Summer 2013: Day 7

This morning started off with a review of all the things we had learned at NCNR the day before. It was quite a bit of an overload, but there were a lot of great things that can be used in the classroom. We were especially appreciative of the excitement and enthusiasm for science from the scientists we met.

Bob McMichael talking about magnets.

Then we played with magnets! Bob McMichael works on detecting magnetic fields. He was able to demonstrate the way the machines can do this by using fridge magnets as cantilevers. The teachers were able to feel the different fields across big chunks of magnets. They also used field viewers to see the magnetic fields of different magnets. It was really cool.

Playing with magnets

Greg Strouse talking about thermometry.

The afternoon was spent working with temperature. Greg Strouse gave an introduction about why temperature measurement is so important. One of the things he mentioned was temperature control for storing vaccines. Vaccines don't work as well if they aren't stored in the proper temperature range. There was an activity in the lab that was based around this idea. They also had other lab stations with activities to measure boiling water, ice water and activities involving dry ice. The dry ice was really fun because they used it to cause neoprene gloves to expand like a balloon. They also made bubbles using dish soap, water and dry ice. Dry ice is always fun to play with.

Testing out the new thermometers.

Testing out vaccine storage.

Filling the gloves with dry ice.

Dry ice hands.

Dry Ice bubbles.

Measuring temperature

As a nice finale to the day, we made liquid nitrogen ice cream! They mixed together the ice cream "batter" and then scooped some out into cups. They also poured cups of liquid nitrogen and everyone got to mix their own. It was a very tasty end to a fun day!

Mixing together the ice cream part.

Liquid Nitrogen

Stirring it all together