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01. LET'S GET QUIZZICAL
Got any long trips to make in the near future with family or friends? Bet you're looking forward to those long stretches where the conversation runs out and even the kids and dogs in the cars next to you refuse to wave back? If the thought of such boredom fills you with doom, we have good news for you in the form of a 9-quiz booklet you can print off and take with you wherever you go. The subjects include you and your mouth, the Sun, spring-cleaning and the Antipodes... Some questions are easy, others less so - but the answers are all there, so there'll be no need for fighting in the backseat (about the quizzes anyway). Here's where you'll find them all, in downloadable pdf form. All you'll need now to make that 4-hour journey go with a swing are a scorecard and pencil, prizes, and someone who can do a good Chris Tarrant impression...  |
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| 02. ACTIVITY OF THE WEEK: FANCY A 'SEDIMENTARY SANDWICH'? This week, thanks go to Katy Hewis for a kitchen activity that really rocks. Create a crusty old sandwich and find out more about how our lovely planet came to be. You can even eat it, if you've got a strong stomach! The Earth's crust is made up of many different types of rock, including 'sedimentary ones. These are formed in layers - a bit like a club sandwich. To find out more about how rocks are formed, take a look at ROCKS FOR KIDS at http://www.rocksforkids.com/RFK/howrocks.html, but in the meantime, here's now to make a culinary version. Before you start: Check for food allergies, particularly regarding peanut butter. Substitute any fillings if necessary (you can even substitute the bread with lettuce leaves if necessary). And feel free to get creative, it's your sandwich! You will need: * A plate * A knife ... and any of the following ... * White bread * Brown or Granary bread * Butter or Margarine * Prawns * Chicken or Turkey * Marmite * Salt & Vinegar Crisps * Jam * Peanut Butter * Honey * Mayonnaise * Raisins * Chopped Egg * Cheese What to do: 1. Sedimentary layers are formed with the oldest layer at the bottom and the youngest layer at the top. So first of all we have to 'date' our layers. 2. Arrange your sandwich fillings in date order, for example: - chickens and turkeys are birds which are the closest thing to dinosaurs that walked the Earth between 200 and 100 million years ago. EDIBLE IGNEOUS ROCKS at |
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| 03. ROLLS-ROYCE COMPETITION FOR SCHOOLS For many of its 100 years in the business, Rolls-Royce has been involved with educational initiatives, but this year, to celebrate the company's 100th birthday, they've decided to roll out a particularly plush and well-upholstered national competition, which you're warmly invited to register for ... The Rolls-Royce Science Prize is a schools' competition with a difference - it's NOT for students. Instead, it's for the staff associated with a particular school, parents, and other adults in the community. The idea is that entrants will work in small teams to come up with a specific idea for a gold-star school science activity, and all these activities will later be compiled into a database of inspirational ideas and good practice, which will then be made available to all schools. All eligible entrants will receive a Rolls-Royce Science Team certificate, but nine finalists from each year will be awarded £5,000 (or the equivalent in Euros) to put their proposal into practice. The overall winning and runner-up team will receive a further £15,000 and £10,000 respectively to invest in science education in their school or college... If you'd like to find out more, it's all on their website at: http://science.rolls-royce.com/home_f.php Their doors will be open for entries from 20th September until 25th February next year, but you can register for guidance notes and an entry form right now. Meanwhile - here's a quick plug for their very cool interactive demonstration of what's going on inside the engineering of a plane. It's called JOURNEY THROUGH A JET ENGINE and can be found at: http://www.rolls-royce.com/education/schools/journey/flash.html |
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| 04. MOUSES AT THE READY FOR 'I, ROBOT' Movie megastar Will Smith this week opened his heart about the turn of events which tragically deflected him from his boyhood dreams of a career in science: "Science has always been a huge part of my life. From five years old I wanted to be a scientist. (But) when I got to 11 or 12 years old I got interested in entertainment," he said at this week's UK premiere of 'I, Robot', adding that he was therefore delighted to have the chance to blend the two by appearing in a sci-fi film. If you've not read much about the film yet, it's a thriller, rated 12A, set in the year 2035, and crawling with mechanical beings. Will plays a Chicago cop investigating the apparent suicide of a big wheel at the local robotics corporation. Could it be murder? And more to the point, might there be a robot out there with blood on its pincers...? The reviews have been generally good, and while the film apparently has one or two stoopid moments, it also has Will Smith on wisecracking top form, and should be a fun evening for Smith fans, thriller fans, or robo-fans anywhere. Fancy going? If so, send an email to planet-science.news@nesta.org.uk entitled ROBO-TICKETS PLEASE with a note of your name and address. The draw will take place at 5pm on Thursday 12th August. PS if you really don't like robots, you can always use the tickets for other films, eg. the Stepford Wives or Spider-man 2... but don't tell anyone! |
