Dr. Dragon Issue #2

Dr. Dragon

Changing Clownfish Strange Loops and M.C. Escher

Physics Of Ballet Treatments For Children With Knee Cancer

Public Key Cryptography And much more!

Table of contents

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Table Of Contents

Dear Readers: We are so happy to have published our second issue of Dr. Dragon!

This issue took a lot of hard work and research from our writers and staff members, and we are eager to finally share it with you. As we’re sure you’ve noticed, you are reading this on our new website. This year, we decided to start putting all of our issues online. Now, Dr. Dragon is available to many more readers, better for the environment and more cost effective. We will continue to print our annual spring issue.

We have to sincerely thank our amazing club members, our dedicated advisor, Mr. Choi, and of course, our readers!

Sincerely, Dr. Dragon Officers

STAFF

President: Hajin Yang Vice President: Michaela Palmer Editors-in-Chief: Michaela Palmer and Hajin Yang Treasurer: Emily Chen Secretary: Alondra Valdez Designer: Ethan Bless-Wint Faculty advisor: Mr. Ronald Choi

Copyright © 2013 by Dr. Dragon All rights reserved. Published by Dr .Dragon No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any means without permission written by the publisher.

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Changing Clownfish

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Black Holes

5

Physics Of Ballet

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Strange Loops and M.C. Escher

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Sleep Deprivation

Effects of Caffeine

12

Children With Knee Cancer

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Public Key Cryptography

15

Raspberry Pi

WRITERS Hajin Yang Michaela Palmer Yael Saiger Aviva Pastor Jingzhi Yang Emily Chen Isaac Elysee Nhia Solari Omotayo Adeoye Ethan Bless-Wint

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Article Name

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Changing Clownfish What would it be like if everyone was the same gender? Well, all

clownfish, Amphiprion ocellaris, are born male. When they mature, they all become female. Yep, Nemo should be a female in the near future. This is because of something called sequential hermaphroditism, which are just two big words meaning a gender change. There are two types of sequential hermaphroditism: protogyny (female to male) and Nemo’s type, protandry (male to female). The gonads of sequential hermaphrodites have the genetic information that is needed for the male and female reproductive organs. However, only the most dominant organ is expressed. This all may sound pretty weird but it is only going to get weirder.

In 1969, American biologist Michael Ghiselin proposed the size-advantage theory to explain why sequential hermaphrodites swapped genders. He proposed that male clownfish choose to change into females for two reasons. The first reason is that male clown fish keep a harem full of females.

Therefore, the player fish has a very high chance of reproducing.

That is the main reason why they

A clownfish swims around its artifical aquarium habitat.

change

genders: to ensure

that that their species is

ongoing. There is always a mate for each clownfish because all one has to do is switch. When two male clownfish get together and want to mate, one of them simply swaps genders. Then, they can mate. No guessing is needed. It’s going to be a boy.

source : http://www.tnaqua.org/newsroom/NemoPR.asp

get together and want to mate, one of them simplyswaps genders.

• Reporting by Isaac Elyse

“When two male clownfish „

The other reason is that, in an anemone, an organism that houses clownfish, the female clownfish is in charge. However, if the queen clown dies, the biggest, toughest, manliest male clownfish turns himself into a female.

There are very few setbacks to sequential hermaphroditism.

One disadvantage is the amount of time that it takes to switch sexes.

In some species, this exchange can take up to 30% of the organism’s life. However, this is not a major problem for clownfish because they have about 100-200 babies at time.

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Photo credit : Todd Stailey Tennessee Aquarium Clownfish (Nemo)

So, sequential hermaphroditism, for the most part is beneficial to the species that exhibit it. So, if there is ever a sequel to “Finding Nemo” and Nemo is still in it, he better be a “she”. Otherwise, we may have to call up its producers and read them this article.

Bibliography Ghiselin, Michael T. “Integrative and Comparative Biology.” Sexual Selection in Hermaphrodites: Where Did Our Ideas Come From? N.p., 5 May 2006. Web. 17 Dec. 2012.

Ho, Leonard. “Hermaphroditism.” Hermaphroditism. N.p., 2002. Web. 20 Oct. 2012.

Staff, News. “Sequential Hermaphroditism - Some Animals Change Their Sex But Why Don’t More?”

Sequential Hermaphroditism - Some Animals Change Their Sex But Why Don’t More? N.p., 2 Feb. 2009. Web. 13 Dec. 2012.

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Black Holes

Black Holes Black Holes:

one of the universe’s most fascinating phenomena, are also one of its most mysterious. Black holes are invisible and almost impossible to detect. The laws of physics simply do not apply inside black holes.

Scientists believe that black holes are formed when stars run out of fuel. The pressure from their dense layers of hydrogen causes the stars to collapse on themselves, forming an extremely dense “black hole.”

Black holes have such immense mass and gravity that nothing – not even light – can escape their gravitational pull; hence the name “black.”

