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.

Intel Science Talent Search Results

photo of Shannon Lisa Babb

Shannon Babb of Utah Named Top High School Scientist:

With a rare ability to combine research and remediation in environmental science, Babb, 18, of American Fork High School, conducted a six-month study to identify water quality problems in the Spanish Fork River. Babb, who started researching water quality at age 13, analyzed the chemical and physical properties along the river drainage system. She concluded that humans, through urban and agricultural factors, have a negative effect on the water quality of the river. She contends that the water quality problem can be resolved with a combination of restructuring and educating the public that household chemicals should not be poured down storm drains.

Yi Sun, 17, of The Harker School in San Jose, Calif., received second-place honors and a $75,000 scholarship. Sun discovered new geometric properties of random walks, a mathematical theory with applications to computer algorithms and polymers.

Yuan “Chelsea” Zhang, 17, of Montgomery Blair High School in Rockville, Md., received third-place honors and a $50,000 scholarship. Zhang researched the molecular genetic mechanisms behind heart disease. Specifically, Zhang implicated CX3CL1 molecules as contributing to plaque build-up in the arteries. This knowledge can lead to the development of new medicines for atherosclerosis.

Intel Chairman Craig Barrett, a long-time advocate for improving science and math education, praised the contributions these young scientists are poised to make.

“The talent represented at Intel STS is a dramatic illustration that investing in science and math education will pay great dividends for the future of American innovation,” Barrett said. “The seed of the next big scientific discovery could very well be planted in this room tonight.”

Photos from News.com

Read about more science talent search winners.

Nanofibers Knit Severed Neurons Together

Hamster Study Shows Nanofibers Knit Severed Neurons Together, Restore Vision by David Biello, Scientific American:

“We have healing of the brain, which we’ve never seen before. We have axons growing through the center of the cut, which we’ve never seen before, and we have axons connecting to the target tissue,” Rutledge notes. “If we could use something like this to mitigate the damage caused by cutting the brain with a knife, that would be great.” The research appears online this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Swimming Ants

Scientists discover swimming ants

North Queensland scientists have discovered a new type of ant, believed to be the only species that can live, swim and navigate under water.
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The ants nest in submerged mangroves and survive by hiding in air pockets and then swimming to the surface.
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“I was actually working with a film crew working on insects in the mangroves and they wanted to film one of these ants and I said, ‘Well, lets put it on a rock in a puddle of water and that’ll stop it going away and then you’ll be able to film it,’ and the ant promptly just leapt off the edge of the rock and swam across the water and disappeared.

“We were sort of dumbfounded.”

Dr Robson says it is amazing that the ants can survive in such a hostile environment.

“We’ve been doing a lot of studies on their foraging behaviour and there’s a lot of things that eat them, so when they’re swimming, fish will sometimes eat them, mud skippers will eat them, crabs will attack them,” he said.

It is great to see experts can still be so suprised by nature.

Unique northern ants gain global attention

The Future is Plastics

Polymer science for everyone: Case School of Engineering faculty, students show that plastics can be interesting—and lots of fun. World of polymers brought to kids at Cleveland Museum of Natural History event.

“Do you guys do birthday parties?”

That was the question a mother of four young girls asked Case School of Engineering professors Christoph Weder and Stuart J. Rowan as they brought the intricate world of polymers to a whole new audience visiting the Cleveland Museum of Natural History on the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, January 16.
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Finally, undergraduate student Eric Giles, postdoctoral researcher Michael Schroeter and graduate student Wengui Weng highlighted the potential of polymeric materials in high-tech applications with their presentation, titled “The Future is Plastic!” They demonstrated the potential of polymer technology developed at Case, including stimuli-responsive polymer gels, high-strength/ultra light polymer AeroClay nanocomposites, smart polymers with built-in deformation and temperature sensors and shape memory materials.

via Polymer Science for Everyone

Avian Flu

Photo of the Bird Flu virus, courtesy of 3DScience.com.

Avian Flu (site broke link so I removed it), World Health Organization Meeting to Discuss Avian Flu Pandemic as Bird Flu Continues to Spread Through Europe

World Health Organization officials are meeting in Geneva to consider the possibility of a global human bird flu pandemic as the deadly H5N1 strain continues to spread rapidly in birds.

