Category Archives: Students

Items for students and others, interested in learning about science and engineering and the application of science in our lives. We post many of the general interest items here.

Two Butterfly Species Evolved Into Third

Butterfly photo

Two Butterfly Species Evolved Into Third, Study Finds by James Owen, National Geographic News:

Researchers say their creation reveals a process called hybrid speciation, in which the genes of two existing species combine to produce a third.

The study suggests hybridization may be more important to the evolution of new animals than had previously been thought.

Hybrids such as the mule, a cross between a donkey and a horse, are sterile. But the team says the butterfly hybrid brought together a combination of genes that allowed it to breed and there be considered a new species.

Canadian Association for Girls In Science

Canadian Association for Girls In Science (CAGIS)

CAGIS chapter members, aged 7-16, meet monthly to explore STEM with fun, hands-on activities led by women and men specializing in many different fields. Since CAGIS is for girls by girls, members are encouraged to take an active role in the development of their own club by voicing their opinions, exploring their interests, writing for the newsletter, writing for New Moon Magazine, and helping to organize the regular chapter events.

Article on the founder of CAGIS, Larissa Vingilis-Jaremko (in photo): Life sciences student honoured for promoting science to girls:

Curious Cat directory of science and engineering educaiton web sites

Ventless Clothes Dryers

Ventless Washer Dryer

Ventless Clothes Dryers

Engineers have provided an alternative to the normal cloths dryer that requires venting. This can come in handy in some apartments that don’t offer a good location for a dryer that also provide an easy venting option. How does such a dryer work:

Ordinary dryers suck in cool, dry air from the room, heat it, blow it through the clothes, and then discharge the damp, hot air outside through a vent. This dryer, on the other hand, runs the exhaust through a heat-exchange system to cool it. Cold water flows through the heat exchanger, absorbing heat from the air. As the air cools, the moisture in it condenses and runs down the drain (along with the used cooling water); the dry air is then heated again, sent back through the clothes, and the cycle continues.

There are even dryers that dry clothes in the same compartment they are washed in, photo: EdgeStar Ventless 110 Volt Combo Washer Dryer.

More details from: What is a ‘condenser’ dryer?

Science and Engineering Podcasts

Engines Of Our Ingenuity hosted by John Lienhard, University of Houston’s College of Engineering, (podcasts via NPR).

A complete history, with transcripts and audio of the over 2,000 episodes, is online – episodes include:

(from 1990)

Thomas Jefferson, the generous Colonial American engineer

This is a great resource. “The Engines of Our Ingenuity tells the story of how our culture is formed by human creativity. he program uses the record of history to reveal the way art, technology, and ideas have shaped us.”

More NPR Technology podcasts

The Science of the Football Swerve

With the World Cup (football – soccer) underway lets look at The science behind the swerve by Dr Ken Bray:

It took the modern science of fluid dynamics to understand exactly what happens in a swerving free kick. When a football moves through the air at low speed the air flow separates from its surface at characteristic points…

When the ball rotates – see graphic 3 – the boundary layer remains tripped but the air flow separation around the ball is distorted. Separation occurs earlier on the side rotating against the flow and later on the side rotating in the same sense as the flow. This causes a pressure differential and a deflecting force which is responsible for moving the ball in the air in a free kick.

Recharge Batteries in Seconds

MIT researchers are working on battery technology based on capacitor technology and nanotechnology.

Super Battery (video also available):

Rechargable and disposable batteries use a chemical reaction to produce energy. “That’s an effective way to store a large amount of energy,” he says, “but the problem is that after many charges and discharges … the battery loses capacity to the point where the user has to discard it.”

But capacitors contain energy as an electric field of charged particles created by two metal electrodes. Capacitors charge faster and last longer than normal batteries. The problem is that storage capacity is proportional to the surface area of the battery’s electrodes, so even today’s most powerful capacitors hold 25 times less energy than similarly sized standard chemical batteries.