The entrance of a black hole is called the “event horizon.” Once an object passes the event horizon, it is not possible for it to ever leave unless it can travel faster than the speed of light (186,000 miles per second). The inside of a black hole is called the singularity. The singularity is the part of the black hole with the strongest gravitational pull.

Some scientists believe that a black hole can be as small as an atom or, on the other extreme, possibly in

An artists rendition of a black hole.

finite in size. In 2011, astronomers reported to have found black holes ten times the size of our entire solar system. Such a black hole would have as much mass as 21 billion suns.

There are two types of black holes – stellar and supermassive. Stellar black holes form after stars run out of fuel and explode (this explosion is called a supernova). What remains of the star after the explosion then collapses in on itself and forms a stellar black hole, which are typically between ten and 24 times as massive as the sun. Scientists are still not sure, however, how supermassive black holes are formed. Supermassive black holes can be millions of times more massive than the sun. There is most likely a supermassive black hole in the center of the Milky Way. In fact, according to observations made with the Hubble Space telescope, astronomers believe there is probably a black hole in the center of every galaxy.

Scientists have been studying black holes for decades, since the existence of black holes was first

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source : http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-HuwSsHS1Bxg/TZHLzvshdpI/AAAAAAAAGQM/AMGUxDOwX9g/s1600/Thebest-top-desktop-space-wallpapers-0i-hd-space-wallpaper. jpg

predicted by Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity. It is impossible to see a black hole, but scientists infer its location by watching the way surrounding stars and gas react to its powerful gravitational pull.

They can tell how large black holes are by finding the speed at which surrounding stars move. If stars are moving faster, that means the black hole is more massive, because more gravity is needed to prevent the stars from flying away.

• Reporting by Michaela Palmer (sources at end of magazine)

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Physics of Ballet

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Physics Of Ballet

Ballet is not just an art; it is also a form of science. The ability to turn and leap and balance is no easy feat. It’s all a matter of knowing the mechanics of the step and how to execute it properly. Most dancers spend their life copying teachers in order to learn steps. However, many dancers still struggle to execute certain steps.

Those dancers that don’t struggle have figured out the physics behind ballet. They’ve managed to unlock the secret to higher leaps and longer turns.

For a dancer, a basic necessity is balance. In order to stay balanced a dancer’s center must be perfectly aligned from top to bottom and her rotational axis should not move. When a dancer is en pointe, meaning she wears shoes that make it look like she is on the tips of her toes, it is harder to keep her balance because the tip of the pointe shoe supplies a smaller area to turn on. As a dancer turns one way the floor pushes against her in the other direction. The idea of a turn is to keep a consistent speed all the way around for each turn a

dancer does. The right amount of force must be applied in order to get around the desired number of times. If anything disrupts a dancer’s center of gravity or speed it can throw off his or her turn.

Gravity is a major factor when it comes to jumps. Since gravity is constantly pushing people down dancers must work extra hard to achieve amazingly high jumps. When a dancer does a grande jeté, a “big jump”, her center of gravity follows a parabola.

Overall, a dancer cannot move her body any higher than this set path allows. But parts of her body can still move. The illusion of floating in air can be created by a dancer lifting her arms and legs at the height of this parabola.

• Reporting by Nhia Solari

Bibliography : http://discovermagazine.com/1999/nov/ physics#.UM6cl3d5eQA http://ed.fnal.gov/trc_new/demos/present/ physofballet.pdf

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A Young Ballet dancer preforms a grand jetés, or big jump. This type of jump is usually prefomed during the grand allegro, where the fast and dramatic choreography occurs. source : http://springfieldballet.wordpress. com/2012/09/14/the-benefits-of-performing-by-ashley-paige-romines-school-director/

Did You Know?

That this past summer, Guinness World Records announced that a new record was set for the highest man-made temperature. The scientists at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Long Island, New York, achieved the highest man-made temperature when they smashed gold ions at nearly the speed of light using the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. This process briefly formed a state of matter known as a quark-gluon plasma. This substance is believed to have filled the universe just a few microseconds after the Big Bang. During the experiment, the plasma reached temperatures of around 4 trillion degrees Celsius, which is 250,000 times hotter than the center of the Sun. • Reporting by Hajin Yang https://sites.google.com/site/hsmsedrdragon/

Strange loops and M.C. Escher

How many times have you heard this: I’m more

of an artsy person; math isn’t my thing. Or: I’m definitely a math person—I just don’t get art. And how many of you (the self-proclaimed-exclusively-mathy people) are annoyed at the first speaker?

And how many self-proclaimed-exclusively-artsy people feel the same way about the second?

Well, it doesn’t have to be this way. Drop your weapons, people, and forget your differences. Art and math can go hand in hand. Not only can they, but to a certain extent they always do. And when this hand-in-hand relationship is highlighted, it takes both the art and the math to a whole new level. Maurits Cornelis Escher, known as M. C. Escher, was famous for doing just that. He explored both the artistic and mathematical worlds.

