Spaced Out Science - Troop and Crew 209 join national design challenge
Guess what some of the First United Methodist Church Boy Scouts and the Venturer Crew 209 members have been doing? They have been working on an experiment called the Ames test that will be sent to the International Space Station.
Our space project was started by a small group of boys and girls (age 11-17) who learned quickly the benefits of teamwork and coming out of their shells. Though at first, we had 84 ideas, we quickly narrowed it down to 12 ideas. Then we further analyzed and voted on our favorites of the 12 remaining ideas, and chose four ideas to research and debate. Since the ideas were too expensive or difficult, we came up with the idea of doing the Ames test which combined pieces from each of the final four ideas. Our logo is "Our Team Ames for Space!"
The Ames test determines if a chemical's genetic material can change or mutate. If it mutates, the substance will change color from purple to yellow. The change in color is due to the liquid growth media becoming more acidic. We plan to take pictures during the three-week test at the International Space Station (ISS) of the wells filled with the substance to see if a mutation happens. Understanding the mutations in space will be helpful in the future because we can see if the bacteria grew faster, which could be a breakthrough in the medical field.
We are also working with the University of Texas A&M, who created the project's NESI board, the programming storage place, and Center or Advancements of Science in Space (CASIS), who support us with materials and knowledge. The boys and girls will perform a test on the ground before testing at the International Space Station (ISS). Our goal is to create an experiment that will be launched in the summer of 2016 to the ISS. We are fortunate enough to have experienced adults help us. They play a vital role in the Mechanical, Hardware, Software, Biology and Data Analytics sub-teams.
The Mechanical sub-team is making model parts and are upgrading them. Some of the upgrades that they are making are moving motors, drawing blueprints for new motors, and finding a way to fit a well inside of a box. The Hardware sub-team is soldering a real time clock, heat, gesture, and humidity sensors. One of the challenges is to fit the experiment, camera, processor board and other items inside a 10 cm. by 10 cm. by 15 cm. box! One student made a way to put the wells inside the box.
The Software sub-team is learning how to code and finding sample codes. They already found a code called GIT and another called MPlab. They made a sample program that turns on and off LEDs. The goal for the software team is to program the NESI Board to run/restart the experiment. Tony Pluta, a member of the software team said, "Love coding and debugging (also) looking forward for the space project going into space."
The Biology sub-team is planning how to deliver hydration to the bacteria. One of their ideas is freezing the bacteria and then heat them up. The second idea is having a syringe inject water into the wells. The last idea was having a membrane that allows water go into the space with the bacteria, but not let the bacteria go outside the well.
The Analytics sub-team are learning how to use Excel and plot numbers in a certain order. They are also finding how many wells will be needed to prove that the experiment is statistically significant. Once the project part is over, the analytics team will graph the outcome of the space test. After that, the challenge will finally be completed.
Overall, the Troop and Crew 209 are doing great and are ready to blast off. They are really excited after completing the Preliminary Design Review! The project leader, Norm McFarland, expressed it well, "I think this is just an unbelievable opportunity for each and every scout involved in this. They don't realize this, but this is something that will be living on their resume for the next 20, 30, 40 years. This this is an introduction to engineering at an early age and probably will affect the lives of several scouts."