Top influenza official Margaret Chan said the outbreak in poultry is historically unprecedented. She said the deadly virus presents a greater challenge to the world than any other emerging infectious disease.

The meeting was called to plan a response in case the bird flu virus mutates into a widespread human flu virus.

Hottest Temperature on Earth

Record set for hottest temperature on Earth – Scientists produce gas more than 100 times hotter than the sun

Scientists have produced superheated gas exceeding temperatures of 2 billion degrees Kelvin, or 3.6 billion degrees Fahrenheit.

This is hotter than the interior of our sun, which is about 15 million degrees Kelvin, and also hotter than any previous temperature ever achieved on Earth, they say.

They don’t know how they did it.
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Thermonuclear explosions are estimated to reach only tens to hundreds of millions of degrees Kelvin; other nuclear fusion experiments have achieved temperatures of about 500 million degrees Kelvin, said a spokesperson at the lab.

Wow! That’s Engineering?

Develop, Design, Discover: Women Innovating with Technology Week

Beginning on March 8th at our “Wow! That’s Engineering?” event in Chicago, and continuing through April 19th, the Society of Women Engineers is holding an essay contest asking girls ages 10 to 17 to write, in 100 words or less, about an invention/innovation they would create, using technology, to make the world a better place.

Girls will enter to win the ultimate grand prize: a trip to IBM Headquarters in Armonk, NY, where they will spend the day working with a leading engineer at IBM. Additional prizes will include a week at Camp Invention, laptops, MP3 players and more.

Enter the contest

In addition to Chicago events are planned for: Austin, Orlando, Philadelphia, Raleigh and San Francisco. See the web site for more details.

Solar Storms

Photo: Solar Storm Causes X-Ray Aurora, On April 7, the SOHO spacecraft spotted a Solar Storm ejecting a cloud of energetic particles toward planet Earth. The plasma cloud’s center missed Earth, but high energy particles swept up by Earth’s magnetosphere still created a geomagnetic storm! Read more, from NASA.

Stronger Solar Storms Predicted; Blackouts May Result, John Roach for National Geographic News

“This prediction of an active solar cycle suggests we are potentially looking at more communication and navigation disruptions, more satellite failures, possible disruption of electric grids and blackouts, more dangerous conditions for astronauts—all these things,” Behnke said during the briefing.

New Model Predicts Severe Solar Activity

Drinking Soda and Obesity

Scientists in food fight over soda (bozos at CNN deleted the webpage):

Biologically, the calories from sugar-sweetened beverages are fundamentally different in the body than those from food.

The main sweetener in soda — high-fructose corn syrup — can increase fats in the blood called triglycerides, which raises the risk of heart problems, diabetes and other health woes.

This sweetener also doesn’t spur production of insulin to make the body “process” calories, nor does it spur leptin, a substance that tamps down appetite, as other carbohydrates do, explained Dr. George Bray of the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

“There’s a lack of fullness or satiety. The brain just seems to add it on,” said Dr. Louis Aronne, a Weill-Cornell Medical College doctor who is president of the Obesity Society.

As with so much life science the “answers” are not clear (Medical Study Results Questioned – Why Most Published Research Findings Are False). The article presents arguments from those who disagree about the link between drinking soda and the dramatic rise in obesity in the USA.

Another article on the topic: Cutting Sugary Drinks at Home Helped Teens Shed Pounds by Judith Groch.

Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo da Vinci drawings including a larger version of the image above.

Math and the Mona Lisa : The Art and Science of Leonardo da Vinci is an excellent book exploring the visionary science of Leonardo da Vinci. More excellent science books that we recommend.

An excellent site for learning more about Leonardo – Museum of Science Leonardo web site (includes classroom activities):

Leonardo da Vinci may seem an unusual topic to study in science. But the more you learn about this remarkable Renaissance man, the more you will realize that he was a terrific role model for applying the scientific method creatively in every aspect of life including art and music. Although he is best known for his dramatic and expressive artwork, Leonardo also conducted dozens of carefully thought out experiments and created futuristic inventions in a time before modern science and invention had really begun.

Leonardo: Master Draftsman exhibit at the Met