The strange loop appears over and over again in Escher’s work. By bending perspective and rules, Escher sends your eyes in an endless paradoxical loop that has its roots in mathematical concepts.

First of all the root creates a sense of infinity. Infinity is defined as an “unbounded quantity that is greater than every real number.” It is a mathematical concept that is explored by many mathematicians including George Cantor. George Cantor concluded that 1/∞ =0.

Divide 1 by progressively larger and larger numbers and the quotient will steadily approach 0, on to infinity. If you begin to graph y= 1/x by hand, you will never hit the x axes, the point where y=0, though you will get infinitely closer and closer. Infinity is the expression of the point where you do hit the axes.

But how do you express a theoretical concept visually?

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Strange loops and M.C. Escher

Infinity is an important concept in geometry. All lines, for example, extend infinitely in either direction. The things that make up shapes, the things drawn on graph paper are line segments. Every segment is a small part of a line that extends infinitely that can never be drawn in full. Circles, on the other hand, can be drawn completely and accurately and they are one of the simplest visual expressions of infinity. The outline of the circle continues forever and ever, and if you trace it with your finger you are caught in the loop, literally. We measure the circle by breaking it up, placing an arbitrary end point in the middle of the circumference.

Without this designated place a circle could not be measured.

Escher has many of his own versions of a circle.. One of these is the piece “Metamorphosis II.”

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Ascending and Descending is a famous lithiographic print produced by Dutch artist M. C. Escher. This print is well known for its paradoxical, never ending staircase. source : http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/66/ Ascending_and_Descending.jpg

Challenge : Try to follow the circles line until you find it’s end.

(Hint : you can’t)

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Strange loops and M.C. Escher

Like an insect moving along a circle, the shapes are simultaneously getting increasingly farther away from and increasingly closer to where they started. It leads the viewer into an infinite loop.

Escher doesn’t stop there. His visual exploration of infinity continues, with the introduction of the visual paradox. The Oxford dictionary explains ‘paradox’ as “a statement or proposition which, despite sound (or apparently sound) reasoning from acceptable premises, leads to a conclusion that seems logically unacceptable or self-contradictory.” Paradoxes are statements that can be neither true nor false, so are caught in the middle. Epimenides’ paradox was one of the first recognized paradoxes and it is essentially this: I am lying This eventually developed into: This statement is false.

This is one of the simplest paradoxes in language. Another layer can easily be added to form this paradox:

The statement below is false.

The statement above is true.

This paradox creates a loop that circles from statement to statement.

It is equivalent to MC Escher’s “Drawing Hands”.

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How could both hands be simultaneously creating each other? How did this loop begin? In order for each hand to be able to draw the other, it needs the other hand to have drawn it. This is Escher’s illustration of a two-part paradox, or strange loop. We can trace the paradox from visual art, to language, or from language to visual art. And then...enter math.

In his book, Gödel, Escher, Bach, Douglas Hofstadter famously drew a connection between the aesthetics of Escher and the German mathematician Gödel.

Metamorphosis II was created by M.C. Escher.

It’s famous for its length and fluid transitions.

Metaphorphasis II was longer than metamorphasis I , and metamorphasis III was long enough that a full scale reproduction could wrap around a small room. source : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ File:Escher,_Metamorphosis_II.jpg

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Drawing hands is a famous lithograph by M.C. Escher. Its main paradox is the impossibity of both hands drawing each other. source :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:DrawingHands.jpg

Gödel delved into the mathematical depths of paradoxes. Paradoxes had previously been applied to language, and Gödel sought to apply them to mathematical concepts.

Gödel’s principle is fairly simple on the surface and it is integral to today’s mathematical system.

Gödel’s incompleteness theorem boils down to this: every system of number theory is either incomplete, or inconsistent. This is something you’ve all heard before. It’s one of those theorems listed at the beginning of your geometry textbook, and it’s accepted. It makes sense, it’s simple. Or so it seems. The paradox is in the proof. In order to prove his theorem, Gödel set out to find a statement of number theory that was paradoxical, one that mirrored the logical paradoxes listed above. Most paradoxes are self-referential, which means that they https://sites.google.com/site/hsmsedrdragon/

Strange loops and M.C. Escher

they describe themselves. The magic behind most paradoxes is that they describe themselves as something they simply could not possibly be. It is components of the paradox itself, not exterior systems, that crash into and conflict with each other. “This statement is false” describes itself as false and in doing so makes it impossible for it to be false. The problem lies in the self-reference. Gödel applied this to number theory, Escher applied it to art.

Most statements of number theory are not self-referential. The statement describes the numbers.

Gödel’s revolutionary idea was that a statement of number theory could describe a statement of number theory. And if it could do this, it could describe itself. To achieve his vision of statements describing statements, Gödel assigned each statement of number theory a Gödel number.

This allows for new statements that describe these Gödel numbers. Now, there are two kinds of statements of number theory:

-statements of number theory describing numbers

-and statements of number theory describing statements of number theory.

