Science Extra Credit

Count for 1 power of place and 2 religions

Science Museum

In the Science Museum there where many hands on exhibits. The first exhibit is Air Rings. You press a pump that sends air through water making rings that float to the top. Water pressure increases with depth so the pressure on the bottom of a bubble is greater than that on top. Bubbles become rings when higher pressured water from below breaks through the center of the air bubble.

The next exhibit I visited was Vortex. Funnel shaped forms in both liquid and gases. Greater water pressure from the outside of the vortex causes higher speeds. In this exhibit you saw a tornado spinning.

Confused sea is the next exhibit in the Museum. A fan blows water in a bowl and the water becomes wild and storm-like. As the fan blows air over the watter small ripples form. These ripples merge together to form a larger, more powerful wave.
Parabolas and paraboloids show up in all sorts of places. This was shown in the water spinner experiment, where the centripetal force creates a parabola out of the water in a spinning container. An interesting fact I learned was that the paraboloid shaped ears of animals help them trap sound and hear better.
In Turbulent orb I learned that the slow circular pattern of fluid motion is called laminar flow and that the fast movement of the fluid is called turbulent flow. The experiment was an orb filled with a red substance. As you spun the orb the material in the sphere started spinning and when you stopped spinning the sphere the material kept spinning.

Museum of Man

The Australopithecus Afarensis is the first hominid species for which they have a large sample of fossils. This australopithecine had many ape like features, it walked on two legs and had a hairy coat. Scientists know that it walked on two legs by the position of the foamen magnum which is where the spine connects to the skull and the pelvis, knee, and thigh bones.

DNA is your personal code. No two people have the exact same DNA. Every cell in the body has thousands of messages in a code, which is called the Genetic Code. An interesting fact is that we have the 50% the same DNA of bananas.
Over 60,000 years ago the Neandertal, a human ancestor, buried their dead. They also made spoken sounds the way modern humans do. By these facts it leads scientists to believe that they where becoming close to the modern human by this time.

There was a room on possible future nano technology. Nano robots which are essentially tiny machines that fix any problem your body can have. They would enter the body through either pills or shots.

The last exhibit was the Morotapithecus Bishopi which lived when apes were evolving into a wide variety of species and were more common than monkeys. They are believed to be human ancestors by some scientists.

Austen Whitcher

Railroad Museum

The railroad flaunted its southwestern flavor in its decor. The railroad museum in Balboa Park had a strange feeling to it. Located in a basement with only a few people in it there was a hidden feeling to the Museum. As you walk in through the iron gates into the Museum you see intricate railroad models. The detail of them becomes apparent when you walk up to one and see that every person and building obviously has hours of time and effort put into it.

The first exhibit has a train station and a western style to it. There is a construction zone and rural area. Two trains run around the track, which is about the size of a small room.

With World War I in Europe in 1914 women started working in more labor intensive jobs such as the railroad. By the end of the war the railroad employed 101,785 women in 99 different occupations.

There was a railroad in the next room that was amazing. It spanned the entire room, with every single part of it holding immense detail. There where 4 trains running the track with each one probably 4 to 5 feet long.

As railroads where being used more and more for transportation of goods and people the robbery of them became more common. The wild bunch, Jessie James and others made their living robbing trains and taking their goods.