What I learned at Universities Week at the Natural History Museum

For the first week that we were at London at the National History Museum it was Universities Week so we got to do lots of things that we wouldn't normally get to do.

Making DNA

The first thing that we did at Universities Week was making DNA out of lollies.  It was quite fun and we got to eat them afterwards.

I learned that DNA is like instructions of how to make you!  You get some from your Mum and some from your Dad.  That's why you sometimes look like one or both of them.  That's why my baby brother Patch looks a bit like Isaac and a bit like me.

This is me and Isaac making our DNA.  We used lollies and toothpicks.

This is what it looked like at the end.  Then we twisted to make them look like real DNA.

Because we were brothers the Scientist helped us put my DNA and Isaac's DNA together to make one big, long strand of DNA.

Knitting Veins and Arteries for a Man-made Trachea

Next we went to a stand where there a lady dressed up as a man-made trachea.  A trachea is a windpipe.  Sometimes there are people's whose trachea doesn't work properly.  So these scientists are doing research about taking out the sick trachea and replacing it with a man-made one.  They are trying to find ways for the new trachea to get veins and arteries.  So, for this activity you had to knit some veins and arteries for the man-made trachea.

Here's a picture of me knitting an artery.

Here is Isaac putting his artery on the lady dressed up as a man-made trachea.  And, here I am putting mine onto a big model of a man-made trachea.

If you want to find out more about what I learned about veins and arteries, check out this link:

http://www.theexcitingadventuresoffinn.blogspot.co.nz/2014/06/finns-fun-fast-facts-1-how-oxygen-gets.html

Circus for the Senses

At the Circus for the Senses you do could do lots of things involving the senses taste, smell and feel.

Taste

The scientists had a special device that you put on your tongue.  It would trick your mind into thinking that you were tasting something sour when you're really not.  It does this by putting a little bit of electricity on your tongue.  They are working toward making a straw that would also trick your mind into thinking you were tasting something sweet or sour even if you were only drinking water.  

This is me with the little device on my tongue.  It really did taste sour.

Here's Mum helping Isaac to have a turn too.

Smell

These iPads had device on them to make you think you were smelling something like strawberries or flowers. But to me it didn't smell very much of anything.  Smell is a really important part of tasting.

The Sound Trunk

This was a large machine that looked like a magical tree trunk.  When the light was on you could make all kinds of sounds into a part that was a microphone.  Then it would repeat back all the sounds to you and you could change how they sounded by touching at different places on the trunk.

I think this was my baby brother's favourite because everybody was making duck sounds and he really loves ducks. So he was signing and saying "uck, uck" and looking very happy!

A Toilet that works with no water or electricity.

Did you know that  1 in 3 people around the world do not have access to a decent toilet.  Did you know that every day 2 million tonnes of human waste goes into water courses.  This is bad for the environment and for people as if there's not good toilets they can get very sick.

At this stand we saw a new invention of a toilet that didn't have to use any water or electricity.  When you close the lid of the toilet the inside of the bowl turned and dropped all of the waste into a big pipe.  Then it filters the pee into fresh water and burns the poo.  

I've also posted this one especially seeing as it sort of ties in with the work we've been doing on sustainability at school.  It's not wasteful of resources like water and electricity.  I think this toilet will make a big difference to the world.

The Lifecycle of a Smoothie

Do you know where the ingredients for a smoothie come from?  At this stand we had a chance to milk a cow and make a smoothie by riding a bike!  

This is me milking the cow.  

Here's me on the bike blending the smoothie.  This blender didn't work with electricity, but when you pedaled it spun round and round, so the faster it pedaled the faster it went round and round.

The finished smoothie tasted great!

 Bacteria

Did you know that there are lots of different tiny bacteria living inside our bodies.  Some are good and some are bad.  The bad ones can make fart really stinkily, make you have a sore stomach or make you vomit or have diarrhea.  The vomiting and diarrhea are because your body is trying to get rid of the bad bacteria any way it can.

We got to choose which of these bacteria to make.  These are of the bacteria from under a microscope to make them much, much bigger.  In real life they are so small that you can't even see them.

Here's what the actual bacteria looks like .

I'm making my bacteria.  I chose to make a BAD one.

 afterwards we got to hang the bacteria in a big glass tank along with bacteria that others had made.  The tank was supposed to represent the stomach and intestines where bacteria live.  
 

The Volcano

This University was teaching us all about volcanos.  They had built a model of a volcano based on an island in the Carribean.  It was exactly like how it was in real life.  Even all the dents and holes on the sides were exactly where they were on the real thing.

This is Isaac and I standing in front of the big volcano.

We got given a small paper house and were asked to think about where our house should be if a volcano erupted.  Then we got to look around the whole island and choose the place that we thought would be the best.

Here is my house.

The man said that we would be able to see if our house survived when the volcano erupted.  It was going to erupt the next day between 8-9pm so we were allowed to stay up late and go to the Museum to see if our house survived.  It was a little silly as there was steam and fire, but no lava or anything going down the sides of the volcano close to touching the bottom so none of the houses were even in the tiniest bit of danger.  Mum says you call that an anticlimax.

The World's Fastest Car

This group was trying to build a car that would go 100 miles per hour.  The current landspeed record is 760 miles per hour.

Here I am on the simulator seeing what it would be like to drive the car.

Next we got to design and build our own car that we thought would go really fast.  WE made these cars out of little lego like things called Knex.  Then we put in a special tube so we could connect it to an air compressor and see if it would go.  

This is the start of my car.  Once it was finished it went very fast on the special track.

Isaac and I (and Patch) had a lot of fun at the Universities Week at the National History Museum.  We learned SO many new things.  My favourite was the cars.