This allowed for the creation of the following self-referential statement of number theory: “This statement of number theory does not have any proof in the system of Principia Mathematica” (Hofstadter). If the statement has a proof, then you read it as true and it therefore cannot have a proof. But if it does not have a proof, then it is not a proved statement, and thereby it proves itself. This brings you back to the beginning. Either way you go, you are stuck, left with a paradox.

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Belvedere is a lithiographic print by M.C Escher. It is filled with paradoxes, like the ladder from the first floor that extends to the outside of the top of the second floor. source : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Belvedere.jpg

Waterfall is a lithiographic print

by M.C. Escher.

source : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Escher_Waterfall.jpg

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Strange loops and M.C. Escher

(Note: this particular statement refers to the system of Principia Mathematica, but there is a similar statement in every system.This is the assertion of Gödel’s incompleteness theorem.)

This is the math behind Escher’s expression of strange loops. It is particularly evident in many of his architectural lithographs. Waterfall (left) and Belvedere (right) are two of many.

Where is the water going? Look carefully at the support pillars of the water fall. Do they make sense?

And in the second: how does this structure work? How is it that in the circled spot, one of the pillars is behind the other at the bottom, but at the top the other is behind the first? There is no answer. These are visual paradoxes. Another clear example is Escher’s Ascending and Descending. Choose a starting point and follow the stairs around and back to that point. Are the stairs going up or down? How is it possible for the stairs to go up and end up where they started? Another paradox. It is the conflicting parts within these works, within the structures, that make them paradoxical. This is the visual version of self-referential statements. In Escher’s Drawing Hands (shown above) the hands are drawing each other and the piece is therefore also self-referential. At first, these lithographs appear to be simply drawings of architectural structures.

They appear to work, and to follow the rules of perspective and form.

In the same way, logical statements follow the laws of grammar and sentence structure. Mathematical statements of number theory appear to follow the rules of the system.

When you look closer, you find the problem, and the picture, structure sentence or statement breaks apart.

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And, in a sense, it takes the entire system down with it. The only way to prevent paradoxes from destroying the system is to accept them as part of the system. This is what Gödel’s theorem does. He proves that paradoxes are part of every single mathematical system. Escher proves that they are also part of the visual system. Escher’s work is dependent on the fact that it at first appears consistent. He is dependent on the illusion that these objects could be created. To achieve the illusion, Escher harnesses a concept called Relabi.

Relabi is an alternative to rhythm that allows paradoxes to work their magic in artistic work. It takes objects and combines them in a way that is coordinated enough to give a sense of pattern. However, it does not quite fit and a consistent pattern cannot be found. The viewer, whether subconsciously or consciously, adjusts his perception to fit the pattern. He then quickly dismisses the adjusted perception, as it does not work either. But the adjusted perceptions remain, despite the fact that they are rejected, and they form a layered perception of the original image.

Escher’s works have enough patterns to convey images of space and structure. But they are un-patterned and inconsistent enough to create puzzles, paradoxes. The math behind relabi is varied, as it is a concept with many applications.

John Berndt describes a musical application where steady beat is replaced by a feedback system that generates sound waves. A feedback system takes the result of a certain equation and plugs it back in to the original equation. Feedback loops generate a series of numbers that appear to be chaotic or random, but eventually fall into some sort of

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order. In Escher’s work, order and chaos exist simultaneously as well.

A building is clearly defined and yet none of the parts seem to work together.

So why is Escher’s work so appealing? First of all, its layers give you the freedom to make it what you will. When you first look at one of his pieces, it’s simply a visually appealing composition.

You can relax and enjoy it. Then, you look again, and you begin to think about how it works and what is going on.Viewing an Escher painting can be either a visual experience or an intellectual experience, but most times it turns into both.

Secondly, the ease with which Escher can twist the universe to his will is astounding. It’s not a fantasy world. Many people build their own worlds that have none of the same rules as reality. Escher played with the real world, the one we live in. And he could bend it and morph it, pull it and push it, seemingly effortlessly into something that should not exist. He uses the rules of proportion, perspective, light and form to break the rules of perspective, proportion, light and form. Look at one of Escher’s pieces above. Now look closer.

Look for the interesting points.

It’s hard to stop looking now. An Escher painting looks like a beautiful yet simple composition, until your eye catches on one place where the perspective seems not to work with the rest. And then you realize that somehow, mind-bogglingly, it works and does not work at the same time. You find yourself staring at the piece, eyes tracing the lines and mind whirling, as you are pulled into one of Escher’s strange loops. • Reporting by Yael Saiger (sources at end of magazine)

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Sleep Deprivation

N0wadays, not everyone gets much sleep, sleep, and when we

do, it’s nearly half of the amount that we are supposed to get.

According to the National Sleep Foundation, teenagers are supposed to get 8-9 hours of sleep each night, but we all know that is nearly impossible. Most of us get into bed at midnight (if we’re lucky) and roll out of bed 5 or 6 hours later. The consequences of sleep deprivation include difficulties in school, disciplinary problems, sleepiness in class, loss of concentration, and sometimes even depression.

