Ecology--flowers!

These flowers can be biotic limiting factors and also a population. What these do is they take water from the ground so that other plants cannot get it. They grow roots that can keep weeds or small plants away from their growing space. There are many of them, so they provide a place for bees to collect pollen, leaves for caterpillars and other bugs to feed, and they block sunlight from reaching the ground with their long leaves to keep other things from growing.

2010 -- 2011

Hey people! Who's ready for another AWESOME year?! Let's all grab those beakers, warm up those Bunsen burners and head on over to the lab tables, 'cause we've got a lot to do! (Although chemistry was last year...)

How Is Popcorn Made?

As most of use usually do, we make our popcorn out of the microwave or an air popper. However, not many people know how it actually pops. In this specific lab, we used a microwave, which uses convection to cook the popcorn. The kernels have a small drop or water inside which is protected my the hard outer shell. When the kernels are heated, the energy increases due to the increase in heat. Then when the pressure inside is too much for the outer shell to hold...pop!

New Branch In Human Evolution?

"It was a shock to find DNA from a new type of ancestor that has not been on our radar screens", says Svante Pääbo of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. In the Altai Mountains of southern Siberia, Svante uncovered what seems to be the DNA of a new hominid line. A hominid is an animal belonging to the family of mammals linking humans and primates together through evolution. However, the connection was not discovered through fossils. Instead it was discovered through the DNA in the remnants of a finger bone belonging to this hominid living in the Altai Mountains 48,000 to 30,000 years ago. It is the first time a species or evolution classification has been done through a genetic sequence! These creatures left Africa about 1 million years ago, according to Pääbo and Johannes Krause, a graduate of Max Planck. This hominid that was discovered in particular was named "X woman", as the sex of the creature found has not yet been discovered. Scientists compared the DNA to that of 54 people living today, a Siberian human from about 30,000 years ago, six Neanderthals from about 40,000 years ago, and a modern pygmy chimpanzee and common chimp. Of course, they had their differences. “That number of differences is good evidence for a new hominid because simple variation can’t account for it,” states Morten Rasmussen of the University of Copenhagen. Next is to extract and examine nuclear DNA which is needed to determine the sex of X woman. but the classification could be wrong, due to interbreeding between species. "...there are massive genetic differences between X woman and both Neanderthals and modern humans,” states Pääbo. Due to this, there may be some species in the hominid family that aren't hominids, due to interbreeding.

Earthquake In Haiti

As you may have already heard, there was an earthquake in Haiti on January 12. It reached a magnitude of 7.0 on its first strike, at least ten aftershocks following. Two of them measured at 5.9 and 5.8. The force was so immense, that the entire city of Port-Au-Prince is covered in debris from concrete houses collapsing. The quake was centered about ten miles away from the city, and "could be felt strongly in eastern Cuba...", according to CNN. Downed buildings, trees, power lines and everything else imaginable cover the hills and roads of Haiti, crushing victims. An estimate by the international Red Cross reads about 45,000 to 50,000 people died during this tragedy. Many efforts of relief to those in Haiti have been launched worldwide to help out, along with many charities. Everybody is willing to help out. Many camps have been set up by the Haitians while some try to find refuge in the rubble that was left behind. "...the silence of the dead otherwise was overwhelming in a city where uncounted bodies littered the streets in the 80-degree heat, and dust-caked arms and legs reached, frozen and lifeless, from the ruins." says Yahoo! News. The U.S. began with about one million dollars in aid, and is continuing to reach out to these people with a countless amount of charities. However, not everybody is helping each other out in the dust and rocks. People have almost begun fights over food and water from donators. Hope is being sucked away from the citizens. Most search for loved ones as others pray to survive. But with all of the world trying to help these homeless people, I do not doubt that they will recover.

Observing Changes In Matter - Sugar!

Lately in science class, we have been studying exothermic and endothermic changes. To put it to the test, we proceeded with a lab using sugar. It showed us what some types of changes look like when it comes to matter. We started off with four sugar cubes, a glass of water, a spoon, mortar and pestle, Bunsen burner (ouch!), test tube, and tongs. Observing the sugar cubes as the easiest. And the sweetest! They looked like any other sugar cubes, but they were in for a beating! We then mashed them up with the mortar and pestle. After this, we observed the sugar, now a powder instead of a cube, again. We then poured the powder into the glass of water. After stirring it for about 20 seconds, the sugar was hardly even visible anymore, but it was still in there. And then came the really fun part!

We carefully put 2 sugar cubes in to the test tube and let our teacher light the Bunsen burner. Carefully holding the test tube over the flame with the tongs, the sugar quickly melted and expanded, filling up more of the test tube as a liquid than as a solid. It bubbled and popped inside and the beige liquid soon turned brown, then black as we pulled the test tube off of the burner. Smoke flew out of it and it didn’t smell so sweet anymore. When we got the "sugar" out of the tube it was hard and crumbled on the table. But i did observe something awfully familiar. The smell of the sugar while it was burning smelled like a marshmallow. So the smell and taste of a marshmallow is actually just the sugar, and not any flavorings.

Again, time to observe. It had small holes, like craters, all over it. Probably from the boiling, I thought. So the changes we made in part a, grinding it, was just a physical change. It didn’t change anything major about it because it's still sugar. When in part B, burning it, it was a chemical change because we cannot un-burn it.

Extra Credit!: Quote Response

In Science the credit goes to the man who convinces the world, not to the man to whom the idea first occurred.
Sir William Osler (1849-1919) Canadian physician.



To me, this quote is true. If you make a discovery but don't reveal it, nobody will know that they discovered anything at all .Although when another person does, they will get the publicity for it. You need to explain and reveal to people what you have achieved and not keep it under your hat. Think about the pain you will feel if you were to discover someone wlse is getting what you could have gotten.