Marie Curie by Caitlin

In November of 1867, Maria Skłodowska, today more commonly known as Marie Curie, was born to a polish family in Warsaw. She grew up in a well educated home, where learning was highly valued. Throughout her life, Marie Curie made many great scientific discoveries that helped the advancement of the atomic theory. These include her discovery of polonium and her discovery of radium. These contributions altered history.

The discovery of polonium began with Marie Curie experimenting with pitchblende, a radioactive mineral. She noticed that unrefined pitchblende was more radioactive than the uranium that she separated from it. She concluded that pitchblende contained at least one other radioactive element. Curie had to refine several tons of pitchblende to receive tiny amounts of polonium. One ton of uranium contains only 100 micrograms of polonium. She officially discovered this element in France in 1898.

Marie Curie’s next discovery was radium. She devised a way to separate radium from its radioactive residues. This made it possible for her to study the therapeutic properties of radium, which became one of her main interests. Marie Curie had to extract radium in the form of radium chloride, out of a substance called uraninite. Like she did with Polonium, she extracted uranium from this substance and found it was still radioactivity, so she continued researching until she found radium.

In summary, Marie Curie is one of the world’s greatest scientific minds. She helped with the development of the atomic theory by contributing to the idea of radioactivity, discovering polonium, and discovering radium. Among these great accomplishment, she also became the first woman to win Nobel prizes in two different subjects. She did these things through meticulous research and astounding perseverance.

Facts:

●     Her daughter also won a Nobel Prize.

●     First woman to win a Nobel Prize.

●     Curie name polonium after her home country, Poland.

Question:

●     What do you think the world would be like without Marie Curie’s work?

Machines by Chase

 Simple machines are basic mechanical devices for applying a force. Some simple machines are an inclined plane, wedge, and a screw. Examples for way people use these Simple Machines are screwing in screws in your deck, using a pulley to move a car engine, and a ramp to load things in the back or on something.

Compound Machines are more complex Simple machines, or a machine that uses two or more Simple Machines. Everyday objects are Complex Machines, Scissors, wheelbarrow, even a fishing reel is a complex machine. Isnt it amazing how objects around your house are simple or complex machines?

 The most interesting part of these are that almost everything you have is either a Simple Machine or Complex Machine. Like if you drive a car, that is hundreds if not thousands of simple machines. Even the stapler you use to turn in multiple page assignments is a compound machine.

I really hope that at least one time in the past few years of thinking more mature that you wonder what something is made of. If you didn't know what a simple or compound machine were would you be able to really know what that object is. You probably would be able to name things it is made of but did you know they were simple or complex machines?

            I think it is awesome how the things you use everyday are simple or complex machines, like without knowing what they were no way would you know if they were simple or complex. Like how awesome is it that you can be doing something you love, like fishing and be using a complex machine. 

Acids and Bases by Connor

Acids and bases are commonly used in chemistry, but they are found in other places. Places like your house or workplace all have acids and bases. Fruits and juices are acidic, and soap and detergent are basic. Acids and bases are categorized by many things. Acids are sour tasting, yet bases are bitter. A quick note, you should never taste acids or bases found in a chemistry lab because this can lead to bodily harm. Acids are the solution of a hydrogen ion, and bases are the solution of a hydroxide ion. They both conduct electricity, so they are both electrolytes. 

Acids, as many can tell by their name, are corrosive, but bases are also corrosive. Bases have a slippery, or soapy feel to them. A scientist named Johannes Nicolaus Bronsted created a theory about the classification of acids and bases. In this theory, it said that acids were H+ donors, or hydrogen ion donors, while bases were H+ acceptors. This theory was a far better one for classification because it was much broader than the Arrhenius theory beforehand, which didn’t apply to all acids or bases.

            There is a scale called the pH scale, which measures how strong an acid or base is. The scale goes from 0-14, with acids being 0-6 and bases being 8-14. The only spot that was excluded was 7 because pure water is neutral. Now, acids and bases are labeled strong or weak. They aren’t labeled weak because they have less affect or anything, but because they are less willing to: give H+ if an acid, or take H+ if a base. Another neat thing I learned about acids and bases is that they counteract each other. When combined, the two counteract one another, yet some have bigger counteractions than others. A question to take away from this could be ‘how many acids and bases do I have at my house alone?’ Finally, what I find most interesting about this topic is discovering that the juices I drink are acidic, and that I’m constantly drinking acids. 

Photosynthesis by Emily

●     Lab:

○     The lab that my class did was try to create a vacuum so that the leafs would sink. This took the air out of the leafs so that they would sink. Then the light would give them the air they needed back to float to the top.

●     Photosynthesis:

○      A process in which  plants use energy from the sun to transform water, carbon dioxide, and minerals into oxygen.

○     Plants produce oxygen during the process.  Photosynthesis is affected by temperature, light wavelengths, and carbon

○     dioxide level. Without plants / photosynthesis we wouldn’t be able to live.

