In the News: What if an asteroid were headed toward earth?

Asteroid 2004 BL86 (large object) has a small moon (top, small bright object)

On Monday January 26, an asteroid, 2004 BL86, came close enough to earth for us to see. To add to the excitement, this asteroid has its own moon. (NASA reports that they have found 150 asteroids with moons, or even double moons.)

Now, at 745,000 miles away, 3.1 times the distance to the moon, 2004 BL86 is not dangerously close. However, it got us curious about NASA’s Near Earth program, which closely tracks asteroids that enter Earth's "neighborhood" and can predict their path years in advance.

Perhaps some readers remember that in 2004 an asteroid named 99942 Apophis was evaluated as having a 2.7% chance of hitting earth in the year 2029. Refined measurements of it's movements showed that we were in the clear for 2029, but that a very small chance of impact remained for the year 2036. A 1 in 45,000 chance to be precise. Even with a 0.0022% chance of an asteroid hitting the earth, there was serious discussion about how to deal with this risk, which shows us that NASA takes it's job seriously. Then in 2013, it was announced that the chance of the asteroid hitting the earth in 2036 was effectively zero. But what if the risk had remained? What actions could be taken?

There have been several proposals for deflecting asteroids, and in this case the necessary deflection to keep us safe was deemed small.  One study found a “130 x 130 ft. patch with a lightweight reflective surface" would change the energy absorption of Apophis by 0.5% which would be enough it influence it's trajectory so it would certainly bypass Earth, IF the procedure was done by the year 2018.

Another report had more extensive suggestions. (A side note: This report also estimated the potential damage of the asteroid hitting earth at 400 billion and the cost of a deflection mission at 400 million. It suggested the course of action be taken based on financial concerns and ignored the loss of human life and suffering (ahem)).

The first two suggestions of this proposal would need to be accomplished prior to the year 2029. This is because the year 2029 is where the 0.0022% danger comes from. We knew that in this year the asteroid would come relatively close to us and if asteroid came at exactly 18,893 miles from the earth it would fly through a "gravitational keyhole" which would alter its trajectory enough to set it on a course where it would hit the planet. To miss the keyhole, the asteroid would only need to be deflected about a mile. However, if it were to pass through the keyhole, it would be to be deflected 5000 miles. The latter obviously a much harder task, and would perhaps (but probably not) be impossible.

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Apophis was discovered in 2004. Image credit: UH/IA

The first proposed method was “kinetic deflection” which would consist of hitting the asteroid with a large spacecraft to knock into a slightly new trajectory. That's it. Oh, of course there are angles, masses and speeds to work out but the basic concept is pretty simple.

The second method promoted in this report for pre-2029 use is the “gravitational tractor” which is much like what it sounds. Remember, all masses in space create a gravitational pull which effects other nearby masses. Here a rocket-propelled vehicle would essentially tow the asteroid onto a safer orbit through it's gravitational pull.

If the asteroid entered the keyhole in 2029, however, and was scheduled to hit earth, neither of the above methods would be powerful enough to keep us safe. In this case a more extreme courses of action would be needed such as "buried bombs" or nuclear weapons detonated near the planet. These are the methods NASA considers most viable for moving asteroids off course. However, bombs (as well as the kinetic deflection method) would send smaller pieces of the asteroid into orbit in an uncontrolled (by us) manner, and some of these could very well end up landing on Earth and still cause substantial destruction.

Other proposals have also floated around such using a laser or giant mirror to "boil" off part of the asteroid.

Luckily, Earth seems safe for quite a while. Jupiter, on the other hand, with its massive size and gravitational pull, has taken the hit from several asteroids and comets. We can be grateful to this large planet as it is thought to be, quite literally, taking hits for us.  

Bill Nye has a nice simple video explaining these concepts if you'd like to check it out. If any of our readers have expertise in this area we'd love to hear from you!

Thanks for reading. Check out our facebook page for daily science news from around the web, and check back here for more original content and news about our company.

In the News: How are electric eels like Tasers?

In a recent Science article, the mechanism electric eels use to incapacitate their prey was found to work via a mechanism surprisingly similar to Tasers.

First, some background. The electric eel is not a true eel, but an electric fish. (Eel themselves are a type of fish, but the electric eel is a different type of fish. Confusing! One difference that true eels have dorsal fins and electric eels do not).

A large portion of the electric eel's body is made of electric organs which contain flat disk-shaped cells called electrocytes. As their name suggest, these cells each produce a small voltage, about one-tenth of a volt. In total however, the electric organs can produce up to 600 V in certain species. The ability to discharge electrical shocks is the basis for their prey-hunting capabilities.

When the electric eel has its prey in range, it discharges a high-frequency volley of electric shocks. Do you imagine a animal jerking around from all the electricity? Don't! Turns out that the discharge frequency completely immobilizes the animal. Basically, the pulses come fast enough that they contract all the muscles in the prey's body, so it remains completely still, and the electric eel can attack.  This is how Tasers work! However, the Tasers deliver about 19 pulses per second, while the electric eels discharge around 400 per second.

But how does the electric eel locate its food in the first place? It turns out that the discharge is under fine control. If the eel wants to locate potential near-by but hidden prey, it lets off two pulses, or doublets, that cause the prey animal to "jerk" or "jump". Now the hiding place of the prey animal has been compromised, and the electric eel can employ its high frequency discharge to attack.

