Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

Hey everyone,

I have a project due the first week of may, and I need to have a bunch of Ideas for projects by next thursday.

Please let me know what you think of the Ideas that I have so far, and if you can suggest any more. Yes, I have looked at the projects on this site, and few of them interest me.
I will list a link below the Idea so that you can get a better Idea of it

My current Ideas:
1) Attempt to replicate, or just see if I get similar results from the expiriment conducted by Aidan Dwyer: Trees are good at collecting sun, they have to be. Have solar cells on an artificial tree (use ratio of how many branches over how many rotations does it take to get back to the starting position) Use different ratios based off different trees, according to the native species, and see if it is more efficient.
tiny.cc/pfugax

2) How does the bevel of a pencil affect how much pressure it takes to break the lead? The thing about this is, how will I measure the pressure?
No link, I just thought of this while sitting around.

If you have any Ideas, I am interested in alternative energy, building things, and generally things that are useful.

Thank you for your advice.

~Nal~

Naltanare Undome - I'm surprised that few of the suggestions in the Science Buddies project guides created any interest for you. If you find some too little challenge or too much challenge, perhaps you can change and improve on one of them.

With regards the experiment done by Aiden Dwyer, it has been written up globally, praised, marveled at, critiqued, challenged and debated by many engineers, author and scientists. To try to replicate his work you would first have to understand his hypothesis, his experiment, his procedures and analysis of the results. I personally question whether his hypothesis has been adequately proven by his work, but I certainly give him a lot of credit for thought and effort. He resembles many scientists before him. Possibly not always correct, but always passionate in their pursuit. He will likely achieve much in his life.

I actually like your question about the bevel of a pencil lead (or actually the lack of a bevel in a pencil lead) and the correlation of what forces, magnitudes, vectors, surface areas, rate of applied pressure (or any other combination of variables) that might change the way the pencil lead breaks. I'm sure you won't find much subject material on the web, so this can be real original work. What do you think the prime factors are? How do you think the pencil lead will break under certain conditions? Create a hypothesis! Create a methodology! Design and run your experiment with several variables in the mix. Measure your results and publish your conclusions. If I were an advisor for this science fair, I would be supportive because this is interesting and I've never seen it done before. good luck.

Rick Marz

rmarz,

Were you suggesting that I don't do Aidan Dwyer's project?

I agree that the pencil lead one is good too. My science teacher needs me to come up with multiple ideas so that she can talk to me about them later. I would measure it on a scale, probably a sensitive one made for massing cooking ingredients.
I would probably test bevel and angle of applied force/pressure. Would it be force or pressure in this scenario?

Did you have any additional ideas? I will keep exploring the ideas on the site.

~Nal~

Nal - I'm not suggesting that you don't consider the Aiden Dwyer experiment. I just suggested that you do some research on it, understand his hypothesis, and review some of the critical comments that have been made. Any experiment can be improved by understanding the hypothesis and perfecting the methodology to test your hypothesis.

The pencil lead breaking experiment might be very interesting, but, again, you have to start with a statement of hypothesis as to what you are going to prove (or disprove) with your experiment, measurements and observations.

Rick Marz