●      My question for whoever is reading this would be, why is photosynthesis so important to living, and what is does to the Earth?

Coulomb’s Law by Maggie

  This week we learned about Coulomb’s law Which is represented by the equation F=k(q1q2)/r^2 .

            Coulomb’s Law states that Electrical Force between 2 charged objects is directly proportional to the product of the quantity of charge on the objects and inversely proportional to the square of the separation distance between 2 objects.

            Basicly it means that the force between two objects depends on the charge for each and how far apart the objects are. This was observed through an experiment called the Torsion Balance.  Where a bar had opposite charged on each side  and was put next to a charge the same as theirs, the bar was observed to turn in the direction of the opposite charge.

The man who discovered this was named Coulomb and he was a French Physicist known mostly for his work with friction and developing Coulomb’s Law.  Examples of this law can be found everyday, they are things like getting shocked after jumping on a trampoline or when you rub a balloon on your head and your hair sticks to is and forms static.  

Prey-Predator Relationships by Rachael

This week in Biology we have been doing a lab that is about predator-prey relationships among animals. The lab was specifically about owls and lemmings and how they interact with each other. In a predator-prey relationship both of the animals both rely on each other for their survival. The owls eat the lemmings and use them for energy so they are pretty important. The population of owls will go up when the population of lemmings go up because they need lemmings to survive. Then the amount of lemmings will go down because the owls keep eating them but then that causes the owl population to go down.

                                              

           A predator is an animal that eats other animals to survive. Predators rely on the prey they eat for energy so they can reproduce and populate their area. When a predator’s population goes up you immediately know that there was a rise in the population of the prey. Predators don’t just eat prey they feed off of other things too but they get most of their energy from other animals that they eat.

                                                     

Prey is an animal that is normally eaten by other animals. The population of prey relies on the amount of predators in the area. If the amount of prey goes down, then the amount of predators goes down which make the population of prey go back up. Something important to keep in mind is that predators can become prey just like how prey can become predators.   

              

Questions:

1.      What exactly is a predator?

2.      What is considered a prey?

3.      Can a predator become the prey and if so how?

4.      How is the prey-predator relationship so important?

Heat, Temperature and Thermal Energy by Mesa

    

Heat, temperature, and thermal energy all involve the movement of particles in an object. Thermal energy is the overall energy of the individual particles that an object has. If two objects are the exact same except one is twice as big as the other, then the larger object will have twice as much thermal energy as the smaller object. Temperature, which might seem the same as thermal energy, is much more simple than thermal energy as it calculates itself by the overall average of the kinetic energy in the object’s particles. Using the same example as before, the larger and smaller object would have the same temperature even though there is a size difference.

   Heat is related to thermal energy in that it is just the transfer of thermal energy from a hotter object to a colder object. Imagine your finger is 90 degrees F. and it touches a 60 degrees F. floor. Your finger’s thermal energy would then transfer to the floor until you finger and the floor are the same temperature. I personally think that thermal energy is the most interesting thing in this topic as it is involved in basically every other energy related thing in this topic. I also think that the equation used to find the change of thermal energy in an object is neat because of how complicated and hard it is to figure out. (This is true as I’m one of those weird kids who likes the equations used to find stuff out.)

   Did you know that the study of heat is called Thermodynamics and the study of any other type of energy including thermal? Also an object becomes hot if the particles in it move faster creating kinetic energy and an object becomes colder if the particles move slower. Another fact is that if an object doesn’t produce it’s own thermal energy, then it adjusts to have the same thermal energy as the air or objects around it. Here’s a little random question, do humans produce their own heat, and if they do, then what would happen to us if we didn’t produce our own heat?

Ecosystem In A Bottle by Teresa

The last couple weeks we were doing a project in biology. Every group built a biome out of a bottle. And now I want to talk about what a biome is.

The biome we did was a closed ecosystem that can survive without any help from outside for a long time. Our ecosystem contained 3 different plants, soil, sand, stones and water and there were two worms in it  but you can put in whatever you like. Some of the kids in our class had some snails or even fish and they are still alive. That proves that the ecosystem actually works. The only things which influence the ecosystem from the outside are light and heat.

During the day the plants in there are doing photosynthesis and produce oxygen and glucose and these are helping them to produce biomass and grow. To complete photosynthesis the plants need carbon dioxide, water and sunlight.

The plants get the water that they need through their roots and releases it  through their stomata in the air. Because of the heat outside the bottle the water evaporates, condenses on the bottle and eventually will fall off as rain. The water cycle is really important for the ecosystem as it is in the “real world”. It makes sure that the soil and the plants always have enough water.

The plants produce all the things they need for the cellular respiration. And that’s what they’re doing at night. They turn the glucose by consumption of oxygen into carbon dioxide and water and that is what they need for photosynthesis.

The animals in there for example the worms are helping by using some of the oxygen the plants produce.

