Thank Planet Science for that Wired-Up Friday feeling! Here’s what’s coming up: 

1. PLANET PICKS – You’ll need your grey matter for this month’s quiz!
2. THE WIRE – Say CHEESE for the Imagine photography competition...
3. SPOTLIGHT ON... – It’s Doctor’s orders to read this profile!
4. TRY THIS! – Celebrate Earth Science Week by making a tornado.
5. GEAR FOR GRABS – Say goodbye to the Air Hogs comp.
6. WINNERS –  Air Hogs Eradicator and more...
   
   

Wouldn't it be great to look at a building plan and think, “I can make this a really pleasant building to work in”? Or how about looking at a helicopter and thinking “I know how to make that good helicopter a GREAT helicopter”?

Well, that’s where the career of an engineer comes in. The term ‘engineer’ covers so many different jobs, so why not take a look in our MEET YOUR MATCH database at the engineering section if you fancy finding out more about this coolest of professions? Here’s the link:
http://www.planet-science.com/nextsteps/start.html

Before you go anywhere though, be sure to take part in the October Quiz in Wired. It’s all about engineers and engineering, and Rolls-Royce (yes, the aeronautical and marine engineering company – oops there’s one of the answers already!) have kindly donated the prizes and there’s 20 of them to be won. “20 of what?” you’re shouting at your computer screen. Let me shed a little light on the prizes – there are 20 globe puzzles to be won so visit Wired now:
http://www.planet-science.com/wired/comp_quiz/10_04_Engineer/

Just think of the advantages of getting your hands on a digital camera; no more waiting for expensive films to develop and all your photographs at the touch of a button – ready for you to re-size, touch-up and alter in any which way you like! If you can do all this with a digital camera then just IMAGINE what you could do with £1000 worth of photographic equipment...

...which is the first prize in the under 18s category in the Imagine Photography Competition 2004. BBC Science and Nature and the Wellcome Trust are looking for photographs that show ‘how science is changing us’. The photographic entries should show how biomedical science is changing our minds, bodies, and society. Biomedicine is the part of science which deals with how the body functions, how it can be healthy and how it fights disease, and how the body reacts to disease and treatment.

If you have ever visited hospital and had a sample taken by a doctor or nurse then the sample would have been analysed by a biomedical scientist to diagnose your illness. Doctors treat their patients based on results of the vital tests and investigations that often diagnose serious illnesses such as cancer or diabetes.

Think back to how the world must have been without antibiotics and vaccinations and how new drugs and technologies have changed our lives, our bodies and our health. Think also of plastic surgery, heart surgery and performance enhancing drugs.

How you can capture the way biomedicine is changing our lives in a photograph is your challenge and I hope Hay-Wire has given you a few ideas. For more inspiration and details of how to enter the competition then visit the following websites:
http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/en/imagine/index.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/competition/

Coming up is the second in our series of inspiring black scientists, running throughout October to celebrate Black History Month. This issue the spotlight is on Rebecca J Cole...

The term ‘girl power’ certainly wasn’t around in the 1800s, but although it wasn’t invented, it still applies in the case of Rebecca Cole. She was born in 1846 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. She was the second African American female doctor. To understand how great an achievement this was, you first have to consider the prejudice Rebecca would have faced in medical school as an African American and also as a woman. She suffered financial hardship because for years her family had been enslaved or oppressed and denied the means to make a decent living or to medical care. But it was her dream to be a doctor and this is how she did it...

Rebecca attended the first co-educational high school for African Americans in Philadelphia. When she finished high school, she enrolled at the women’s Medical College of Pennsylvania. Rebecca then took a job at the New York Infirmary for Women and Children after graduating in 1867. She was the health visitor in the local community and was responsible for giving out practical advice to mothers living in poverty about the best ways to keep their family healthy. 

