SCIENCE YEAR NEWSLETTER - ISSUE 81 Week ending Friday, 23rd August 2002 Welcome to the next instalment of the "our regular editor is on holiday" edition of the Science Year newsletter. I am David Tasker, and I will be your tour guide through this newsletter. Given my background as a professional traveller away from my distant home (Australia) for two years, and the fact that lots of people will be taking some time away this Bank Holiday weekend, I thought that I would look deep into the science of travelling. No we are not talking about why everyone has to queue nose to tail on the motorway, or why your bag seems unable to close once all your necessities are inside, we’re talking science travelling topics. We are going to look at how to overcome a fear of flying and what scientists are working on for the future of long distance travel. And that's not all that is flying around the Science Year skies this week, we also have free tickets to some great UK attractions on first-email, first-served basis, hilarious jokes and a bank holiday activity that will make a cool helicopter to help you fly the skies. (And while we’re on the subject – where are all the boomerang designs – Sophie is feeling a little disappointed!) Here's the itinerary: • MOUSES AT THE READY 1 - Free tickets to Longleat • BBC UNCOVERS THE SCIENCE OF COOKING – What you didn’t know • OVERCOMING THE FEAR OF FLYING – Or Aviophobia to the experts • MOUSES AT THE READY 2 – Free tickets to Inspire • ACTIVITY OF THE WEEK – Build a helicopter • AT BRISTOL – Are you ready? • SCIENCE LINE QUESTION – Is time travel possible? • WHAT ARE THE SCIENTISTS WORKING ON – Will we be travelling faster and further in the future? • ANYONE FOR A SPACE JOKE – Top secret NASA project • ARE YOU READY FOR CHAOS – Some dates have changed • RECOMMENDED FAR OUT SITE OF THE WEEK – The Aussie science week • ANOTHER LAME JOKE – I need a tow • A.O.B. First of all, congratulations to everyone clever enough last week to win free passes in one of our popular competitions. As they say "you have to be in it to win it". Eden Project; Victoria Collings and Gail Tutcher. Marwell Zoo; Emily Pearce, Karen McQuillan, and Will Ryder-Davies. Globe; Findlay Rush Your prizes will be with you shortly if they're not already... Oh and if you were wondering what the winning Travel Joke was, well here it is in all it’s glory: Written on a postcard – Weather is here, Wish you were lovely! This week we have two great Summer Science offers: LONGLEAT, WARMINSTER – FREEBIES AHOY If you live in the Bath area, or are looking for a unique destination to visit over a weekend why not put your entry in to win tickets to Longleat House and Safari Park? This interesting park – 5 minutes from Warminster and 15 minutes from Bath – has heaps to do to keep both the parents and kids enthralled for hours, if not days. This attraction has so much to do that you will find it hard to plan your day, from the ground-breaking Safari Park (housing the giraffes and lions), a number of world-class mazes (including the worlds longest hedge maze), a butterfly garden, a Postman Pat Village, the Stately Longleat House (home to Lord Bath), to the full-size wooden fort. You are sure to be fighting with the family about what to do next. To check out all the goings on at Longleat point the cursor in the direction of http://www.longleat.co.uk If Longleat sounds like somewhere you would like to explore why not send me an email to david.tasker@scienceyear.com, with 'Longleat Tickets' in the subject field, and your name and postal address in the message. We have two family passes to give away. >top BBC UNCOVERS THE SCIENCE OF COOKING How do you boil eggs without breaking the shells? And why do sauces go lumpy? Solve your cooking problems with expert tips and scientific solutions! Try some kitchen experiments at home - make bendy bones and self-slicing bananas. Enter their competition to win top cookery books. To find out more about this cool feature why not check out their website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/hottopics/cooking/ >top OVERCOMING THE FEAR OF FLYING – Or Aviophobia to the experts While some of us are scared of spiders (Arachnophobia), teenagers (Ephebiphobia), or work (Ergophobia), one of the most common phobias in the world is Aviophobia, or the fear of flying. With more and more people taking to the skies this problem is likely to arise more often, but don’t worry because there is help available. A number of groups have come to the aid of Aviophobia suffers everywhere, with some even offering to take you through every step of flying, from the booking ticket to the actual flight. If you are uncomfortable flying why not try some of these handy hints: • Make contact with the airline to