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Rainbow Paper Windchime
by Tessy

Can you make a rainbow? Create rainbow paper and string it together in a homemade windchime to catch the summer breeze!

Thank you to The Science Kiddo for letting us share their rainbow paper craft.

Posted by [email protected] On Jun 22, 2020 at 10:10 AM

Learn It! Makey Makey Banana Piano

Makey Makey with Brandy Brandy (formerly known as Mr. Brandon)

Have you ever stopped to think: “Jeeze, I wish I could combine my love of science with my love of fruit”? No, neither have I…but still wouldn’t it be cool if our fruit could make music? Well thanks to the lovely folks at Makey-Makey, you can now make that happen, along with a wide variety of other awesome activities! You can even play 2D platformers similar the style of a classic Mario game with your kit! If something requires a few simple controls, Makey Makey can probably make it work, pun intended! For the kiddos out there reading this, please make sure you receive permission from your parents before playing, creating music or performing mad science with your food.

So what is a Makey Makey?

What it is, is a small circuit board that can turn some of your household objects, such as an apple or banana, into buttons for your computer! It works by creating electrical circuits which you play a part in making! Your computer first provides the initial power source which then flows into the item such as a banana. We need to complete the circuit though, so a person must be holding the ground wire which works as the return route for the electricity!

Do I have Superpowers?

So why is it that the electricity can flow through you as well? Why are you conductive? Are you a child of Odin? Well no, but the answer is quite ionic…I am sorry. Really though, your body is full of ions! Flow of charged energy and ions creates an electrical current and you currently play host to sodium ion, potassium ion and so much more! Thankfully though, your epidermis (surface of your skin) keeps you from becoming a human lightning rod. Your skin helps provide resistance to becoming too conductive and keeps potential electrical flows at a very minimum level. This is a reason why the low energy that flows into a Makey Makey kit is completely safe for you. In fact, if your hands are too dry, you might have some difficulty completing the connection so please keep that in mind. Alright, you got the details and now it is time for some fun! If you want to see Makey Makey in action, you can check out Mr. Brandon’s video below or you can pick up one for home from makeymakey.com. You also have the option of reaching out to us on this blog and we will get back with you to help guide you on your way.

Thank you so much for taking your time to learn with us at Aurora Public Libraries and we hope you are doing well!

Makey Makey at MLK

Posted by [email protected] On May 05, 2020 at 5:34 PM

Create It! - Stomp Rockets

Stomp Rockets
by Adam

Supplies Needed
· 2 liter or similar-sized plastic bottle
· Bike tire inner tube (demo one is 26 inches but most sizes will work)
· Small piece of 1 inch PVC pipe (Size can vary)
· Duct Tape
· Scotch Tape (Masking and electrical will work as substitutes)
· Scissors
· Paper
· Markers/Crayons/Colored Pencils

Launcher
1. Take out the inner tube and cut it with the scissors just above the valve. Do not cut off the valve.
2. Pull one end of the tube over the mouth of the bottle and use the duct tape to anchor it in place.
3. Pull the other end of the tube over one side of the PVC pipe and duct tape in place

Rocket
1. Personalize a sheet a paper by drawing a picture, writing your name etc. Roll the paper around the pipe, making sure that it is snug but not tight. Tape the seam.
2. Slide the paper up and down the pipe to make sure that it moves freely and adjust tightness as needed.
3. Make a cone by cutting out a baseball diamond from a different sheet of paper and joining the straight edges with tape. Use additional tape to seal the cone as airtight as possible.
4. Place the cone over the rocket body. It will overhang so taping will be easier if you reinsert the pipe to give yourself a solid surface to tape on to.
5. Tape down the edges of the cone.
6. Create fins by cutting out triangles and then taping them to the body of the rocket.

