What are the Properties of Waves and How do they Interact ?

In science class our new topic is waves. Today in school we got to investicate with water waves and how objects interfere with it. We would also drop little amount on water and then would looking at the patter the wave shows us. This is one site which can kind of demonstrate what we did today in class. 

http://phet.colorado.edu/en/simulation/wave-interference

Some of us from the start new the patterns the wave is going to make, although when you put objects in its path the whole pattern changes forming into something amazing. We also found out that when you put 2 drops of water into the water that the wave is going to become smaller rather then bigger, which was kind of a surprise to me before i actually thought about it then it made sense. Today we also got to learn some new words which seemed familiar to me. These words were wavelength, frequency, and amplitude.   One important fact which i learn about these words and their meanings is that if the frequency and the amplitude are both high, there is going to be a problem with the people who are riding on the open seas that day. This is a perfect website showing this information

http://www.classzone.com/books/ml_science_share/vis_sim/wslm05_pg18_graph/wslm05_pg18_graph.html

Today we learned a lot about a topic which i would have never expected to go into this much depth. Today was very fun and a good way to start this week.

Space Exploration; is it worth the cost?

The big question which everybody has probably thought of once in their life time is if space exploration is really worth all the risks and costs. While we have made many astonishing discoveries in space is their really something that can help us change our way? Or be an emergency planet if our world gets destroyed? or should we stick with helping our own planet before moving on to another? These are all great questions to think of when thinking about space. I will do my best to answer all of these the way i believe it should be (my own opinion)

I think that sending people out to space is a good way to take samples of ideas (such as plants) but can be very dangerous and may lead to what happen with the columbia space shuttle. Earth based research is a good and safe way to lear new information but iv got to admit that its not as affective as being there your self. Sending out robots to space to collect is an information is once again a safe and good way to collect data but a thing to keep it mind is that the scientist who's controlling the robot may give signals to it and it will respond sometimes 10-15 mins after because there is a long gab and the signal of course isn't that strong. All of these different ways of getting information have their pros and cons. If its not danger then its accuracy, if its not accuracy then its the speed, nothing can be as accurate and as good as a living person.

Now to answer the questions which i had at the beginning of my writing. I truly believe that Nasa or any other space program out there can't find any helpful resource from space which will help us with our lives our with our earths. Even if our planet is dying one day and they do find another to replace it will you thing that we could reach it in time not to grow old and die in a space ship? How many space ships should be made to fit the whole world, this would right away equal a lot of money! maybe even more then 20 trillion dollars. Therefore the possibility of finding another planet or substance of some sort which can help us is really love, for that reason i would focus more on the earth and help people/kids in need. Nasa has a lot of money in their hands they could easily share it with other countries which are quite poor such as Africa. Imagine if everyone was rich in someway there would be a lot of smiles, we wouldn't even be that interested in space because OUR world is so precious and nice. When scientists are look at new planets they are subconsciously trying to escape this one and picture a better one in their mind.

If i was congress with a fixed money to spend the most important thing that i would use my money for would be helping the ones in need (this can also include animals, but the focus would be a little bit more on humans.) After that i would give my money to the hospitals which then would use that money to buy medicine and tools which would save lives of many. Some other things i would give my money for would also be figuring out cures for cancer, and just help our whole environment. After all those important tasks have been completed, only then shall i give money for the research of space.

As you can see space is important but what we got on this world is more important and we should rather look after that then something in space which we possibly may not even go to.

Tsunami Tracks in the Sky

Even though this is not current news, it has to do a lot about the topic which we are working on right now i science. My friend and I found this event a couple of days back and found it really interesting, maybe the most interesting one i had to read this year. The article has to do about the Tsunami wave that struck Japan, and how a group of scientist have discover my photography the tsunamis path by looking at the sky, to be more precise in the ionosphere layer of our atmosphere. The discovery was a pure accident, or at least that what they say. The camera was just supposed to talk picture of the beautiful hawaiian sky but grabbed a big discovery with it. And the tsunami is indicated as the glowing ripples that move a cross a sky, like a tsunami in the water,  just its in the sky. So literally were the wave passes these glowing ripples pass as well in the same direction like the tsunamis twin. This event happens because in the ionsphere there are many ions, so even the smallest boost of the oceans send particles racing toward the ionsphere layer which then causes the glowing ripples thus making the Tsunami in the sky. Even though these are as i understood not the first studies of the tsunami in the sky they are the first one with actual proof pictures. Now the scientist Makela and his team are thinking about installing sky watch cameras in areas which have a lot of floods and tsunamis, They also said that at one point noraml cameras will be able to trace signs of tsunamis. And im going to end it with this one quote which really stuck to me!