The researchers solved this by covering the electrodes with millions of tiny filaments called nanotubes.
…
This technology has broad practical possibilities, affecting any device that requires a battery. Schindall says, “Small devices such as hearing aids that could be more quickly recharged where the batteries wouldn’t wear out; up to larger devices such as automobiles where you could regeneratively re-use the energy of motion and therefore improve the energy efficiency and fuel economy.”

Previous post: MIT Energy Storage Using Carbon Nanotubes

Art of Science 2006

Seahorse

2006 Art of Science exhibition from Princeton University has many amazing images.

Image: “created in Photoshop to illustrate the vertebral column of the genus Hippocampus. While most fish have scales, seahorses have bony plates over which a thin layer of skin is stretched. Seahorses are vertebrates and thus have a vertebral column that runs through the center of their body and the center of their prehensile tail.” – larger view

National Spherical Torus Experiment

Photo: The National Spherical Torus Experiment (NSTX) is an innovative magnetic fusion device that was constructed by the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) in collaboration with Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Columbia University, and the University of Washington at Seattle. This image is of the interior of the experiment showing the protective carbon tiles and the central column. Various diagnostics are mounted at the midplane. larger view

See the full gallery of images and movies. Previous post: Art of Science at Princeton.

Ocean Life – photos and videos

Strawjet: Invention of the Year, 2006

Invent Now 2006 Modern Marvel of the Year (links all broken by History Channel, so links were removed, – when will we finally have people in charge of websites that understand basic usability fundamentals?):

The Strawjet is a farm implement that processes straw (wheat, flax, sunflower, tobacco, hemp, etc.) in the field (after the plant has been harvested) into a mat, similar to a large bamboo window blind. This is used to construct composite building panels in much the same way as fiberglass or carbon fiber; however, the Strawjet uses a binder made from paper pulp, clay and cement rather than plastic resin.

Update, 2013: strawjet.com. Also I added this webcast from 2009

Read (except they broke all the links so you can’t) about more finalists in the History Channel and Invent Now Inventor contest:

Dr. David L. Cull, Hemoaccess Valve System
Kristin A. Hrabar, Illuminated Nutdriver
Dr. Sundaresan Jayaraman, Wearable Motherboard (Smart Shirt)
Robert C. Kelly, Resc-hue Lite Line

Related: Pay as You Go Solar in India – Appropriate Technology: Solar Water in Poor Cairo Neighborhoods – Lemelson-MIT 2010 Award for Sustainability – Play pumps had the idea of putting a merry-go-round on the site and letting children playing on it provide the energy… The solution does not appear to have been executed well.

$100 Laptops for the World

$100 Laptop from MIT OLPC project

The MIT Media Lab is developing a $100 laptop to provide affordable and appropriate technology to all parts of the world. One Laptop per Child is a non-profit created to pursue this project (which is independent of MIT).

What is the $100 Laptop, really?
The proposed $100 machine will be a Linux-based, with a dual-mode display—both a full-color, transmissive DVD mode, and a second display option that is black and white reflective and sunlight-readable at 3Ã— the resolution. The laptop will have a 500MHz processor and 128MB of DRAM, with 500MB of Flash memory; it will not have a hard disk, but it will have four USB ports. The laptops will have wireless broadband that, among other things, allows them to work as a mesh network; each laptop will be able to talk to its nearest neighbors, creating an ad hoc, local area network. The laptops will use innovative power (including wind-up) and will be able to do most everything except store huge amounts of data.

This is another wonderful example of engineering a better world. The challenges are still large. Making such an audacious plan work will not be easy but if they pull it off the potential benefits are enormous.

UN debut for $100 laptop for poor by Jo Twist, BBC News

Our $100 laptops will run on human power, Rediff

Middle School Students in Solar Car Competition

Students work on solar car

Students vie in solar car competition (unfortunately the link has been broken – *sigh*) by Rob Seman:

That much was true for a squad of sixth grade girls from the Northwest Christian School in Newton, who allowed the school to keep the competition’s top trophy for a second year.

Their racer, a sleek black-and-yellow aluminum number called “Yellow Stinger,” took the overall award for the annual event after placing second in the craftsmanship, innovation and technical merit categories.

Junior Solar Sprints web site