Launch
1. Place your rocket on the pipe and aim it skyward away from people, animals and trees. Never launch directly into a tree, you will have a hard time getting your rocket back in one piece 😉
2. Stomp on the bottle to launch the rocket.
3. Retrieve the rocket and re-inflate the bottle (either with a bike air pump or by blowing into the pipe – if you use this method, be sure to sanitize the pipe!)
4. Have fun!

Tips & Tricks
1. Fins help with stability and aerodynamic flight. Consider different numbers of fins and shapes of fins. Notice how each combination affects the flight of the rocket.
2. Change the launch angle of the pipe. Track how far each launch goes and see which angle is the best.
3. Do not underestimate the range of your rocket. It will go farther than you think.

Tell us how your rocket flew in the comments below! How far did it go? What type of fin worked best?

Posted by [email protected] On Mar 27, 2020 at 8:56 AM

There's a Genre for That? Medical Non-Fiction

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Title image for page There is a genre for that? Medical non-fiction

Post by Tessy W.

A sudden throbbing at your temples. Shivering until your bones seemed to jolt and creak beneath your skin, even as your fever spikes. The sweating starts. Sweating first through clothes and then blankets. And within a day, sometimes even hours,¹death.

The English sweating sickness killed between 30 to 50 percent² of all who contracted it at the turn of the 16^th century. Appearing and retreating in five epidemics², it sent the English upper class into hysterics as it struck not only the poor, but also ravaged the young, healthy, and more importantly, the rich.¹

What caused the virulent ailment? Where did it go? The sweating sickness is an epidemiological mystery that leaves even modern experts guessing.

That's why my reading list is littered with medical non-fiction. From gripping tales of disease running rampart, to in-depth histories detailing medical breakthroughs, the world of medicine is as fascinating as it is terrifying.

Death rates from infectious diseases in the United States have plummeted from around 800 deaths per 100,000 people in 1900 to just 46 deaths per 100,000 people in 2014.³Thus transforming the specter of violent and imminent death by disease into vague plans to schedule that annual physical, at least for patricular areas of the world like the United States.

However, the phantom of disease still has the power to inspire prickles of nervous fear, and in some cases, outright panic. During the 2014-2016 Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the four cases⁴ that were diagnosed in the United States sent the country into a frenzy, making it impossible to turn around without catching another Ebola news headline.

In fact, "The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston was one of the first books of the genre I ever read. A classic New York Times bestseller,Preston plotted the emergence of the Ebola virus from the jungles of Central Africa and described the virus' hyperbolic lethality in gruesome detail. More is known about the terrifying virus since the book's publication date, but the air of terror around the then mysterious virus is near tangible in this fast-paced, scientific thriller and it is still well worth the read.

Furthermore, if you're the sort to grumble about your annual flu shot, you might want to give "The Great Influenza" by John Barry a glance. Barry narrates the vicious onset and devastation of the 1918 flu pandemic in plentiful detail. Not only does he track the ravaging virus, but Barry, in exploring the question of why the virus was so monstrous, scrutinizes the history around the Spanish flu. From the setting of World War I to the emerging adeptness of the American medical community, the book chronicles one of the deadliest pandemics in human history with amazing scope and detail. Blinking up from its pages, you might be a little less reluctant next October when your doctor asks you whether you would like a flu shot.

Presently, the average American doesn't have to worry about a sweeping epidemic of Ebola or the flu. Instead, our illnesses come quietly, creeping forward through our bones, blood and flesh with ruthless intent. The leading cause of death in the United States is heart disease, but right on its heels, menacing on the edge of sight, is cancer.⁵

Dubbed "The Emperor of All Maladies" by Siddhartha Mukherjee in his book thus titled, cancer is disease at its worse. “Indeed, cancer’s emergence in the world is the product of a double negative: it becomes common only when all other killers themselves have been killed," according to Murkherjee.⁶ His sweeping epic of humanity's fight against cancer is an interweaving of narrative and lucid prose. Explaining the devastation of how our own bodies can turn against us and the successive ways we have attempted to battle against cancer, he illuminates an illness that up until modern times, we'd been afraid to even speak of.