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| 05. NATURAL WONDERS OF THE WORLD #2: METEOR CRATER This week we fly from Uluru in Central Australia, to northern Arizona, where our own natural wonder, Ian Francis, has been investigating an unearthly hole in the ground... 'Meteor Crater' is a circular depression, 1275 metres across and 175 metres deep, with a rim of smashed and jumbled boulders. Nowadays this dramatic natural feature is a popular tourist destination, but it's also been used by NASA as a mock lunar surface for astronaut-training. The crater is the result of the impact of a 300,000 tonne iron-nickel meteorite into the Earth's crust about 50,000 years ago. The meteorite was an estimated 46m across, and it would have exploded into the surface with the force of a thousand Hiroshima bombs. Meteor Crater also goes by the name of the Barringer Crater, after Daniel Barringer, the mining engineer who first suggested it was the result of a meteorite impact. Originally, it was thought to have been volcanic in origin, because many craters are formed when the top of a volcano collapses in when the magma chamber below empties. Barringer showed that there were no volcanic rocks present and so another explanation was needed, namely meteorite impact. Barringer reckoned that the meteorite itself would be buried under the crater, leaving lots of valuable - and mineable - iron to mine deposits. While he was correct about how the crater was formed, he was mistaken in his belief that the meteorite would be found under the crater. We now know that the meteorite was destroyed by the impact due to its immense speed (around 65,000 km/hr) and the consequent vapourisation of both rock and metal. Over 150 other meteorite craters are known today, but there must have been thousands that have come and gone during the Earth's history, the majority worn away or filled with sediment. If you look at a photo of the moon's surface as a contrast, you can see that there too there have been many, many impacts, but these have been untouched by weathering and erosion so they're still easily visible. The largest impact crater ever found here on Earth is the Chicxulub Basin in Mexico, which is an awesome 300km across. This crater dates back 65 million years, the time that the dinosaurs became extinct. It is likely that the debris hurled into the atmosphere by such an impact have caused climate change and wiped out the dinosaurs, though scientists are still arguing that one! Such impacts have happened at various occasions over the Earth's history. Indeed, the Tunguska Event in 1908 was a dramatic one, described recently in the Planet Science newsletter. For pictures and more information on Meteor Crater, and other craters, check out the following links... http://www.meteorcrater.com/ http://www.barringercrater.com/ http://www.meteoritecentral.com/ |
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| 06. RECOMMENDED WEBSITE OF THE WEEK As the themo-tastic spacecraft Messenger heads off towards Mercury, it seemed appropriate to flag up a very good-looking and information-packed space site which has come to our attention this week. It's called WINDOWS ON THE UNIVERSE, and not only is there a huge amount of up-to-date information and activities on it, but the content has been arranged so as to be equally accessible for all ages from around 8 upwards. The site's is bilingual too, so if you prefer your space in Spanish, you've come to the right place... There are large sections devoted to the science of the Earth, the Solar System, and the Universe, but the ambitions of the site go far beyond this, and make you feel like you could spend a whole weekend exploring the content and still not have finished. The areas they cover include the mythology of a huge range of the world's civilisations and their beliefs about the planets and stars; art, books and films on space subjects; the biology of life on Earth and whether it could exist elsewhere, and the history and achievements of our space missions to date... There are also online activities and ideas for projects, with teacher resources where appropriate. Here's where you'll find it all: http://www.windows.ucar.edu And if you want the Spanish version, it's: <http://www.windows.ucar.edu/spanish >(600 pages translated so far, and the rest on the way.) Incidentally, the creators of the site say they have a bilingual educator on staff who is prepared to respond to comments and questions in Spanish from site users. |
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| 07. AWKWARD QUESTION - AND ANSWER Last week's Awkward Question featured a vet-fearing monkey trying to avoid a tranquiliser dart. How did you get on? Here's a reminder of the scenario: Imagine a zookeeper aiming a rifle loaded with a tranquiliser dart at a monkey who needs to be checked by the zoo vet. The monkey spots the zookeeper take aim with the rifle. The monkey is dangling from a branch level with the zookeeper. Now this monkey is older and wiser than the average monkey and doesn't fancy being tranquillised and then fiddled about with by the vet. So, at the instant the monkey sees the flash of the gun going off, he lets go of the branch and falls to the ground. Will the dart zip past harmlessly over his head mid-fall or is he doomed to wake up in a cage in the vet's surgery? Here comes the answer: The monkey isn't as clever as he thinks he is, because the tranquiliser dart does hit him. The monkey obviously falls to the ground due to the force of gravity, but the tranquilliser dart will also fall to the ground due to gravity at the same rate, so will fall the same distance in the same time that the monkey does, (just under 5 metres vertically in the first second of fall). It's tempting to think that a dart travelling so quickly horizontally will be somehow 'immune' to the effects of gravity, but how should gravity 'know' if a dart is initially moving sideways rather than initially motionless? So the monkey would have been better off staying put on his branch, as the dart, if it was aimed straight at him, would have passed below him. There is a nice animation of this at http://physics.bu.edu/~duffy/semester1/c04_monkeyhunter.html Real life target shooters have to take gravity into account by aiming slightly higher than the bullseye. Their skill is knowing how much higher to aim for a particular distance from the target. >>>>>>>>>>>>>> Ready for another question? Here it comes: The captain of a submarine tries at all costs to avoid letting his sub come to rest on a clay or sandy ocean bottom. Why? Answer next week! |
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08. WINNERS WINNERS WINNERS |
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09. JOKE OF THE WEEK Thanks guys! |
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