Biome Brochure Projects

The first project for the fourth quarter required the students to devise a "travel" brochure to tout the marvels to be found in the various biomes on our planet.

Gauging the Intelligence of Infants

I read the article, “Gauging the Intelligence of Infants”. This article describes an experiment that was conducted in 1989 by Joseph F. Fagan on infants and how this experiment relates today. Fagan believed that this test could predict their score on an intelligence test years later, when they started school. “In the test, the infant looks at a series of photographs — first a pair of identical faces, then the same face paired with one the baby hasn’t seen. The researchers measure how long the baby looks at the new face.” This test tests novelty preference. The babies of below average intelligence were found to not exhibit the same attraction to novelty as the smarter babies did. Dr. Fagan's goal was to look for babies at the other end of the intelligence curve, those who would fall behind as they grew up. '“His hope was always was to identify early on, in the first year of life, kids who were at risk, cognitively, so we could focus our resources on them and help them out...”' Twenty-five years later the validity of Dr. Fagan's tests proved to hold up. “Dr. Holland revisited infants they had tested in the 1980s, and found that the Fagan scores were predictive of the I.Q. and academic achievement two decades later when these babies turned 21.”Although his tests worked, Fagan's dream of a widespread screening for infants did not come to pass. This is mainly because of concerns that this test may put labels on children at a young age that would become self-fulfilling prophecies. However, “the numbers become more reliable in aggregate, and the test is widely used in the academic world to quantify the effects of, for example, toxic chemicals on young children.”

These tests, if widespread, could have a great effect on humanity. Knowing and predicting a child's future based on their intellectual ability of an infant could help prepare each child for school by targeting their unique needs. This could help ensure that all educated children will reach the peak of their success. However, I agree that this may also be a way of labeling children, and could be very harmful to those who are not predicted to score high in later years. This could be a way of deterring these children from trying their best. Regardless of labels, I think it is important that these tests be used to test chemicals on young children. This could be a highly successful way of saving children from harmful chemicals and ensuring the environments children grow up in are as safe as possible.

Overall, I really enjoyed this article. It was amazing to me that a test so simple could predict the intellectual success of an individual. This shows be how complex an infants brain is, even though it is very young. I am interested to see if these tests will come into play more in our society.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/08/science/gauging-the-intelligence-of-infants.html?ref=science

Program Gives Bees a Leg (or Six) Up

I read the article, Program Looks to Give Bees a Leg (Or Six) Up, written by John Swartz and published in the April 2^nd, 2014 science times. In this article, Mr. Swartz describes how the bee population has been declining due to habitat loss, parasites, infections and pesticides. “That is taking a toll on crops that rely on bees for pollination, including many nuts and fruits.” Mr. Swartz then goes on to detail how both the federal government and agriculture consultants are targeting the problem by encouraging farmers to grow bee-friendly crops on their unused land in order to stop the decline. “The new program will encourage farmers and ranchers to grow alfalfa, clover and other crops favored by bees and which serve a second purpose of being forage for livestock. Other proposed changes in practices include fencing property for managing grazing pastures in rotation so that they can replenish, leaving living plants for the bees.” The idea is that hopefully bee populations will be less likely to succumb to diseases if they have a stronger nutritional and habitat background. Despite the obvious benefits to the bee population, the challenge will be getting farmers on board with the program as they do not directly benefit.

This article is relevant to society today because the health of our nation’s agricultural products is obviously very important as they make up not only our food supply but also a substantial portion of our economy. A decline in fruit and nut production could depress the agricultural economy and lead to a downward spiral in many other areas of the American economy much like the great depression in the 1920s. Thus it is of the utmost importance that we catch the problem before it is too late.

This article was extraordinarily interesting as it is really cool to study how a problem in nature can affect the economy. I thought the author did a really great job overall explaining what the problem was and what potential solutions might be enacted. I would have liked to know more about what was killing the bees, especially in relation to pesticides. Furthermore, I wish the author could have included more information about the small results of the programs which have already been put in place.