Dr Rebecca Cole practised in South Carolina for a number of years, before returning to Philadelphia. In 1873 she opened a Women's Directory Centre to provide medical and legal services to women and children in need. In January 1899 Dr Cole was appointed superintendent of a home in Washington DC, run by the Association for the Relief of Destitute Colored Women and Children. In her years of caring for families living in terrible poverty in the city of Washington, she was most appreciated for the difference she was able to make. Although Rebecca Cole practised medicine for fifty years, sadly few records survive to tell her story, and no images of her remain.

If you want to find out about other black scientists and inventors, and you didn’t visit the Planet Science website last October, then be sure to take a look at the Black History Scientist profiles at:
http://www.planet-science.com/outthere/black_history/index.html

Now, for an experiment that will blow you away...

In celebration of Earth Science Week (Oct 10^th to Oct 16^th), why not try and make a tornado in your kitchen? With your parents’ permission first, of course!

Stuff You Need:

• Two plastic 2-litre fizzy drink bottles
• Plastic washer
• Masking tape
• Food colouring
• Water

What To Do:

1. Remove the caps from the two empty bottles.
2. Fill one soft drink bottle half-full with water and add a couple of drops of food colouring.
3. Place the plastic washer over the opening of the bottle.
4. Turn the other bottle over and place it on top of the first bottle, neck to neck, with the washer wedged between.
5. Wrap masking tape around the two bottles' necks to tightly attach the bottles to one another. You might need a lot of tape.
6. Turn the bottles over so that the full bottle is on top. Lightly shake the bottles in a circle so the water begins to swirl.
7. Place the bottles on a table. Watch the water drain from the top bottle to the bottom.

You Will Notice:

You’ve just created a tornado in a bottle! A tornado is a type of vortex, which is a spinning column of air with some water vapour. Tornadoes are formed below strong thunderstorms when warm, humid air tries to push through cool, dry air. Pushed by a cross wind, the air begins to swirl forming a funnel cloud.

In the experiment when you spin the bottles around a few times, the water in the top bottle starts rotating. As the water drains into the lower bottle, a vortex forms. The water is pulled down and forced toward the bottle opening in the centre by gravity. To make water move in a circle, forces called centripetal forces must act on the water. These forces are provided by a combination of air pressure, water pressure, and gravity.

You can tell where the centripetal forces are greater by looking at the slope of the water. Where the water is steeper, such as at the bottom of the vortex, the centripetal force on the water is greater. Water moving with higher speeds and in smaller radius curves requires larger forces. The water at the bottom of the vortex is doing just this, and so the wall of the vortex is steepest at the bottom.

When you’ve completed the experiment, you can visit the Earth Science Week website by clicking here: http://www.earthsciweek.org/

The last Air Hogs Eradicator is sat here in the office, looking very lonely and in desperate need of a home to go to. If you want to be in with a chance of winning it then you’ll have to go on a Web quest...

The last two Air Hog draws have focused on flight – in the first competition we looked at aerofoils and last week the question regarded two names related with early human flight (answer below). So for the final question, Wired-Up has set a Web quest – we’re giving you a flight-related website to look at to find the answer to a question.

Here’s the website:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/barrier/

And here’s the question:

Is a plane travelling at subsonic speeds travelling faster or slower than the speed of sound?

Send the answer to the question, along with your name, age and address to: wired-up.news@nesta.org.uk with ‘THAT LAST AIR HOG IS MINE!’ as the subject and all emails will be entered into the draw, which will take place next Thursday at 5pm. Good luck!

First up, is the answer to last week’s Air Hogs question and it was Wilbur and Orville Wright. An Air Hogs Eradicator will be making its way to Barney Prouse, Herts.

The other winner of a smaller prize was Victoria Hale, who was the first person to send an email saying that a cosmonaut was a Russian astronaut.

Congratulations to you both!

Got Wired-Up? Got clued up!

See you in seven...

REMEMBER Wired-Up wants to hear from you so write in with your science questions and comments to: wired-up.news@nesta.org.uk and they will be featured here.

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