It seems as if though sleep and good grades don’t get along. If a student gets enough sleep then they won’t be able to finish all their homework and study, so they won’t get good grades, and if they don’t get good grades, they will need to study more and sleep less. The struggle of balancing these two things out is what many teenagers deal with. While working, it seems logical to sleep less and study more, but the long term affects might make you think otherwise.

Even though our lives are busy, we need to keep these facts in mind and use them to help us get enough sleep every night and make healthy decisions. So the next time you catch yourself procrastinating at night, think about how much more sleep you can get if you stop, and how much better you’ll feel the next day. • Reporting by Emily Chen

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1. Food

4. Patience

2. Memory

5.Caffeine

3. Pimples

6.Health

With little sleep and little time you tend to reach for the sugary and salty snacks to help you say energized and awake. These foods are unhealthy and the excess calories and fat will accumulate quickly leading to weight gain.

Your ability to remember what you learned in class slow declines, you may go home that night and completely forget what you have learned earlier in the day

Everyone dreads and fears them, but because you are depriving your body of sleep, you are not allowing your body to heal and restore itself.

When you go to sleep your body enters a state of restoration, where cells are renewed, healing cuts, bruises and cleansing your body internally. With lack of sleep your hormone production is also distorted, leading to uncontrollable levels of oils being put out by your body, which results in pimples and bright red zits.

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Your might snap at a friend for asking why you look like a panda, or at your teacher when they ask why you didn’t complete the assignment.

You might think that this is your best friend, but caffeine is also considered a drug that becomes addictive very quickly. Before you know it, getting a cup of coffee becomes part of your morning routine.

Needless to say, lack of sleep affects your health negatively. When your body does not get the amount of rest and time it needs to restore you and prepare you for the day ahead, you find yourself prone to fevers and illnesses.

Solutions 1. Healthy Eating

Don’t replace your lunch with snacks and coffee; instead try a salad or fruit. Natural sugars will keep you running for longer.

2. REST!!

Take naps! Plan them out so that it does not interfere with your homework schedule. Don’t procrastinate on assignments. https://sites.google.com/site/hsmsedrdragon/

Effects of Caffine

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Effects of Caffeine Students often drink coffee, to keep them awake

during long nights of studying and doing homework. Many of them do not know that caffeine is an addictive drug. If a regular coffee drinker, for example, fails to drink his daily dose of caffeine, he or she can end up with headaches and a feeling of not being able to function.

Withdrawal from caffeine can take between a few days and several weeks, depending on the person and the amount of coffee they usually consume.

Caffeine is a central nervous system stimulator that causes the production of adrenalin, which results in short term awareness, alertness and higher energy levels. Caffeine also results in elevated heart rate, increased blood flow, and raised body temperature. Studies have found that two or more cups of caffeinated coffee a day can increase the risk of heart disease in people with a specific genetic mutation that slows down the breakdown of caffeine in the body. Ultimately, the speed with which one can metabolize caffeine affects the associated health risk.

But don’t worry, caffeine also has

a good side. Benefits of caffeinated coffee include the ability to protect against from Parkinson’s disease, type 2 diabetes and liver cancer.

It also contains a high content of antioxidants. The Nurses’ Health Study and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study concluded that people who drank two to three cups of regular coffee a day had about a 20 percent lower risk of gallstones than non-drinkers.

Overall, many problems caused by caffeine are only brought on by heavy and frequent consumption.

People should drink coffee moderately and spread it throughout the day. It is better to consume two to three ounces every hour or so instead of consuming 16 ounces at once. Moderation is the key when it comes to healthy caffeinated consumption. • Reporting by Jingzhi Yang

A bunch of dried coffee beans are poured out onto a sack. Coffee beans grow for about five weeks before being harvested.

source : iStockphoto/Kadir Barcin

Did You Know?

That many people buy lots of healthy foods and nutritional supplements to ensure that they consume enough important vitamins and minerals. For example, omega-3 fatty acids, which have been said to help prevent dementia and improve circulation and heart health, have become very popular. Many people purchase omega 3 capsules. Unfortunately, there is a crucial fact about omega-3 consumption that many people aren’t aware of. The many benefits of omega-3 mainly come Bibliography from natural foods, such as fish and Dr. Shelley Narula. “Positive and Negative nuts. The omega-3 in capsulated Health Effects of Caffeine.” Healthy living supplements doesn’t get absorbed online. n.p., 14 Jan. 2009.Web. 27 Jan. nearly as well into our bodies. To 2013. fully benefit from omega-3 fatty “What Are the Negative Effects of Caffeine?” wisegeek. Health, n.d. Web. 27 Jan. acids, eat omega-3 rich foods rather than purchasing expensive omega-3 2013.

Hensrud, Donald M.D. “Coffee and health: supplements.