With a dramatic cast of characters, the genre of medical nonfiction can narrate like your standard novel, with the heroes garbed in white lab coats or hazmat suits. Until recently, we'd appeared to be marching past the climax in our perpetual struggle between sickness and health into a neat, healthful resolution. But perhaps disease is a timeless villain after all.

According to the World Health Organization, "antibiotic resistance is one of the biggest threats to global health, food security, and development today".⁷ Illnesses previously controlled by antibiotics such as bacterial pneumonia and tuberculosis, are now contributing to an estimated 23,000 deaths per year in the United States⁸; a surging tide of lethality caused by the misuse of one of humanity's greatest epiphanies.

Antibiotics are overused and inapplicably applied. Instead of prescribing antibiotics for legitimate bacterial infections, they are prescribed for illnesses such the flu, which are caused by viruses not bacteria, or given as a health supplement to livestock instead of strictly to sick animals. This confluence of misuse has driven the evolution of bacterial strains that are resistant to most of the antibiotics we have, and the discovery of new antibiotics is a slow process due to poor investment and regulations.⁹

Unfortunately, antibiotic resistance is only one of many looming threats of the medical variety. If you're in the market for a doomsday directory, you might want to give "The Coming Plague" by Laurie Garrett a thorough read. Published in 1994, it has since proven its predictive power; the Ebola outbreak a few years ago being one of its many dire portents that has since become reality. In addition to foreshadowing 21^st century health crises, Garrett also takes the time to detail the emergence and history behind many of the modern world's more villainous diseases such as HIV/AIDS. A hefty book packed with a decade of research, each chapter is crafted to keep you up at night.

Ultimately, the genre of medical nonfiction recounts an enduring battle of wits against humanity's greatest nemeses - and who can resist a plot like that?

Interested in more medical nonfiction?

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

The Demon Under the Microscope: From Battlefield Hospitals to Nazi Labs, One Doctor's Heroic Search for the World's First Miracle Drug by Thomas Hager

Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness by Susannah Cahalan

Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach

Rabid: A Cultural History of the World's Most Diabolical Virus by Bill Wasik and Monica Murphy

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures by Anne Fadiman

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales by Oliver Sacks

The Ghost Map: The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic - and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World by Steven Johnson

References

The Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica. Sweating sickness. Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/science/sweating-sickness. Published July 5, 2017. Accessed December 12, 2017.
Heyman P, Simons L, Cochez C. Were the English Sweating Sickness and the Picardy Sweat Caused by Hantaviruses? Viruses. 2014;6(1):151-171. doi:10.3390/v6010151.
Rettner, R. (2017). 100 Years of Infectious Disease Deaths in US: Study Shows What's Changed. [online] Live Science. Available at: https://www.livescience.com/56968-infectious-disease-deaths-united-states-100-years.html [Accessed 12 Dec. 2017].
World Health Organization. (2017). Ebola virus disease. [online] Available at: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs103/en/ [Accessed 12 Dec. 2017].
Cdc.gov. (2017). Leading Causes of Death. [online] Available at: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/leading-causes-of-death.htm [Accessed 12 Dec. 2017].
Mukherjee, S. (2012). Emperor of all maladies. Thorndike Press.
World Health Organization. (2017). Antibiotic resistance. [online] Available at: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/antibiotic-resistance/en/ [Accessed 12 Dec. 2017].
Antibiotic / Antimicrobial Resistance. About Antimicrobial Resistance. https://www.cdc.gov/drugresistance/about.html. Published September 19, 2017. Accessed December 13, 2017.
Ventola CL. The Antibiotic Resistance Crisis: Part 1: Causes and Threats. Pharmacy and Therapeutics. 2015;40(4):277-283.

Posted by [email protected] On Feb 02, 2018 at 12:17 PM