How do you get kids excited about science that’s so small they can’t see or touch it? Balloon models, live animals, and action figures of course! The newest kid-friendly tools for teaching about the ultrasmall were big hits at LHS Nano Days.
Sculpting balloons into hexagons, Cal engineering students created a giant model of a carbon nanotube. “While the children did just see balloons in the model,” said undergrad Spencer Lin, “they learned in a hands-on manner the importance of the shape, orientation, and connection points of the balloons in continuing the nanotube’s hexagonal pattern.” Real nanotubes (which can only be seen with highly specialized microscopes) are sheets of carbon atoms in hexagonal patterns, rolled into tubes. Scientists predict that nanotubes, only a few billionths of a meter in size, could become building blocks for amazing new electronic devices, from tiny computers to powerful sensors.
LHS docent Roger Edelson introduced nanotech in nature with a live gecko from the Animal Discovery Room. As the gecko climbed its terrarium’s glass walls, the motion showed off the clinging force of “invisible” nanosized split ends on the gecko’s toe hairs. UC Berkeley biologists’ discoveries about how geckos stick are helping Cal engineers create "gecko tape,” superstrong adhesive that peels off easily and can be reused indefinitely.
Berkeley Lab scientist Steve Whitelam gave visitors a hands-on lesson in the nanotech process of “self-assembly,” by transforming action figures into teaching tools. Using pieces of Superion, his favorite childhood Transformer, Whitelam demonstrated how bits of matter can, or cannot, arrange and rearrange themselves into large patterns. Self-assembly at the nanoscale, where matter behaves differently, may hold promise for incredible inventions such as molecular robots for medicine and manufacturing.
At the end of a long Nanoday, student Lin said he felt “nostalgic seeing science exhibits similar to the ones that spurred my curiosity when I was much younger.“
Two weeks of LHS Nano Days were part of celebrations across the country, supported by the National Science Foundation and sponsored by the Nanoscale Informal Science Education (NISE) network. As a NISE regional hub, and developer of the pioneering NanoZone exhibit, LHS is helping other science museums in the western U.S. develop nanotech education programs. To download a Nano Days kit, go to http://www.nisenet.org/nanodays/kit/digital. If you missed Nano Days, you can still visit the NanoZone at LHS or go to nanozone.org.