Water Intoxication: Hold your wee for a Wii contest

Here is the article we read in class from the New York Times "The Lede" blog. 

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/01/15/too-high-a-price-for-a-wii/

Take a look at this short MSNBC news story about Jennifer Strange and her death by hyponatremia.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16614865/ns/us_news-life/

This link describes the sports medicine concern with hyponatremia that occurs in athletes who sweat a lot during an event, and then drink large amounts of water. Jennifer was not sweating like an athlete, but her body reacted in a similar way.

http://sportsmedicine.about.com/od/hydrationandfluid/a/Hyponatremia.htm

CBS News also did a story a few days later explaining a bit more about the consequences for the people who worked for the radio station.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/01/18/national/main2369761.shtml

It turns out that the DJs were joking about a person who died from water intoxication two years prior to their Wii contest... so they knew it was dangerous. The radio station was sued by Jennifer Strange's family and had to pay them quite a bit. The following article from the LA Times newspaper gives the details.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/10/jury-awards-16-million-in-radio-prank-that-left-sacramentoarea-woman-dead-.html

Cells in the News!

New Methods Could Speed Up Repair Of Injured Nerves

- John Hamilton, NPR

Nerves, of course, are cells which transmit information in our brain and between the brain and the rest of the body. Many scientists used to believe that nerve cells almost never repaired themselves. Some researchers are finding that there may be ways to help nerve cells regenerate to repair nerve injuries.

Story from National Public Radio http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2012/02/27/147344516/new-methods-could-speed-up-repair-of-injured-nerves

Study Suggests Way To Create New Eggs In Women

- ROB STEIN, NPR

Scientists are finding that there may be ways to help women's ovaries to produce new eggs after their normal egg supply runs out. This may help women - especially women over 40 - to have children who might not have been able to otherwise. 

Story from National Public Radio http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2012/02/27/147344258/study-suggests-way-to-create-new-eggs-in-women

Identifying Microorganisms

Use the following websites to help you identify as many of the organisms you can see in our pond water sample as possible. Draw detailed diagrams of the organisms you see and draw a comparison diagram from one of the websites.

You MUST try to identify the organisms you see in your water sample by using the images and descriptions you find on the websites. Take a look at several of the websites before you decide which one you want to use first.

Pond Water Critters ID page

http://www.microscope-microscope.org/applications/pond-critters/pond-critters.htm

Pond Life ID kit

http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/index.html?http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/pond/index.html

http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/mag/indexmag.html?http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/mag/wimsmall/smal1.html

Microbus

http://www.microscope-microscope.org/microscope-home.htm

Virtual Pond Dip

http://sciencenetlinks.com/esheets/virtual-pond-dip/

AAAS Pond Water A Closer Look

http://sciencenetlinks.com/student-teacher-sheets/pond-water-closer-look/

Pond 2 – Life in a drop of Pond Water

http://sciencenetlinks.com/lessons/pond-2-life-in-a-drop-of-pond-water/

Once you think you've identified a microorganism you may search for other images or videos of it online to confirm your identification.

For example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmwN_mD7TvY 
and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocv67Px49AA&feature=results_main&playnext=1&list=PL3900A98EEBD72DC2

Also try to identify any organelles you can in the microorganisms you observe. You may see nuclei or flagella or other organelles.

Flash Animation of Cells to DNA – Compares Eukaryotic cells to bacteria and zooms from chromosomes to chromatin to dna.

http://sciencenetlinks.com/media/filer/2011/10/13/dna.swf

Cell Size and Scale - interactive

http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/begin/cells/scale/

Second Semester Begins with CELLS!

What are cells? Who discovered them? Why do they matter? What are they made of? How do they work? What happens when they don't work right?

These are all questions we will be investigating during our Cells unit.

