Blood Camera

This article is about a study carried out by Glenn Porter a scientist at the University of Western Sydney in Australia. This study was about a camera that can find blood under paint. How they made this work is they changed the type of lens that the camera would be using so it could be a regular camera first and then one that looks for blood. With the new lens, the camera can see infrared light. They used several different types of paint including colors. The camera found blood under six layers of black paint!!!!

They hope that this will help with forensics and police with evidence and how they can now find evidence from an old case that they thought where a dead end. I do think that it is stupid how they mentioned that there was only one type of paint that the blood was unseen by the camera. They told what color it is and what kind. However, this also has some positives to it like how it can help with forensics and police crimes by making their job easier and quicker.

http://www.sciencenewsforkids.org/2012/08/crime-solving-camera/

-Hayley Hillison, 2nd Period

Therapeutic Guinea Pigs

This is an article about a study on guinea pigs and kids with autism. Maggie O’Haire, a doctoral candidate psychology at the University of Queensland, carried out this study. The study found that children with autism were more talkative and happy with the guinea pigs than with toys. They were in classrooms and interacted with people with when they had the pigs. O’Haire says that people actually look at you differently when you are holding a pet. They see you as sweeter, friendlier, happier, and less threatening. The animals give people something to talk about and make everyone calmer.

This is very interesting to me because I have two guinea pigs myself. I have never once thought that could be help to people with disorders. It just seems so cool that such a small animal could help with such a big thing. I have always thought that animals helped with depression but I never would have thought of them helping with disorders. I have neighbors who have a little boy with autism and I would love to see if by letting him play with my guinea pigs what changes might take place. I hope that we can find a way to get places like schools, doctor offices, and many more places to consider getting a pet guinea pig to help them with children with autism.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/02/27/172965436/how-guinea-pigs-could-help-autistic-children

-Hayley Hillison, 2nd Period

Animal Warfare

In Guam, brown tree snakes have wiped the birds that live only in Guam and lots of other birds. The snakes can grow to more than 10 feet and are everywhere in the jungles. They are causing power outages, blackouts and sneak into homes. These are snakes that bite but don’t kill you. There is a big worry that they get into Hawaii and kill all their birds which don’t know what to do about a snake like that. The snakes got to Guam on boats and the US government is afraid the snakes will get on a plane to Hawaii.

So in Guam they are going to drop dead baby mice with the stuff in Tylenol. The snakes are allergic to that stuff and unlike most snakes, they will eat the dead baby mice even if they didn’t kill them. They’ll drop the mice by hand from a helicopter but they’ll have streamers on them to stick in the trees where the snakes live. This made me think of those little guys with plastic parachutes that are fun to throw and watch their parachutes pop out. But with dead baby mice. GROSS.

I hope this works because Hawaii has a lot of cool animals and I haven’t been yet so I don’t want anything to happen to the place before I get to see it. After I see it, I don’t care. I’m kidding of course. I hope it stays nice always.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/to-battle-a-slithery-enemy-us-to-air-drop-mice-laced-with-drugs-toxic-to-guam-tree-snakes/2013/02/22/dcdc90ac-7cbc-11e2-9073-e9dda4ac6a66_story.html

Hayley Hillison, 2nd Period

Cat Walk

This article explains how some animals can use the earth’s magnetic fields to navigate around the earth. This all fits in with how a cat was lost and walked 200 miles back to its hometown. So to help us understand how an animal can do that this article tells you that some animals for example the loggerhead turtle are born with a magnetic field of the ocean mapped out to where they are supposed to go when they first hatch. Some animals have to have certain things visible to them so they can make it to the place they need to be. Dung beetles can make their poop into a straight line as long as the Milky Way is visible. Bees can see patterns in sunlight that we cannot see. There are lots of things animals can sense that we can’t.
To me this is very interesting because I always thought animals used their sight to be able to get where they need to be. Now I know that it is just more than sight it is also many other things. I think this will help me understand why some animals get lost. It’s not just because they were left behind, it may also be because they have lost the ability to sense their way to things.

