Innholdsfortegnelse for February 2019 i Muse: The magazine of science, culture, and smart laughs for kids and children

1 Identify the Problem Team members list concerns in their community. They spend weeks reflecting. With time, they narrow it to one. Homelessness is a major problem, and it’s on the rise. “We see homeless people in our community—at church, on the streets, and in our family,” the team blogs. But can they really make a difference? The DIY Girls InvenTeam digs in deeper. 2 Research The students learn more about the problem. They read articles and listen to podcasts. Then they interview people who serve L.A.’s homeless population. The team visits The Homeless Studio at the University of Southern California (USC). There, architecture students build homes from discarded supplies. USC builders discuss tools, materials, and structures. The DIY Girls InvenTeam decides to design a tent for a mother and…

For the SOAR Early College High School InvenTeam, the path to the 2018 EurekaFest at MIT began very close to home. It was on a walk through the school’s California campus. Watching their fellow students, they realized that many kids travel solo. And they’re not looking around. “We have our ear buds in, our hoodie up,” says Madelen Flores. She’s on the team and a senior at the school. “We’re not really aware of what is around us, and not every place is lit.” Keeping an Iris Out When team members saw walkers without much awareness of their surroundings, they perceived a problem. A sudden movement—or even an attacker—might startle these walkers. Meanwhile, the team conducted a survey of college students in southern California. It confirmed that many students don’t…

Mark Agostinelli and several of his classmates descend into the dolphin cave. It’s a dark and dusty school basement in Hyannis, Massachusetts, a coastal community located on Cape Cod. Amidst the clutter of old school desks and construction equipment sits something the size of a snowmobile. It looks sort of like a gigantic child’s wagon, but with oversized wheels and a canvas sling. It was designed to rescue dolphins. Today, though, the invention is the one in need of rescue. Mark and his friends are here to take it out of the basement. They plan to get it ready to make a difference in the real world. We’re Gonna Need a Better Cart Four years earlier, in 2011, a different group of students had come together with a goal. They…

WILL YOU develop a vaccine to cure a deadly illness or innovate the next social media fad? Or maybe you’ll improve the way we travel or create a must-have app. Sure, you’re capable of inventing something wonderful. But what will it be? Here’s a fun, easy way to start finding out. Inventors’ personalities, work habits, and outlooks on life help shape their inventions. The result? Great inventions often reflect the women and men who made them. For example, Thomas Edison was energetic and impatient. He aimed for an invention every ten days and held more than a thousand patents. By contrast, Edison’s rival Nicola Tesla focused for years on ambitious projects. Scientists are still developing some of Tesla’s revolutionary ideas. What kind of inventor will you be? For a few…

You’re done with your ear buds, so you carefully coil the headphone cord around your phone and stuff it in your pocket. The next time you take it out, however, you find that you have to unravel the cord and undo a knot before you can go back to listening to your favorite podcast. In fact, it’s pretty amazing how easily knots can form by themselves—not only in headphone cords, but also in necklaces, strings of holiday lights, or garden hoses. Two physicists at the University of California in San Diego decided to do some experiments to try to find out why knots form so easily in coiled strings. They looked at what happens when a long string is coiled into a box and the box is then tumbled. The…

Do you dream up inventions? Ever thought about entering one of your inventions in a contest? In 2018, Kavi, 9, and Hamsini, 11, entered Spark!Lab Dr. InBae Yoon Invent It Challenge. Each won an award for their age division. They shared their experiences with us. KAVI’S JOURNEY “ I like to imagine inventions to solve problems,” says Kavi. That’s why he entered the challenge. (He adds, “I also was hoping to win a free trip to Washington DC.”) The contest called for new ideas for natural disaster preparation or relief. For Kavi, that meant an invention to deal with drought. After researching drought and ways he might solve it, Kavi designed a sponge tube to suck water from soil. But he was far from finished. “I have made more than…

INVENTIONS IMPROVE our lives. But not all of them. Every once in a while, a bizarre, outlandish, or downright silly idea appears on Kickstarter, Indiegogo, or another crowdfunding platform. Of the four real inventions below, which do you think most deserves to quietly fade away? And which would you maybe want for your very own? Fish on Wheels Ordinary fish tanks just sit there. That’s a huge problem for a pet fish that wants to see the world (or at least the next room). This invention gives fish wheels. Literally. A fish tank sits on top of a robotic car. A camera watches the fish, and the car drives in the same direction that the fish swims. In a video, a goldfish takes the prototype for a spin. Light-Up Toilet…

Growing up near Los Angeles, California, Aracely Chavez often saw homeless people. So when she and a group of her high-school classmates set out to invent something that would help others, they thought of a tent. As participants in DIY Girls, an afterschool program, the 12 students designed and built a high-tech tent. It folds up into a backpack. It has solar panels that power a phone charger and lights. (The team imagined that if a homeless family had their tent, kids could use the lights to do their homework.) The team also planned to add a system for cleaning the inside of the tent with ultraviolet light. Their project won a $10,000 grant from the Lemelson-MIT Program. The girls sewed, soldered, and programmed a prototype. Then they traveled to…

Q: If everything the human brain does is basically sets of electrical impulses, how exactly does that translate into a state of mind? —Alejandro M., age 15, Washington A: You’re not the only one asking this question. Every neuroscientist in the world is wondering the exact same thing, says Zach Mainen, who studies the brain and mind at—get this—the Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown in Lisbon, Portugal. In fact, it’s one of the biggest mysteries in science. Here’s what neuroscientists do know: certain parts of the brain are responsible for—or at least involved in creating—certain experiences, feelings, and abilities. For example, your ability to speak seems to depend in part on a particular piece of your left frontal lobe called Broca’s area, named after the doctor who discovered it in…

The arm on display dazzles viewers. It consists of 3D-printed plastic pieces with windshield-wiper motors to power its joints and knuckles. Brainwaves from an EEG (electroencephalography) headset control its movement. The user imagines giving a thumbs-up, and the limb obeys, curling the fingers into a fist while sprouting the thumb upwards. Wave, pitch a ball, grab and hold—the robotic arm proves very capable. THE GRAND PRIZE Surprisingly, the arm was not forged in a glimmering laboratory by teams of brilliant scientists with millions of dollars to spend. Sixteen-year-old Easton LaChappelle designed, built, and programmed the invention, now on display at the 2012 Colorado State Science Fair. “I actually did this in my bedroom,” he grins. The robotic arm won first and third place in different categories. But Easton is too…