To summarize: To locate hiding prey, the electric eel lets off two pulses that make the prey "jump." To immobilize said prey, the electric eel lets off a high frequency volley of electric shocks and then eats the still, floating, fish.

This work comes out of Vanderbilt from a fantastic researcher named Ken Catania (although at the time of this posting his website has not been updated to reflect the electric eel publication). I've had the honor of hearing him speak and his work is truly an original and creative exploration of animal behavior.

If you want to know more, this research has been reported all over the internet. Check out this video from Slate, or these reports from the NYT, BBC or National Geographic. You can find a link to the original research here, (click on the Science link on the right) but you need a Science subscription to access it.

501c3 Official!

Science Delivered is happy to announce that it has received its 501c3 status! This means we are a public charity and all contributions to our company are tax deductible.

We will give credit where credit is due and say that the IRS was actually quite speedy, we received the status less than a month after filing! No doubt this was helped by Nonprofit Elite, a small company that helps nonprofits file for 501c3 status. They were efficient and easy to work with and had reasonable prices.

We are so happy to be official and able to concentrate less on paperwork and more on our mission!

Blog Post Number One: An Overview

Blog Post Number One – An Overview

For Science Delivered’s first blog post, I wanted to do something a little different than I imagine subsequent blog posts will be. This post is an introduction to myself and the company – you can find a lot this information throughout the website, but for potential supporters and collaborators  interested in more detail, please look no further!

Inception

The idea for Science Delivered was conceived while training for my Ph.D. I realized how enjoyable outreach was and found I had a knack for simplifying information for younger children. I also have always been passionate about social issues. Eventually, in August 2014, I made the tough decision to leave research (which I do love) to create this company. At the time of writing this post, Science Delivered, located in San Diego, is in its earliest stages and I am so excited to see what the future has to bring.

So what is Science Delivered?

Science Delivered is a mobile science lab that provides ‘science classes’ to elementary school students. Our programs can be thought of as in-school field trips. We offer about ten different classes, most of which can be modified for different ages (even adults enjoy most of our activities :) ). We focus on optimizing fun and learning.

Benefits of science education

There is nothing quite like the satisfaction that comes from understanding a “hard” concept. Or understanding the principles behind an object that you use everyday.  All kids have seen batteries, but how many of them can explain what they actually do? How many kids know why it is windy by the sea? But kids can understand these concepts!

We want to teach kids things they are excited to tell their parents at dinner.

We want to help kids to understand the world they live in.

We want our students to feel confident and good and smart, and to be excited to learn more.

There is a saying about education, ‘The rich get richer’. This means, if you know a little about a concept, it is much, much easier to learn a lot about it than if you start from nothing. To continue the metaphor, we want to start our students a savings account. The bits of knowledge we give them can grow and flourish over time. And we do this by…

…making our lessons sticky

Not literally (expect where we make slime with seeds). But I still remember the biology lesson a decade ago where my professor walked around the lecture hall with dental floss to show us the scale of DNA is a cell. That image stuck in my head and popped up whenever I thought of DNA. Hopefully, a decade or two from now, our students will sit in their dorms rooms saying, ‘I remember when that science lady showed us a real sheep brain’.

We embrace - and then go beyond - ‘classic science'

Do any students do the classic volcano science experiment anymore? They should – because it’s a classic for a reason! That being said, we expand beyond what people might think of when they hear ‘science.’ We have a program, ‘Health and the Human Body’ where students learn why they love sugar so much and just how much sugar is in that Mountain Dew from the vending machine. We teach about psychology – we show how easy it can be to ‘implant false memories’ (which happens all the time with eye witness identification) and other counter-intuitive aspects of the mind. Such instruction can help build empathy and even help students if they encounter their own mental health struggles. Finally, we have a critical thinking class, as the basis of science is critical thinking. Here students look at information on the news and internet to help them figure out when to ‘believe what they read’!

Diversity

Let’s be straight – we have made wonderful terrific advances in our country, but there is still this idea of ‘science for boys’. It starts young. When I was looking for bedding for my now nine-month old son, everything related to science and technology was ‘boy colored’, rocket ships, trains, space, even animals!

Many, many studies have shown that if you tell girls that ‘girls are bad at math', and then give them a math test, they actually have lower scores than girls not given that information.  The same thing goes for telling children that their ethnicity underperforms in a subject. Yet children get these destructive messages all too often. Children are perceptive, and while many of the negative messages might be subtle, they are constant.

Science Delivered understands that representation and encouragement matter and we aim to do our part in counter-acting negative societal messages. We aim to spend time at schools where kids have fewer educational opportunities and also will incorporate a short science history activity, called Beyond Einstein, into most programs. Here students will learn about the diverse group of people who have contributed to our STEM knowledge base.

Some principles we use in devising our programs:

~ Activities will be safe, fun and instructive.

~ Students will learn a new word or two, but we will never overwhelm with jargon.

~ Programs are amenable to student and teacher feedback.

~ Activities in any particular program will tie into a central scientific principle.

~ Programs are scaled to be age appropriate.

~ Programs can be modified to fit into certain curricula.

Thank you for reading! If you are interested in a visit from Science Delivered, please e-mail omullins@science-delivered.org (don't forget the dash!). If you are interested in providing support please go here.