We're starting out with the film "The Cell - The Hidden Kingdom" which shows how cells were first discovered in the 1600s.  The website for the film is http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00m425d  and you can watch it in 10 minute chunks on YouTube here or you can search for "The Cell The Hidden Kingdom." (the YouTube link will not work in school because CPS blocks YouTube, but you can watch it outside of school.)

The Cell - The Hidden Kingdom - photo from BBC website. 

It traces the work of Antony Van Leeuwenhoek, Robert Hooke, Robert Brown, Joseph Lister, Theodore Schwann, Matthias Schleiden, Rudolph Virchow, Luis Pasteur, Robert Remak and others as they discovered that all living things are made of cells and that all cells come from other cells.

Van Leeuwenhoek's single lens microscopes were the most powerful for over a century after his death.
image from  bibliodyssey.blogspot.com/2008/08/early-microscopes.html

Here is a link to Robert Hooke's book, Micrographia you can click on the links to the right of the test in the e-book to see the amazing drawings that Hooke created.

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/15491/15491-h/15491-h.htm

Hooke's drawing of the face of a housefly from Micrographia. Image from www.Gutenberg.org

Macromolecules - Lipids, Carbohydrates, Proteins and Nucleic Acids

Certain types of Macromolecules (a.k.a. Big Molecules) such as Lipids, Carbohydrates, Proteins and Nucleic Acids are the building blocks that make up all cells in all living things.

These special molecules each have certain characteristics which allow them to perform unique functions in cells that, in turn, allow cells to function.

Since humans are living things which are made up of cells, our bodies must either ingest (eat) or synthesize (put together) these special macromolecules in order to stay healthy.

The following links are to articles that relate to health issues that arise from imbalances in these macromolecules.

Lipids:

When Being Overweight is a Health Problem

http://kidshealth.org/teen/food_fitness/dieting/obesity.html 

Five Ways to Achieve and Maintain a Healthy Weight

http://kidshealth.org/teen/food_fitness/dieting/weight_tips.html#cat20131

Obesity in Children and Adolescents: Facts for Families
http://www.aacap.org/cs/root/facts_for_families/obesity_in_children_and_teens


Carbohydrates:

Click on THIS LINK to see an animation about diabetes and its relationship to carbohydrates

Type 2 Diabetes: What is it?  http://kidshealth.org/parent/medical/endocrine/type2.html#a_About_Diabetes 

Teens with Diabetes: Chicago Tribune
http://www.chicagotribune.com/health/sns-health-diabetes-teens-with-diabetes,0,5075500.story 

Teen Diabetes: Kaboose. com
http://health.kaboose.com/kids-health/teens-wellness-diabetes.html

Building Molecules Virtual Lab

Goals of the lab:
1. Understand the difference between atoms and molecules and recognize how how different atoms can come together to make various molecules.
2. Learn several new molecule names and their chemical formulas.
3. Recognize that the subscript describes how many atoms are in a molecule and that if there is no subscript that means that there is one of that type of atom in a molecule.
4. Recognize that the coefficient is a number which describes how many of a particular molecule is present.


Click on the image below to download and run the virtual molecule lab. It takes a few minutes to download and run, so be patient. 

Click to Run

If clicking on the image does not work you can go to http://phet.colorado.edu/en/simulation/build-a-molecule and click on "run now."


Have fun making lots of different types of molecules and collecting them all.

Powers of Ten

This classic film shows the power of "adding a zero." It starts off looking at a one meter square picnic scene near the shore of Lake Michigan. The camera pulls back to reveal 10 square meters, than 100, then 1000 then 10,000 etc... until the viewer is at the edge of the known universe many millions of light-years away from Earth. Then the viewer gets pulled back into the picnic scene... finally into the man's skin, into a blood vessel and eventually into a carbon atom in the man's DNA.

You can watch the film at this link.

This movie is introducing our basic chemistry unit. In order for us to understand the universe and the living things in it (Bio, after all, means life) we must understand the matter of which they're made. Since all living things are made up of atoms and molecules we need to understand how these basic building blocks of matter interact.