Angelina and Jennifer.

40 Years Ago Today

LHC Rap

A fun video about the Large Hadron Collider.

I love geeky science videos.

Artist of the Week: LEGO Robotics

certificate
Originally uploaded by Teckelcar

This week's artist is Jake. Today was the last day of his LEGO Robotics course that he took under the auspices of the Summer Regional Governor's School (scroll down the page for the summer school programs). The courses are free and are open to gifted students that have been accepted into the program via a competitive application. It is a wonderful program and, as you can see in the picture, Jake was one very happy camper.

He was very willing to get up early each morning of the eight day session and ride in with his father and be dropped off before the opening bell at 8:30 am. Not once did he gripe to me about going to school. I think his only disappointment was concerning their field trip to a local robotic manufacturer, because the students were not allowed on the production floor.

Anyway, he had a great time and this is about the final robot that he helped to produce. The students would get partnered up with different kids then design, build and program a robot for the challenge of the day. The kids were not only learning about the engineering side, but also about teamwork.

Team 1
Originally uploaded by Teckelcar

Today family members were invited to attend the last robotic challenge. It gave us a chance to see exactly what had been going on during the past eight days of class. Fortunately both Larry and I were able to go and see the fun firsthand.

For his last project Jake was teamed up with the young lady in the picture. She seemed like a really sweet girl and was bright and chatty when we met her today. She explained the program and the robot to us and was very impressed with Nate's knowledge of radar (thank you History channel- aka the WWII channel). It looked like she and Jake worked well together and were having a good time.

The Robot
Originally uploaded by Teckelcar

The robot they designed was meant to follow a course and hit four different targets. The course, on white paper, was laid out on several tables in the classroom. A black lined marked the preferred path to the targets. From what I could see Jake's team used line/color sensor to find the line and an ultrasonic sensor to find the target. They used a laptop to set up the running program and then downloaded it into the LEGO NXT Intelligent Brick (the brain of the robot).

Each team got two tries with time built in to modify the robot in between runs. The course stared off fairly simply with a straight path to the first target. Then it got tricky. The robot had to turn and cross a short yet narrow bridge. After the second target the course got progressively harder.

Here is a longish film of the two runs spliced together.

Second Place Trophy
Originally uploaded by Teckelcar

I'm very proud to say that their robot came in second overall. It wasn't able to complete the course, but points were awarded for hitting the taget and following the line. One robot almost finished the course. It just missed hitting the final target. The two teaching assistants made special trophies to commemorate the occasion. Jake, of course, promptly put it on his head and walked around with it precariously perched on top. I t was such an utterly Jake thing to do I just had to share it with y'all.

Artist of the Week: Science Fair

Jake
Originally uploaded by Teckelcar

This week's artist is Jake for his massive science fair project.

His project was to determine which fertilizer worked the best. We got off to a late start, what with all the hospital madness at the end of January and the beginning of February, but we did get started and the plants cooperated.

He ended up with six different conditions: plain topsoil, topsoil with Chesapeake Bay Blue Crab soil enhancer, compost from a local organic farm, composted cow manure, organic compost from Ukrops (a local supermarket chain that composts trimmings from the produce section) and Sta-Green (a chemically based product). As for the plants, he went for green beans. I found some nifty germination trays and he planted 36 seeds (half a tray for a total of 3 trays) for each of the conditions. The dining room table became a greenhouse and he waited for the plants to start growing.

As I stated earlier the plants were cooperative. I was afraid we started a bit late, but after 3 days a few plants were already poking out of the soil. 11 days later we had a veritable forest of green beans. I practically did a double take every time I went by the doorway to the dining room. You could practically see the plants grow.

Jake's project
Originally uploaded by Teckelcar

Two weeks later he took his final data and I helped him put it together. I had never done a science fair project in school, but I had helped all sorts of grad students and post docs put together poster of biological conferences. With my limited background and an extensive instruction packet he was able to put together a fairly good poster.

Today I stopped by the school to check out the science fair. Literally every available surface was covered in the library. I found out from the librarian that there were over 200 submissions. From what I understand the posters will be judged and the winning entries will go on to compete in the county wide science fair.

I don't envy the judges. There were a lot of outstanding and informative presentations. Everything from chilling sodas, to what batteries work best, roof trusses and the very popular mentos fountains.

Late Night Fun

I just found out from over at the Angry Professor that we're going to get a total lunar eclipse Wednesday night.

I hope we have a reasonably clear night so I can share this with the crew. I know Jake and Nate will get a kick out of it and I think I can get the dynamic duo enthused as well.