Schwartz, John. "Program Looks to Give Bees a Leg (or Six) Up." The New York Times. The New York Times, 02 Apr. 2014. Web. 08 Apr. 2014. <http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/03/science/program-looks-to-give-bees-a-leg-up-or-six.html?ref=science>.

A Strad? Violinists Can’t Tell

I read the New York Times article, “A Strad? Violinists Can’t Tell” by Pam Belluck. I am thoroughly interested in classical music so this article which combined music and science was perfect for me. This article hypothesized that the age and type of violin, in the end, doesn’t really matter as the two types are basically indistinguishable. Professional violinist, soloists and acclaimed artists from around the world participated in an experiment in which violinist were given a variety of violins (both old and new) and asked which was their favorite. One such line of research was “new-versus-old research in 2010, asking 21 players at an international competition in Indiana to put on goggles that obscured their vision, and try three new violins and three old. Thirteen chose a new violin as their favorite; the least favorite of the six was a Stradivarius, researchers reported.” Many believe that the hundred year old instruments made by Stradivarius or Gesu are better than any new instrument. “Researchers looking into this belief beg to differ. In a new study, they report that internationally accomplished violinists could not distinguish between old and new in a blind playoff, and that many chose a new instrument as their favorite.” Although further tests need to be conducted, the conclusion for now is that the Stradivarius violins aren’t necessarily better than newer instruments. 

This article is important to our modern society as well as to the classical music world. The experiments detailed in the article show that “old” and “acclaimed” instruments aren’t necessarily the best. This is important for young musicians, both amateur and professional, who don’t have the funds to pay for a multi-million dollar violin. 

Although this article was informative and interesting I felt that more evidence concerning the scientific and experimental aspects of this phenomenon could have been included. The article mentions a more in depth experiment that was recently completed and it would have been nice to have those results. 

Scientists Solve the Riddle of Zebra Stripes: Those Pesky Bugs

I read the article entitled Scientists Solve the Riddle of Zebra Stripes: Those Pesky Bugs. This article is about the fact that scientists have been searching for many years to discover why zebras have black and white stripes. There has never been a clear, proven hypothesis until now. Researches and the University of California Davis have discovered that the reason that zebras have evolved to have black and white stripes is because they ward of bugs. Their statement of research is: “The scientists found that biting flies, including horseflies and tsetse flies, are the evolutionary driver for zebra's stripes. Experimental work had previously shown that such flies tend to avoid black-and-white striped surfaces.” (Caro, 2014) Scientists have been studying the phenomenon of zebra stripes for hundreds of years, proposing hypotheses such as their camouflage, their confusion for attackers, heat management, and their display for social interaction, but nothing has been proven until the hypothesis regarding bugs. The team at UC Davis’ research included travelling to many different areas of the world known to house many wild zebras and testing each hypothesis and comparing them to results from elsewhere in the world. After many trials, the only hypothesis left standing was that the zebras have evolved with stripes because they repel bugs. They found that in areas of higher insect population, there is more striping on the body of local zebras. The only part of this discovery that still confuses scientists is why these flies avoid black and white striped areas.

            This article is important to science because it has proven a reason for the evolution of a very common and striking animal. Everyone knows that a zebra is striped, but until now, no one knew why. This can prove that evolution is very complicated and can even take professional scientists many years to uncover. A discovery like this could lead to more improvement on the discovery of the evolution of other animals, which could change the way we see an evolutionary tree now. This will also allow us to dive deeper into the evolution of these specific flies and hopefully help discover why certain bugs dislike black and white striped surfaces.

            I think this article was very interesting and was written very well. I especially liked how the author described all of the hypotheses that the team had made and described that they had gone through a trial and error process to discover the true reason for the stripes on the zebra. It made this article much more relatable knowing that scientists discover things in the same way that many of us do and the same way we do in the classroom. Overall, I really enjoyed reading about this topic and I hope that in the near future research will be started about the bugs’ dislike for black and white striped surfaces.

Caro, Tim. "Scientists Solve the Riddle of Zebras' Stripes: Those Pesky Bugs." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 1 Apr. 2014. Web. 01 Apr. 2014. <http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/04/140401112111.htm>.