What does the research say?” Science On- • Reporting by Hajin Yang line. n.p., n.d. Web. 27 Jan. 2013.

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Treatments for Children with Knee Cancer

Treatments for Children with Knee Cancer An osteosarcoma is a

malignant bone tumor that usually develops during the period of rapid growth that occurs in adolescence.

It is the most common bone tumor in children, and the sixth leading cancer in children under 15. Osteosarcomas often develop in osteoblasts, cells that are responsible for bone formation. Osteosarcomas are one of the few cancers that actually begin in the bone and can later metastasize to other areas such as the lungs or other bones.

The symptoms of osteosarcomas include pain and swelling in the legs or arms. Sometimes the bone becomes fractured because it has been weakened by the cancer.

To diagnose osteosarcoma, the doctor will perform a physical exam and obtain X-rays to identify any alterations in bone structure.

An orthopedic oncologist will then perform a biopsy and send the sample of the tumor to a pathology laboratory for examination. If a diagnosis of osteosarcoma is made, the doctor will order a combination of scans, to test if the osteosarcoma has spread parts of the body beyond the bone. Once this is done, the child will begin treatment, and often, these tests are repeated after treatment to check if the treatment has been effective.

Osteosarcomas are treated by a combination of chemotherapy, (the treatment of cancer with an antineoplastic drug or with a

combination of such drugs and surgical removal of cancer cells or tumors. In a case of high grade osteosarcoma, it is best to use both treatment options in trying to eradicate the cancer. This would be done by using chemotherapy to shrink the cancer followed by surgery to remove the tumor and more chemotherapy to kill any remaining cancer cells. If the osteosarcoma is low grade, surgical removal of the tumor may be enough to get rid of the cancer.

A picture of a osteosarcoma cell, taken a medium magnification.

This sample was stained so it would show up pink. source :http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/ File:Small_cell_osteosarcoma_-_intermed_mag.jpg

detrimental to the body. Because it kills cells that divide rapidly, chemotherapy must kill cells that do so under normal conditions, which includes cells in bone marrow, the digestive tract, and hair follicles.

Common side effects of chemotherapy include decreased production of blood cells, diarrhea, hair loss, fatigue, loss of appetite, sore Chemotherapy is crucial in the treatment of osteosarcomas because mouth, and sickness. These immediate side effects can be managed it helps kill the cancer cells that by that patient’s doctor, are usually are rapidly dividing, and helps to stop the cancer from spreading and temporary, and go way once treataffecting other parts of the body. It ment is complete. There are some is also helpful because it decreases side effects that last longer, such as decreased kidney function, reduced the need to amputate the arm or strength of the heart muscle, or leg. Although chemotherapy medhearing loss. icines help cure the patient, they can also have side effects that are

Chemotherapy

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Treatments for Children with Knee Cancer

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Surgical Treatments

Surgical treatments for osteosarcomas are essential because they are a very effective way of removing the tumor. The three forms of surgical treatment for osteosarcomas are limb-sparing surgery, amputation, and rotationplasty surgery.

Limb-sparing surgeries are the most common, and approximately 85 percent of osteosarcomas are candidates for limb preservation.

The amputation is chosen from patients when the tumor cannot be taken out with wide margins or in very young children. Rotationplasty surgery, also known as Van-ness rotation, is a form of amputation that allows a greater form of mobility for the child.

Limb salvage surgery

Limb salvage surgery is often used to treat osteosarcomas because it is the most cosmetic surgical treatment. There are two types of surgical reconstruction options for limb salvage surgery: allograft (bone transplant) or arthroplasty (metal replacements.)

An allograft replaces the malignant bone with a human bone and joint transplant. The implant is frozen, which leaves the bone dead, to help prevent the patient’s body from rejecting it. The implant requires a considerable amount of time to heal to the patient’s bone, which is similar to how a fracture would heal.

A metallic arthroplasty is performed with a modular oncology prosthesis, which enables the surgeon to assemble the prosthetic that will best fit the patient The installation of the prosthetic can be done with press fit implants, which allows the surrounding bone to grow into the implant to hold it

in place. Implants are commonly cemented into place, using a strong glue that hardens to act as space filler and hold the implant in place.

Amputation

urgical amputation is the removal of a body extremity to control a disease or pain in the affected limb.

Amputation can cause detrimental emotional side effects, and is usually used when the cancer has grown to a point that it can no longer be controlled with limb salvage surgery. Amputation is often used on large tumors that do not decrease in size after chemotherapy. Tumors that reach the skin and/or touch important nerves, veins, or arteries are also better suited for amputations.

Rotationplasty surgery

A rotationplasty, also known as Van Ness rotation, is a unique and relatively new form of amputation.