see if you can tour a plane prior to your flight – this will allow you to be at ease with what you are about to do. • Make sure that you are well rested in the days prior to your flight – this will reduce your stress levels • Ensure that you do not have caffeine or alcohol in the hours leading up to the flight – these will make you dehydrated • Be at the airport early – you don’t want to be rushing. To get more information check out some of these great websites: http://www.fearofflyinghelp.com/ http://www.anxieties.com/7Flying/fear_of_flying_summary.htm Now that you have overcome your fear of flying and are ready to board the plane, why not look in the parents section of the Science Year website for a great selection of travel games. >top INSPIRE DISCOVERY CENTRE, NOWICH – WHAT MORE GIVE-AWAYS Inspire in Norwich has a great show coming up and we thought that we had to tell you about it. From the 26th to the 30th of August Inspire will be unveiling their latest show - Inspire Audio Visual. This show will allow you to find out about the history of hi-fi and learn the secrets of a wildlife filmmaker. There will be sound and light demonstrations throughout the day. If this grabs your fancy, or you would like to find out more about the goings on at Inspire why not check out their website http://science-project.org/inspire/ Our friends at the Inspire Discovery Centre have given us four family passes to give away, so get clicking and send an email to david.tasker@scienceyear.com with "INSPIRE" in the subject heading and your name and address in the message. >top ACTIVITY OF THE WEEK – Fly Away Why not make your own helicopter? 1. Take a piece of paper 20cm long and 5cm wide. Fold it in half lengthways. 2. Unfold the paper. Draw an 8cm line from one end along the fold. Cut along this line. 3. Measure 10cm from the opposite end of the piece of paper along the fold. 4. At the 10cm mark draw a line the width of the paper that forms a T with the line you have just drawn. 5. You need to divide this short line into three. 6. Cut one third of the way along the line from each edge, but don’t cut the middle portion. 7. Fold the paper lengthways to make a thick ‘stem’. 8. Measure 2cm from the end of this three-way piece of paper and fold it upwards. 9. Now take the opposite end of the paper. Fold one portion of the cut paper forwards, and fold the other portion backwards. 10.You need to make the folds straight. 11.Unfold the ‘wings’ and hold as high as you can. Let go. With any luck you will have made a helicopter. If you have done something wrong or couldn’t follow the instructions why not check out the Exploratorium website for an easy to use template that you can print out. >top AT-BRISTOL – AT ONCE The team at At-Bristol have been busy coming up with an impressive list of things to do at their centre between now and the end of the year. Why not get down and explore for yourself… Here is a sneak peek of what they have ready and waiting for you; Inflatabubble – from the 24th to the 26th of August Do you love blowing bubbles? Well they do! You'll be amazed by their giant bubbles, coloured bubbles and bubbles that disappear in a mysterious fog. You'll get a chance to blow some of your own with their special bubble mixture and see if you can discover the secret of the cubic bubble. They'll take a look at the science behind bubble behaviour and find out how bubbles are used in the natural world. The Bristol Dinosaur Project – from now until the 30th August 2002 Come and meet Thecodontosaurus - Bristol's very own dinosaur! This primitive plant-eater has not been found anywhere else in the world. A team of palaeontologists from Bristol University - including Prof. Mike Benton of BBC's Walking with Dinosaurs fame - have been piecing together this remarkable skeleton for the first time. Come and see some of their work and learn how you can get involved in The Bristol Dinosaur Project. DinoMites – from now until the 22nd September 2002 The dinosaurs are coming! Take a journey back over 65 million years to a time when dinosaurs ruled the Earth - and discover a prehistoric landscape populated by families of beasts protecting their young from prying eyes. See life-sized models of your favourite dinosaur families - including T. Rex, Velociraptor, Iguanodon and Stegosaurus. Visit the diorama and watch millions of years pass in front of your eyes as a dinosaur body gradually decays and fossilises. Try your hand at dinosaur hunting - dig in the fossil pit to find the hidden remains and discover lots of fascinating dino-facts. If you want to find out more about the activities at At-Bristol then check out their website: http://www.at-bristol.org.uk/ >top SCIENCE LINE QUESTION Is time Travel Possible? Find out the answer to