Welcome to another Randomised. Can’t stop to chat – just off to do a mile for Sport Relief. Have you done yours already? You have? Well better curl up with your Randomised then, you deserve it!

1. Wassup Planet Science? – March Magnetic Quiz and other stuff

2. Sooo Random – it’s all happening under the sea

3. Gear Giveaway – Cell Trumps

4. Over 2U! – Sticky Books

5. Winners – Flipsides

6. Rib Busters – sounds fishy

1. Wassup Planet Science?

Righty ho! First up we’ve got the new March quiz. March - the month of magnetism! (Well, it is here on Planet Science anyway.) If you haven’t played Polarity yet then this is your big chance as it’s the prize for our new magnetic majestic quiz. Positive people who feel the force most strongly and attract all the right answers will go into the draw to win a game.

Don’t forget about the Making a Mint competition! This is a mintastic opportunity for 7 – 14 year olds to win £1000 for your school or clubhouse in either Amazon or Garden Vouchers. Send off for your free pack now!

And finally - if you’ve been visiting our Planet SciCast site you might want to know who the nominees for the SciCast Awards 2008 are... well, wait no longer! Here they all are. Category winners get £250 and a nifty block award for the trophy cabinet.

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2. Sooo Random – Science news straight to your Inbox...

‘Sea slugs’ have provided scientists with inspiration for a new material that could one day be used to build brain implants for patients with Parkinson's disease. Yes, we did say sea slugs.  Apparently the response of a startled sea cucumber (it gets more bizarre) is to tense when it is threatened. The new material mimics this ability, and could be used to make advanced brain electrodes which are stiff when implanted, yet supple inside the body. The material can rapidly switch from being rigid to flexible and vice versa. Adding water changes the state of the material. "The water acts as a chemical switch," days Dr Christoph Weder, one of the team who developed the material. This is important as the brain is around 75% water.

See the BBC news site for more.

And it gets fishier - coral reef fish spend weeks scouting out a new neighbourhood before they move in - just like human house buyers do, Edinburgh scientists have revealed.

The fish use their acute sense of hearing to eavesdrop on locations before deciding where to live. Edinburgh University researchers studied shoals of fish near the Great Barrier Reef off Australia. They found damselfish, cardinalfish, emperors and blennies chose communities by the "reef noise" they give off.

They then choose one based on their needs - in much the same way that a human would choose a new neighbourhood based on local schools or work commitments.

For more information.

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3. Over 2U! – Science experiments for you to try at home...

Sticky Books

You will need:

  • Two large, thick, paperback text books - the closer they are in size the better.
  • A strong volunteer

What to do:

  1. Lock the books together. You can do this as if you were riffle-shuffling a pack of cards (but much slower!). Alternatively flick through about 20 pages of one book and flick about 20 pages of the second book on top.
  2. The deeper the books are inserted into each other the better the grip.
  3. Now ask your strong volunteer to pull in the spine of one of the books while you pull on the spine of the other.
  4. To take the books apart, you'll need to give them a shake and ease them apart.

What's happening?

Paper isn't quite as smooth as it seems. We can write on it because there is friction between a pencil and the paper - the friction rubs off some of the pencil's graphite.

If you hold two pieces of paper together with flat palms and try to rub them together you get an idea of the amount of friction between just two pieces of paper. The dips and grooves in the surface of one piece of paper lock into the dips and grooves of the other.

Each time a page from one of the books comes into contact with a page from the other book there will be friction when they are pulled in opposite directions. Multiply this friction by the number of pages in contact, and the amount of friction increases enormously.

The spine, and the fact that you are squeezing the books to get a good grip, just pushes the dips and grooves in the interleaved pages of the books harder into each other. The result is books that can't be pulled apart.

The only way to release them is the lift the pages apart - and you can do this by giving the books a bit of a shake.

Special Safety advice

Don't pull so hard that either one of you falls back. Also be careful if the books are important: the friction can hold them together very strongly and you could rip the spine off before getting them apart.

This activity came from the Planet Scicast site. There are some fantastic films on there – why don’t you have a go and make one yourself?

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4. Gear Giveaway – You’ve got to be in it to win it...

Centre of the Cell is a fantastic website with loads of info on all things medical and cellular.  Maybe you hadn’t better look at it just before you have your tea! Anyway it will also soon be a fantastic interactive science centre with lots to see and do. 

Centre of the Cell have given us TWO sets of cell trump cards, postcards and badges to give away.

If you’d like to win one then email us with your age, name and postal address to randomised.news@nesta.org.uk with ‘HARD CELL’ in the subject line. The winner will be picked at random at 5pm on Wednesday 26th March 2008.

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5. Winners – Has your name been picked out of the bag?

Last time we were offering ten copies of Flipside magazine. The winners are Alex James from Portishead, David France from Welshpool, Pearl Edyvean from London, Brandon Neal from Leicester, Christopher Davis from Cowbridge, Rebecca Brett from West Midlands, Emma Martin from Devon, Chris Daly from Hertfordshire, Josh Wilson from Leeds and Conor Bryan from Peterborough. Well done!

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6. Rib Busters - Funny ha ha AND sometimes funny weird!

A man walks into a chip shop with a Trout under his arm. 'Do you do fishcakes?' he asks the proprietor.
'Yes we do' he replies,
'well make him one, it's his birthday tomorrow'

Why did the Flounder cross the road? To get to the other tide.

Who held the baby octopus to ransom? Squidnappers.

Which fish performs operations? A Sturgeon.

Where do little fish go? Plaice School.

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THAT'S ALL FOR NOW

You've been Randomised!

Send any questions, comments, jokes or experiment ideas to: randomised.news@nesta.org.uk

Bye for now!