It is an alternative to an above-theknee amputation, and is very useful in young children that have not finished growing. The operation entails the removal of the bone that is contaminated with the tumor, which usually calls for removal of part of the femur and tibia to

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source : http://www.cancervic.org.au/images/CISS/ cancer-types/what-is-cancer-diag.gif

ensure a clear margin. This is done without tampering with any veins, arteries, or nerve cells. The leg is then rotated 180 degrees and connected to the thigh, so that the ankle bends in the opposite way that the knee bends, and then the ankle would need to be turned around to function as a knee. The femur and tibia are connected with the use of plates and screws. The leg now looks shorter and has a backwards facing foot. The ankle and foot now function as a knee, and a prosthetic can be attached to the foot to enable the child to walk.

Osteosarcoma in children is a curable disease. Children experience long term survival rates of approximately 70% when treated with chemotherapy and surgery.

Several reconstruction options are available following removal of the tumor. The type of reconstruction depends on a number of factors including patient age, size of the tumor, location within the bone, and the child’s physical activity level.

• Reporting by Omotayo Adeoye (sources at end of magazine)

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Public Key Cryptography

Y0u are a secret agent,

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Public Key Cryptography

deep undercover in a foreign country. You have been sending coded information to your contact in the army. He is the only person who knows how to break your code, but for security reasons, he does not know your identity. A few weeks before the U.S. is planned to gain How to make a code when nothing is secret control over your area, you learn that the enemy has cracked your code, and has been intercepting your transmissions. However, as you have never stated your identity, neither side knows who you are.

How do you send a password to identify yourself to the U.S., without the enemy figuring it out?

The answer is a trap door problem. A trap door problem is a problem that is very easy to compute in one direction, but very hard to reverse without special information. It is like a Rubik’s cube, which is very easy to mix up, but very hard to unscramble. In this situation you might send the U.S. a list of one hundred random numbers. From these numbers you pick twenty, and add them together. You then send the U.S. the sum. When the army takes over, you can give them the twenty numbers you used, and it will be very easy to verify that they have the correct sum. a secure website. After all, how can to verify an electronic signature.

The enemy however, will have a a website be secure when so many They would create a secret algovery hard time, finding the twenty people are capable of intercepting rithm to create an encryption, but numbers you picked out of the list online transmissions? The answer make the process of decrypting it of one hundred. lies in a lock, or encryption, with public. That way, no one can make This type of encryption is a fake signature, but everyone can called public key cryptology. It gets two keys. One key can lock, or encrypt something, and the othread the signature. The advantage its name from the fact that despite er key can unlock, or decrypt the of this type of method is that it all the transmitted information code. One key is a public key that does not require a secure initial exbeing public, the password reeveryone has access to, like the list change of secret information, since mains secret. Although public key of numbers from the previous exany information being sent can be cryptology seems like something ample, and the other key is private, viewed by anyone without comprothat doesn’t have much to do with like the specific twenty numbers mising the security of the message. everyday life, your computer uses from the previous example. Web• Reporting by Aviva Pastor it every time you send your inforsites might use this to allow a user mation to someone online through Dr.Dragon vol #2

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Raspbery Pi

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When you hear “Rasp-

berry Pi”, what do you think of? More and more people are thinking of a tiny computer by the same name. It has 512 mb of ram, a 700 mhz processor, no hard drive and no wifi. By comparison, chances are that your computer has at least a 2Ghz processor, a 250Gb hard drive and 4GB of ram and if it’s a laptop , built in wifi. That’s well over 4 times more powerful than the Raspberry Pi. So why are people interested? The Raspberry Pi is perfect for hobbyists who want to use a computer in their projects, or parents who want a safe way to teach their kids how to use a computer. Raspberry Pi is just a circuit board, no case. How could it be safer? First of all, it runs on 5v, not the 128v mains power that will fry your brain. Second, it’s operating system runs off of an SD card. No matter how corrupted your computers settings become, a total reset is as easy as reloading the SD card with the operating system. Third: the price. It’s easy to replace if it gets broken. Parents can give their kids their own computer so they can learn how to use it without risking their own. Eben Upton, the Raspberry Pi’s creator, envisioned it as an educational device to teach kids how to program. His goal is that “Schools that want to teach computer science will find the Raspberry Pi to be a powerful and very cost effective platform for this purpose”. His original goal for the Raspberry Pi was solely for education, so he did not expect many sales. “We honestly were thinking of this as a 1,000- to 5,000-unit opportunity,” He said of the Raspberry Pi’s popularity. “The thing we didn’t anticipate was this whole other market of technically competent adults who wanted to use it. We’re selling to hobbyists.”

source : http://www.raspberrypi.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/RaspiModelB.png

Over 1 million Raspberry Pi’s have been sold to date.The Raspberry Pi Foundation, which produces the device, is a non-profit.

So what can you do with it?

(Make a mini arcade machine like the one in the picture above?)Before you can start using it, you must have a keyboard, mouse and other peripherals because the raspberry Pi comes with nothing. Second, because it is intended for computer education, it runs on a version of Linux which boots into a command line, an simple interface that does not have fancy windows or mouse control. This is something that the average computer user might not be comfortable with. But using it falls in line with the Raspberry Pi’s spirit of learning all about computers and how they work. For the less adventurous, you can configure the Raspberry Pi to boot into a desktop environment.