“It’s a really neat example of how the environment is coupled together,” Makela says
Hope you enjoyed!

Skills lab: A "Moonth" of Phases

Guiding question: What causes the phases of the moon

Skill Focus: Making models, observing, drawing conclusions

Materials
-Floor lamp with a 150-watt bulb (normal flashlight)
-Pencils 
-Plastic foam balls

Analyze and conclude
1) In my model the earth is represented as the big foam ball, the moon as the smaller foam ball and the sun (suns rays) as the flashlight and its brightness.
2) We did four circles around the earth instead of 8 and figured out that you always see have of the moon that's bright or visible
3) Iv done this problem in my notebook. 
4) Iv only seen half of the lighten part of the moon after each turn
5) Once again only half of the surface was lit up while the other half was dark because it was facing the opposite direction. I don't think that the new moon was cause by the eclipse but yet the sun itself. when the suns rays are not on shining on the moon
6)Having the model next to me was a big advantege because i could actually see how this was happening in real life, although an disadvantage of using a model is that it of course isn't accurate enough. But all in all it was a big of a help. 

Guiding question: How does the tilt of the earth axis affect the light received by Earth as it revolves around the sun?

Skill focus: Making models, observing, inferring, predicting 

Materials: 

-flashlight

-Paper

-Pencil

-Protractor

-Toothpick

-Foam ball marked with poles and equator

-Acetate sheet with thick grid lines drawn on it

    

    Analyze and Conclude:

   1)When its winter in the norther hemisphere the equator and the southern hemisphere get more direct sunlight and heat then the northern, when its summer in the northern hemisphere then the northern has the most concentrated sunlight thus making the south have less.

    2) During the sumer the light of the sun is more concentrated on the equator (the exact middle of the earth} and is less concentrated and spread out during the winder. And you can see this easily with the squares activity we got to do to answer this question

    3) It would mean that the sun is further away from an area, therefore there would be no area which the suns light is the most concentrated on, making colder

     

    4) Both the poles (north and south) are the coldest places on earth while the hottest are the ones closest to the equator because that where the sun rays are most concentrated on. Thats why greece, and serbia are so hot during the summer.

     

    5) Shadow of the tooth pick is the longest in the summer because the earth is tilted on the other side making the shadow longer therefore making it that in winter that the shadow are shorter.

     

    6) If the heat is less it means that the squares will spread out and if the heat is more direct and concentrated the squares would be in the shape of squares and not rectangles, because like i said the sun is concentrated on that spot.

    

    7) The seasons are caused by the suns position toward the earth and the way that the earth is titled, either on the far side making it winter or on the closest side to the sun making it simple enough summer.

Current Even

Spiders silk web stronger then steel!


By Meera Dolasia on 01/05/2012


Im guessing that not most of you ever though that the strength of silk could be as hard as steel itself. To prove this scientist have been playing around with spider silk for many years, but now they developed a new technic that has proven to be successful. Scientists have taken an animal that naturally produces wool as well as the spider, and they have decided to settle with silkworms. Even though we been using there silk to produce body wear for so many centuries is not nearly as strong as the spiders silk. So in order to change that scientist took the spider silk and injected it into the cocoon of the silkworms {the cocoons are the place in which were they produce silk} and this injection contained spider silk elasticity* as well. The result as i mentioned above was exact to the scientists hypothesis. The resulting silk, that comprised of 95% silkworm protein and 5% spider silk proteins is 48% stronger than normal silk and about 61% as strong as the overall strength. Scientists already see of this experiment being of great help in the future. People have already been discussing on making a bullet proof vest with this soft material. By this experiment you can see that so many things in life are not what they seem at sight of a naked eye.


*elasticity is the stretching of an object, commonly refereed to as flexibility  

Weird Animals; Red Panda

In science class we got to do an assignment where we would get to choose any weird or interesting animal with different kind of looks or powers of some sort. I choose the red panda, for many reasons. Some of these reasons are because their look is interesting and cute, others are because their type is unique and different then normal pandas. One interesting fact about their kind is that they have a strip of read on their back and a hint of white of their face, and a whole column of black on their tummy and feet. The physical characterization of this marvelous animal is 56-63 cm long and their tail is about 37-47 cm. The red panda is a native to the Himalayas and to the southern part of china. The difference between a normal panda an this creature is that a panda is in a group with the bears while this animal has nothing to do with the bears, it resembles more on a raccoon. They are very skilled at climbing trees and does that a lot. Its pray or food are the following: Bamboo,{like a normal panda} eggs, birds, insect, and infact smaller mammals. It to is a mammal. The sad thing about these animals is that they are very rare and scientist have estimated that their are fewer then 10,000 individuals. This is a very bad fact for me because i was hoping that sometime in my life period i will get to see these animals.