How a Kitty Walked 200 Miles Home: The Science of Your Cat’s Inner Compass

-Hayley Hillison, 2nd Period

Rat Friends

Did you know that some animals can choose friends in need over treats? This article is about a study done with two rats. Both rats were put in a plexi glass cage but one rat was free to run around while the other was put in a second cage inside of the plexi glass cage. The freed rat would free the other rat 23 out of 30 times. But scientist wanted to make it an even tougher decision. Therefore, they put another cage in with the five white chocolate chips in it, a favorite treat for the type of rat. Again, the free rat would help the trapped rat escape and then instead of blocking the doorway into the cage with chocolate chips, they would share the chips. Sometimes the free rat would even bring the chips to their newly freed friends. This is very sweet to me how they share it. They plan to follow up on this and use another common lab animal the mouse to see what results they will get from them. Maybe we should not use the word ‘rat’ the way we do because it turns out rats can be caring creatures.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=jailbreak-rat

-Hayley Hillison, 3rd Period

Mock Mars Mission

This article is about the sleeping problems that astronauts might face going on a trip to Mars. Mars is a big deal right now. The article talks about a study done by a scientist from the US but in Russia. This study used six different people and a fake mission to Mars. It observed what the people would do on a trip to Mars by measuring their movements with something on their wrist.

The study was 520 days long and they lived in a windowless capsule in Russia. One of the things being looked at was their sleep patterns. Four of the men developed sleep problems. One slept a lot less and wasn’t very alert.

When you are doing stuff in space, it can be really risky. It can be life or death for you and everyone else. So people need to have enough sleep to do important job on the trip and when they get there.

When I don’t get enough sleep, I get cranky and mad. If the astronauts don’t get enough sleep and are stuck in a small space together, they could end up with a very long miserable time together.

-Hayley Hillison, 2nd Period

Animal Crossing

When we drive to school in the morning, we come down Highway 55 because we live in Cary. I always hate seeing dead animals on the side of the road. Sometimes I start to cry over them especially the deer on the side of the road.

I found out there is a solution to helping animals not be killed by cars on highways and it is called animal bridges. This article shows very cool photos of them. The bridges are constructed so they have greenery on them and can go over or under highways. I haven’t seen any here but this site show photos of them from all over including some in the USA like in Montana and New Jersey. They are really pretty and colorful.

The bridges are good for humans too so we don’t get hurt in car accidents. Also it helps us share the environment with animals because our roads and houses are built on their habitats. I wish they would build on over highway 55 to protect them.

-Hayley Hillison, 2nd Period

Antimicrobial Mouthwash

I watched a cool science video that was about a new anti-microbial mouthwash being studied. It fights the growth of bad bacteria by only getting rid of the harmful streptococcus mutants bacteria that stay in the mouth on your teeth.
In the video, a researcher at UCLA and his team spent 10 years developing this special new mouthwash that uses something called STAMPS to target the bacteria called Streptococcus mutants and then remains on the teeth for a while. This is the main bacteria that are responsible for tooth decay. In their test, 12 people used the mouthwash once and the bacteria were completely washed away for four days.
I think that if this were to be used by all children then it would help with have fewer cavities. If people were to use this then later in the life they would not have to get false teeth. If I could actually buy this stuff, I would use it so I’d keep away more cavities and keep my teeth healthy. I don’t want to get false teeth!

-Hayley Hillison, 2nd Period

Human Emissions and Pine-Tree Gases Combine to Pollute the Air

This video explains that pollution can even come from trees. We normally think of pollution as coming from factories, cars and stuff humans do. But they did a study and it showed that pine trees are a big contributor to pollution. They give off gases can combine with human’s pollution and can make an even 3 times more harmful pollution. They affect the air quality in a big way. Areas with a lot of factories and a lot of trees have some of worst air quality that the study found.
I always thought that it was most pollution was from human actions and I didn’t think something natural like trees could play a part in it. In the future they need to plan things differently where they build factories and stuff. Maybe there is a way to make the combination not so heavy and dangerous. I’m curious are there other trees that aren’t harmful like the pine trees that could help? Are all the trees in the pine tree family dangerous?

-Hayley Hillison, 2nd Period

Shape Shifting Bat Ears

This is related to science because it is studying bats and how their ears help them navigate. With their ears, they change the shape of it faster than the blink of an eye. Scientist are using 3-d models to show how different ear shapes give bats different information back from the sound waves they send out. The sound waves they send out are a type of sonar. By studying this, researchers hope to apply this new find to microphone and navigation technology that adapts to sound much like the bats ear does. I think that if they do find away to put this into navigation technology we might be able to use sonar just like bats do at night and send sound waves out and when we receive them back to adjust how something is moving without someone having to control it by hand like a car or plane.

-Hayley Hillison, 2nd Period