Search: Bio and medicine, Classroom activity

In this activity, students learn what composite materials are and why they are used in many industries. Students put these ideas to work as they design and create their own bricks. After the bricks are made, students employ a variety of mechanical tests to evaluate their bricks.

This hour long classroom program introduces nano science and nanotechnology as a leading, cutting edge science with an emphasis on nano in nature, health, energy and the environment. The class includes a PowerPoint presentation, three minute video, nine self-guided activities set up as “stations” around the classroom along with a concluding, teacher facilitated class discussion. This program was created for the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry’s (OMSI) Outreach Unit. It has been designed for 4th – 8th graders and travels to elementary and middle schools in seven states around the Pacific Northwest.

This program describes a weeklong summer camp for high school students. The camp does not assume any previous knowledge of the field and thus is open to students from all backgrounds. It is hands‐on; application based and also gives a broad overview to nanoscience/nanotechnology as a field with many career opportunities. Students are able to gain a comprehensive understanding through activities that introduce them to the unique properties at the nanoscale. Though lab‐tours, discussion groups on societal and ethical implications of nanoscience/nanotechnology and an open‐house at the conclusion of the camp where they present projects to families and friends, students are exposed to a wide variety of experiences.

This 50-minute program includes an introduction to the nano-scale science, conversation time for the participants and 2 ten-minute plays that stimulate conversation about the impact the field of nanoscale science may have on our lives. It also gets the audience thinking about how we should respond -- both individually and collectively -- to those potential impacts. This program was performed at the Science Museum of Minnesota and as an outreach program. The plays have also been performed individually as part of forums.

Experiments exploring nanomaterials and properties. Find how nanofilters clean water, the size of a molecule of oleic acid and movement of molecules by diffusion. This resource provides hand-on activities, experiments, PowerPoints and hand-outs covering many topic in nanoscale science and engineering.

Demonstrations that the NNIN Education Office at Georgia Institute of Technology uses with visiting groups A demo that introduces encapsulation, diffusion and osmosis is on page 17.

"Scale and Measurement" is one of the modules developed by AccessNano. It includes experiments, Power Points and activites to help students learn about scientific notation and the metric system; putting the size of things at the nanoscale into perspective and about the methods used to visualise things at the nanoscale, including microscopy and light diffraction.

"Biotoxicity" is an experiment that explores the antimicrobial properties and biotoxicity of nanoscale particles of silver. Students first produce nanosilver and then use the rate of respiration of yeast in the presence of different forms of silver to compare their biotoxicity.

"DNA Fingerprinting Activity" is a complete lesson with experiments and PowerPoint presentations that uses beads to explore self-assembly and DNA fingerprinting. Several experimental approaches to working with materials that are both too small to be seen and too numerous to be counted are covered. (Restriction Fragment Length Polymerization, Polymerase Chain Reaction, Short Tandem Repeat DNA Analysis, and gel electrophoresis.) This is a product from the NanoEd Resource Portal.

This is a framework for a summer camp for campers aged 8 - 10 years. Campers learn about nanoscale science and engineering through hands-on activities. The framework can be delivered in 5 half-day (1.5 – 2 hour) sessions. Alternately, the sessions do not have to be delivered consecutively. The first session (Intro to Science and Technology on the Nanoscale) can be used on its own or paired with any of the other four sessions.