A little ecosystem is like a big ecosystem, it is combined by many different cycles and they determine and make it possible for plants or animals to live in there. I think this is really interesting. How you can create your own world in a bottle. The three best things about it would be 1. You don’t have to do anything to help it, once it’s closed, 2. It rains in it and 3. Animals can survive in it.

How does ATP work in an effective manner? by Charlie

This week in Advanced Biology we were learning about ATP which means  adenosine Triphosphate.  ATP is one of the main sources of energy within a cell.  They are made up of adenine, a ribose sugar, and 3 phosphate groups. ATP is reused again and again by the body.  If it wasn’t reused the amount needed for a single day would add around 500 more pounds to the human body. 

ADP is very similar the only thing is that it has 2 phosphate groups instead of 3.  For an ATP to change to an ADP it has to go through hydrolysis which is when water is introduced and it breaks off the 3rd phosphate and releases energy.  The energy is ‘stored’ between the phosphate groups this is called potential energy.  Like I said the ATP is recycled this is done through Phosphorylation.  Which is when another Phosphate group is attached making it an ATP again.     

The energy created through the hydrolysis is used for active transport across the cell membrane, muscle movement, and protein synthesis.  The energy from ATP is the base of energy in the body and is used for a variety of different things.  

Potential Energy by Kateri

Potential energy is the stored energy of an object. Three types of potential energy are elastic potential energy, gravitational potential energy, and chemical potential energy.

Elastic potential energy is stored in objects that can stretch, and sometimes compress. Balloons, springs, diving boards, and rubber bands are just a few examples of things that can hold elastic potential energy. Stretching a rubber band requires energy, and that energy is changed into potential energy. When the rubber band is let go, the energy is released.

The next type of potential energy is gravitational potential energy. The higher up an object is place, the more gravitational potential energy an object has. This energy is built up because of gravity. When an object is dropped from a high space, the potential energy is directly changed into kinetic energy. If two objects of different masses are held at the same height, and then dropped, the object with the heavier mass will fall faster. Air resistance can have an effect on how fast an object falls. For example, a crumpled piece of paper will fall faster than an unfolded piece of paper because it is more aerodynamic.

Potential energy can also be found in the chemical bonds of a substance. This type of energy is called chemical potential energy. Gasoline is an example of where you can find chemical potential energy. Gasoline in it’s liquid form holds energy, and this energy can be released when gasoline is lit on fire. When gasoline is burnt, part of the energy turns into work, but heat is also produced which is why car engines  become so hot. Batteries also hold chemical potential energy, and batteries sure are useful. Food is another example of chemical potential energy, and the energy in this food is very important. The stored energy is released when food is digested. Thanks to potential energy, you have enough energy to do basically anything.

It is amazing that energy can be stored in something as simple as a rubber band. Potential energy stored in foods are especially important, perhaps the most important way energy is stored.

Could potential energy in food be used to power cars?

Periodic Table by Joe

The periodic table is one of the most well known and widely used applications in chemistry, easily recognizable by the manner in which it organizes all known elements in a table in ascending order of Atomic Number.

Development:

The first widely accepted periodic table was published by Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev in 1869. He achieved this by ordering the properties of the known elements, and was even able to predict where unknown elements would appear once they were discovered.

Organization:

The elements are grouped according to their characteristics. The most obvious organization line falls between the metals and nonmetals, which can be viewed by the diagonal fracture on the right side of the table, where the brown elements, the metalloids, bridge the gap between the metals on the left, and the nonmetals on the right.

Application:

The periodic table is immensely useful for reference, as it is possible to determine the number of elements in a given material by using the atomic mass of an indicated element.

Interesting Facts:

➔    There are 118 known elements at the published time.

➔    The rows are called periods, and the columns are called groups.

➔    90 of the elements on the table are naturally occurring. The others are synthetically created.

Question:

What is the significance of having a single reference picture for all elements? Why is it so important that the information be organized in the manner in which it appears on all periodic tables?

Peanut butter cookie lab by Arissa

In Kitchen Chemistry the class learns how to conduct and do their own experiments. At the end of the experiment we often get to eat the results of experiment we made. The last experiment my group and I conducted was to compare how different lipids (Butter, Olive oil, Coconut oil) would change the outcome of peanut butter cookies.

          In this experiment we compared the density of peanut butter cookies using olive oil, coconut oil, and butter.  We wanted to see how dense the cookies would be. We decided to measure the cookies in cm in the center of them to get the best results.

Our hypothesis was that if we used olive oil and coconut oil instead of butter the cookies would be more dense because butter is more solid.

At the end of our experiment we measured up the cookies and averaged them.

We were wrong! The olive oil cookies were the biggest in height (cm) ! So we concluded that lipids do have an effect on the things we bake.

Interesting facts: 

●     Out of five taste tests all five liked the peanut butter cookies made with coconut oil the best!

●     Not only were the cookies made with butter less dense but they had the worst texture.

●     The cookies made with olive oil tended to be sticker then the cookies made with butter or coconut oi.

*Note from Ms. Raino. height does not equal density.