this age-old travel question here. Remember you can ring them on 0808 800 4000 or visit their website at http://www.sciencenet.org.uk >top WHAT ARE THE SCIENTISTS WORKING ON Will we be travelling faster and further in the future? While this does sound like every travellers dream it could soon become reality with some of my compatriots achieving some startling results over the last week. Deep in the Australian outback a group of scientists achieved the first ever flight of a supersonic combustion rocket, or an engine running mainly on oxygen from it’s surrounding air. This engine is capable of getting to speeds of Mach 7.6, or seven times the speed of sound (approx 5,700 miles per hour at sea level). To give you an idea of how fast this is I have put together a list of travel times to some well-known places at this speed: • 1 hour and 40 minutes from London to Perth • 3.5 minutes from London to Edinburgh • 2.2 minutes from London to Paris • 1.5 minutes from London to Newcastle What this means is that not only will the cost needed to get into space (either for a passenger or a satellite) be considerably less, but that flight times could be greatly reduced. It could also lead to the opportunity of space travel for everyone. If you want more information on this interesting project go to the University of Queensland website at http://www.uq.edu.au/news/hyshot.phtml >top ANYONE FOR A SPACE JOKE – Top Secret NASA Project While we are talking about space flight I must tell you about a story a friend of mine at NASA told me. NASA has established a top-secret project involving scientists building a gun specifically to launch dead chickens at the windshields of airliners, military jets and the space shuttle, all traveling at maximum velocity. The idea of this highly important project is to simulate the frequent incidents of collisions with airborne fowl to test the strength of the windshields. British engineers heard about the gun and were eager to test it on the windshields of their new high-speed trains. Arrangements were made, and a gun was sent to the British engineers. When the gun was fired, the engineers stood shocked as the chicken hurled out of the barrel, crashed into the shatterproof shield, smashed it to smithereens, blasted through the control console, snapped the engineer's backrest in two and embedded itself in the back wall of the cabin, like an arrow shot from a bow. The horrified Brits sent NASA the disastrous results of the experiment, along with the designs of the windshield and begged the US scientists for suggestions. NASA responded with a one-line email: "Defrost the chicken." >top AN UPDATE ON CHAOS HAPPENINGS Last week we mentioned the ChaOs Tour that a group of Cambridge University students are running as part of Science Year. The tour, which runs from the 23rd until the 29th of August, has a heap of hands on experiments, student demonstrators and a number of interesting challenges. The dates and venues for the tour are: • 23rd Lymington - St Thomas' Church Hall • 24th Crossways Village Hall • 25th Swanage - The Mowlem Community Room • 26th Preston (nr Weymouth) - St Andrew's Church Hall • 28th Kingbridge Bandstand • 29th Exmouth Elisabeth Hall If you are looking for more information on this tour point the cursor to http://www.chaosscience.org.uk >top RECOMMENDED FAR-OUT SITE OF THE WEEK Following on from the announcement that Science Year will be continuing into 2003 I thought that it was timely to see what other nations are doing in the area of science. It’s not that I am biased, or homesick, but Australia is in the middle of Science Week. To find out all about the National Kilowatt Count or the Science Of The Bush point the cursor in the direction of: http://www.abc.net.au/science/ >top ANOTHER LAME JOKE – I need a tow An out-of-towner who was on a driving vacation drove his car into a ditch in a desolated area. Luckily, a local farmer came to help with his big strong horse named Buddy. He hitched Buddy up to the car and yelled, "Pull, Nellie, pull!" Buddy didn't move. Then the farmer hollered, "Pull, Buster, pull!" Buddy didn't respond. Once more the farmer commanded, "Pull, Coco, pull!" Nothing. Then the farmer nonchalantly said, "Pull, Buddy, pull!" And the horse easily dragged the car out of the ditch. The motorist was most appreciative and very curious. He asked the farmer why he called his horse by the wrong name three times. "Well... Buddy is blind and if he thought he was the only one pulling, he wouldn't even try!" >top A.O.B Heave a sigh of relief because next week Anne will be back in charge of the Science Year Newsletter, so things will be back to normal!! Make sure you get all the info that you would like to see included to anne.mcnaught@scienceyear.com. >top