NASA Spaceward Bound Mojave Desert 20th - 22nd March

Sunday 20^th March

Travelled to Spaceward Bound at Zzyzx Desert Research Center in the Mojave Desert. Presented programming and lesson scaffolding ideas to the 30 attending university students, NASA scientists and NASA science education officers. The presentation included programs and activities I had developed myself following Spaceward Bound Australia, ways of building student knowledge about a topic using Bloom’s Taxonomy and collaborative team building through a fun science-based task. 

Monday 21^st March

Involved in discussions on how to implement astrobiology content into lessons. I offered my programs and materials to students and these have been added to the NASA website and students set up a drop-box so that they could access the materials whilst they were still involved in Spaceward Bound. Please contact me if you would like to have a copy of these materials.

Tuesday 22^nd March

Experiments being conducted by NASA scientists with the assistance of university students were observed. One experiment involved the use of equipment and chemicals which may not be easily accessed by schools and teachers. This experiment involved identifying living components of soils using a spectrometer rather than having to grow microbes on count plates, which involves significant risk of contamination. This is important in astrobiology because contamination can destroy the viability of data from microbial investigations and when investigating life on Mars it is important to remove any risk of contamination from Earth. The dye, LB and spectrometer are not all going to be available in schools, I would recommend teachers use equipment and materials at local university campuses with the assistance of academics or that an simulated laboratory be set up on the internet so that students may interact with this investigation.

Mud batteries were also being developed and tested on Tuesday the 22^nd of March. This activity has immense potential in the classroom and would tie in with a number of areas of science in the New South Wales and Australian science curriculum. The mud batteries use big sheets of carbon fibre, this is thought to increase the surface area in contact with the surrounding environment. The cathode is buried under ground, at an anaerobic level and the anode is above ground in oxygenated air.  Wire is weaved through the carbon fibre. The voltage created by the battery can be measured using a voltmeter. These and other battery related experiments can be located at www.r2labs.org