Pufferfish

Pufferrfish are amazing creatures. They have multiple ways of defending themselves from anyting that seems harmful to them. Pufferfish can range in size from 1-inch long to 2 feet long. One of theire defenses is inflating their stomach using water (or air) to expand more than 3 times is body size. Pufferfish also taste really bad. When an animal eats it, it constains tetrodotoxin which is deadly to humans. Their is enough toxin in a pufferfish to kill up to 30 adults. Their is 120 different types of pufferfish in the world. All pufferfish only have 4 teeth that are pushed together to for a beak. 

Information Source: http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/fish/pufferfish/

Photo Source: https://c2.staticflickr.com/4/3057/3046410645_2eb802cd4a_z.jpg?zz=1

Solar Cooker Update

My group and I had to build a new solar cooker because the person in charge of taking ours home never came back to school. So now our solar cooker is a box full of tin foil and mirrors reflecting sun light into the pan. I learned that you should always have a sturdy box so the wind does not blow it over. Now we brought a weight to make sure it wont blow over. I think our solar cooker will be successful if we make the hole box sturdier. 

Miracle of Water- Extra Credit Bingo

Earths surface is made up of 70% water. Very few planets contain any type of water. Water is a great temperature stabilizer. It can absorb a ton of heat and then absorb lots of cold. Without water you could not freeze ice cream or boil water to eat noodles. Water can also change its volume. At really cold temperature it grows until it freezez, when it is hot it shrinks. You never realize how much water can do until you actually live without it. God's made an amazing earth for a reason and he put water on the earth so that us humans can thrive and live without freezing to death. 

Source: http://www.icr.org/earths-water/

Diamonds Burn

It's hard to imagine something so expensive could burn very easily. One scientist found taht burning diamonds would be easy using liquid nitrogen and some fire. Even though diamonds are hard, the chemical bonds that hold the carbon atoms in diamond together are weaker than the chemical bonds that hold together the other common form of pure carbon, graphite. The difference between diamonds and graphite is that diamonds chemical bonds create a inflexible bond where in graphite the chemicals are tightly bonded to make sheets stacked on top of each other. It is the chemicals bonds strength not hardness that determines how easily something catches on fire. If your house burns down with the jewels inside it , you can collect the melted gold, but the diamonds will be gone with a little bit of C02. 

Source: Gray, Theodore. (10/8/2009) Gone in a Flash, 4/8/2014

http://www.popsci.com/diy/article/2009-08/burn-diamonds-torch-and-liquid-oxygen

Photo Credits: http://www.popsci.com/sites/popsci.com/files/styles/article_image_large/public/images/2009/08/diamond3.jpg?itok=i_Q530Po

Metal Detectors

Metal Detectors

   Metal Detectors are used often all around the world. Some are used at airports, some are used by people finding treasures, and some also save peoples lives by uncovering hidden mines underground. I wanted to know more about metal detectors so here is what I learned. Metal Detectors work by making a electromagnetic field using electricity. This is like when you wrap a wire around a nail and hook it up to a battery. A smart Scottish physicist named James Clerk Maxwel came up with the idea of you can make electricity with magnetism and magnetism with electricity. A metal detector has some wire that is wrapped around a circular know known as the transmitter coil. When electricity goes around the wire, a magnetic field is created around it. When a magnetic field finds metal it goes straight through it. This creates an electric current and causes another magnetic field. This goes back up to another wire and connects another electric current through a loud speaker. This alerts whoever is holding the metal detector that there is something below.







Source: Woodford Chris, Metal Detectors:http://www.explainthatstuff.com/metaldetectors.html

Black Holes

Black Holes

A black hole is nothing but empty space. It is also a lot of matter packed into a small amount of room. If you made the sun 10 times bigger and then squeezed it into the size of New York City thats how much matter are in them. This causes a huge gravitational field. This field is so big not even light can escape. Black holes are created when a star dies and it leaves its core that could be 10 times bigger than the sun. Lets say a star moves toward the  black hole it tears its atoms apart and sucks it in. Most black holes are made when a Super Nova explosions kills the star this causes the star to collapse because the explosion is so big. Stellar Black holes are almost impossible to detect. These can get up to 24 times the size of the sun. There are also "Super Massive" Black holes that could be billions the size of the sun.  

http://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics/focus-areas/black-holes/

How Cotton Candy is Made

How Cotton Candy is Made

Cotton Candy is a very unique sweet treat that has a crazy path to make it.  You might see cotton candy at the fair or at a carnival. Did you ever wonder how is it made. Cotton Candy is a sugar based product. Cotton candy contains sugar flavoring and a liquid packet. What the machine does is it mixes all these then It boils them. After it is boiled its sent to a spinning section that actually makes the oval shape. While it is spinning around in circles using centrifugal force it cools rapidly making it a crystal solid. Then it is pushed through tiny holes in the side of the walls and spun into a round ball. Then you have you puff of sugar at 220 calories and full of sweet flavor. Also every year 9.2$ million dollars of cotton candy is sold every year.  Maybe you can try making some cotton candy on your own. 

Cotton Candy Citation

Cotton Candy Citation

Picture Citation

BW1

BW1

   Have you ever been golfing before and had to take the cart path all the time? A famous golfer named Bubba Watson made a customized golf cart.  Most people think thats theres not many ways to customize a golf cart. Bubba took it to the extreme.

This is the BW1. First hovercraft golf cart in the world. This thing can go over the ponds and the lakes but most importantly it will not tear up the course. This hovercraft has a foot print pressure 33 percent less than a human. The BW1 cost 58,000 dollars. The hovercraft uses a 65-hp twin-cylinder Hirth engine and a streamlined, sound minimizing fan that promises enough power to reach 45 mph. This powerful hovercraft can fit two golfers and two caddies.

The science behind a hovercraft is simple. In every hovercraft it has a fan to creat a wind tunnel half the wind is used for steering and moving forward and backward, while the other half is used to keep the hover craft off the ground. Hovercrafts can float anywhere from 6" to 108". 

Photo Credits- http://www.fastcocreate.com/1682758/how-oakley-got-bubba-watson-behind-the-wheel-of-a-hovercraft-golf-cart

Information Credit- http://www.discoverhover.org/abouthovercraft/works.htm