If you want to get somthing cool done without touching any special computer stuff, you could download

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an installer for RASMBC, which downloads and installs RASMBC, a popular media center based of of the XMBC media center, onto the Raspberry Pi. Instant $35 home media center. (And it works with Airplay). It’s easy to use and has a remote control app for IOS and Android. Something else the Raspberry Pi could be used as is a phone server, enabling you to create needlessly complex automated menus complete with cheesy waiting music for whoever makes the mistake of calling you. Some other things you could use the Raspberry Pi is your own proxy server to bypass the school’s firewall and browse Facebook and Youtube. (will not go into detail on setup, but can be confirmed that it is very possible). The Raspberry Pi’s popularity shows no signs of slowing, because it also has GPIO (General Purpose In Out) pins that allow you to hook the Raspberry Pi up to a push button, or to a motor.

Since you can interface with the physical world, the possibilities are only expanded, such as a flip clock connected to your number of Twitter followers, and so on. The possibilities are endless. What you as a reader should really think about is what you could build with it. • Reporting

by Ethan Bless-Wint (sources at end of magazine) https://sites.google.com/site/hsmsedrdragon/

Additonal Information

Do you want to contribute to HSMSE’s Dr. Dragon Magazine?

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All HSMSE students are welcomed to contribute articles.

If you have any questions, want to submit an article, or join our club, please feel free to contact us.

-Email us at hsmsedrdragon@gmail.com -Visit our website: sites.google.com/site/hsmsedrdragon -Go to the Dr. Dragon Facebook page

Additional Sources

Strange loops and M.C. Escher:

Berndt, John. “Relabi”: Patterns of the Self-Erasing Pulse. Johnberndt.org. August 2009. Web. Hofstadter, Douglas R. Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid. New York: Basic Books,1979.

Print.

Infinity. Wolfram Alpha: Computational Knowledge engine. Wolfram Mathematics. 27 Dec. 2012.

Web. The Mathematical Art of M. C. Escher. Platonic Realms: Math Academy Online. 1997-2012. Web.

Treatments for Children with Knee Cancer: Thacker, MD, Mihir. “Osteosarcoma.” Kids Health. Ed. Mihir Thacker, MD. 2012.

16 Jul. 2012 < http://kidshealth.org/parent/medical/cancer/cancer_osteosarcoma.html#>.

Soni, MD, Emily. “A Surgeon’s Approach - The Dynamics of Rotationplasty.” Rotationplasty. Ed. 2.

Soni, MD, Emily. 2012. 18 Jul. 2012 < http://www.rotationplasty.com/Child-Life-Specialist >.

MacMillan. 2011. MacMillan. 16 Jul. 2012 < www.macmillan.org.uk>.

OrthoInfo. 2007. Association Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons. 16 Jul. 2012 < http://orthoinfo.aaos. org/topic.cfm?topic=A00092#A00092_R14_anchor >.

A. Longhi, C. Errani, M. De Paolis, M. Mercuri, and G. Bacci, “Primary bone osteosarcoma in the pediatric age: state of the art,” Cancer Treatment Reviews, 2006 vol. 32, no. 6, pp. 423–436, 18 Jul. 2012 Stryker. 2010. Stryker. 16 Jul. 2012 < http://www.stryker.com>.

Sowa DT, Weiland AJ, “Clinical applications of vascularized bone autografts,” Orthopedic Clinic North Am. 1987 Apr;18(2):257-73, 18 Jul. 2012 Chemotherapy drugs for bone cancer. 2011. Cancer Research UK. 16 Jul. 2012 < http:// cancerhelp.cancerresearchuk.org/type/bone-cancer/treatment/chemotherapy/chemotherapy-drugs-for-bone-cancer#osteo>.

Black Holes

Freudenrich, Craig. “How Black Holes Work.” How Stuff Works. n.p., n.d. Web. 1 Dec. 2012.

Overbye, Dennis. “Astronomers Find Biggest Black Holes Yet.” New York Times. New York Times, 5 Dec. 2011. Web and print. 1 Dec. 2012.

“What is the Mystery behind Black Holes?” Online Star Register. n.p., n.d. Web. 1 Dec. 2012.

“What is a Black Hole?” NASA. n.p., 30 Dec. 2009. Web. 1 Dec. 2012.

“Black Holes: A Mighty Void.” National Geographic. National Geographic Society, n.d. Web. 1 Dec. 2012.

“Black Holes.” NASA. n.p., n.d. Web. 1 Dec. 2012.

Raspbery Pi

Other Photos http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/97/NGC_5033,_Schulman_Foundation_32_inch_ telescope_on_Mt._Lemmon,_AZ.jpg http://clownfish-translator.com/img/pic2.jpg http://www.raspberrypi.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/7513051848_9a6ef2feb8_o.jpeg

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