Issue 5

Elements The Scientific Magazine of the University of Puget Sound

Science 2.0: Best of the Internet

Sustainability in Action: Rain Gardens Issue 5, Fall 2008

Slater Museum Exposed!

Infrared Photos:

Seeing the Invisible

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Elements: The Scientific Magazine

Credits

Editor-in-Chief: Marissa Jones Managing Editor: Nick Kiest Copy Editor: Megan Kiest-McFarland Staff Photographers: Matt Loewen & Nick Kiest Layout: Marissa Jones, Nick Kiest, Megan KiestMcFarland, Tanya Rogers Image Editing: Nick Kiest Illustrator: Tanya Rogers Table of Contents Photo: Marissa Jones CosmoNerd, Front & Back Cover Photos: Nick Kiest

Acknowledgments: Elements would like to thank ASUPS, the Student Affiliates of the American Chemical Society, the Sustainability Advisory Council, and the Physics and Dual Degree Engineering Department for their generous donations.

We would also like to thank the following organizations and individuals: Office of the President and the Admissions Office for purchasing our magazine; the ASUPS Media Board and the Trail for loaning us the computers and software we need; Mark Martin for advising and support; Melanie Heisler, Paul Jones, Curt and Debbie Kiest for intense copy editing. Thank you to Megan Kiest-McFarland, the graduate, for tireless assistance. And lastly, thank you, Wikipedia, for being a font of knowledge and fact checker, and Wikimedia our font of imagery.

Contact & Publishing: e-mail: elements@ups.edu

web: clubs.ups.edu/clubs/elements mail: ASUPS - Elements, University of Puget Sound, 1500 N Warner St. #1017, Tacoma, WA 98416 Published by Consolidated Press 600 S. Spokane Street, Seattle, WA 98134

This issue was published on paper from well-managed forests, controlled sources and recycled wood or fiber.

Letter From The Editor Welcome back to Elements, the Scientific Magazine for the University of Puget Sound.

For two years, we have chosen one of the four classical elements (earth, air, fire, and water) to represent the magazine and appear on the cover.

We planned to recycle the elements once we had gone through them all: earth, air, fire, water, then “rinse and repeat.” But this semester, a fifth element caught our fancy: the ether. With so much talk of space exploration in the media, a lunar eclipse in February of 2008, and some astrophotography on the horizon… well, we just couldn’t pass it up!

On the cover is an up-close and personal photograph of the moon taken by our managing editor, Nick Kiest. The photograph was taken through the astronomy department’s telescope on a rare Washington clear night. The moon appeared so large through the telescope that it filled the entire eyepiece. Twelve separate images were stitched together to create the single picture that appears on the cover.

You will also find that the ether has permeated the content of our magazine. This semester we offer articles about seeing faces on Mars, taking photographs beyond the visible spectrum, Einstein’s relativity, and a personality quiz that can reveal your true home planet. We are also proud to feature a few articles that hit a little closer to home: geology research, the Permian extinction, a history of the Slater Museum, and the new rainwater collection garden at UPS, to name a few.

Many key staff members graduated last spring, and although we have left the school, we hope that Elements is here to stay. We invite the next generation of science enthusiasts to follow our lead and continue to produce this magazine for years to come.

All the best, Marissa Jones Editor-in-Chief

Find an article interesting or infuriating? Want to see Elements investigate something?

Let us know, or join the Elements team and share what you know with others.

of the University of Puget Sound

Table of Contents The Distributed Computing Revolution

4

Pareidolia on Mars

5

Harvesting the Future: Rain Collection at UPS

8

Joe LeSac

Marissa Jones

Carolyn Anderson, Mckenna Krueger and Pauline Seng

Science 2.0: The Best of the Internet

10

Einstein’s Relativity

12

Disaster: Climate Change of the Permian Period

14

Keaton Wilson Matt Getchell

Elizabeth Smith

Seeing the Invisible: Infrared Photography

Nick Kiest and Megan Kiest-McFarland

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Inside the Slater Museum

20

Climb to Safety in Case of JĂśkulhlaup

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Threats to Deep Sea Coral Reefs

26

Electron Theory

27

New Classes at UPS

28

Elements Quiz

29

Cosmonerd!

31

Marissa Jones

Christine Chan Tanya Rogers

Anne Pew

Matt Loewen

Which Planet are You?

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The Distributed Computing Revolution J o e L a S ac

T

he scientific and cultural problems that our society faces today are being addressed systematically, not only by teams of scientists, but by volunteers worldwide. Users across the globe volunteer the processing power of their own computers to research-level university departments, who, in turn, send information in various packet sizes to computers at home in order to solve a wide range of computational and algorithmic problems. We installed the Stanford-based project “Folding@Home” onto all of the UPS lab machines and workstations in the summer of 2007. Each computer on our campus is working in its spare time to solve various problems that could lead to a greater understanding of how diseases and disorders develop. Since then our campus has worked its way to one of the top scores for folding teams.

At the time of printing, we ranked 348 out of nearly 90,000 teams globally thanks to our combined processing power.

This is the genius of outsourcing scientific research, and the genius of encouraging productive competition.

The structure of scientific knowledge is effectively decentralized with distributed computing projects. Among a list of distributed computing projects, Folding@Home is one of the most practical. The project simulates problems that occur in lab settings (and real-life settings, of course) where proteins fold, or assemble themselves, in ways that are little understood by the scientific community. When proteins fail to fold properly, this gives rise to all sorts of disorders, such as Alzheimer’s disease, Creutzfeldt-Jakob’s disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Huntington’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and many forms of cancer. The idea is that understanding the folding process will lead to all sorts of solutions to these diseases. Folding@Home has, in fact, received numerous awards since it began in 2000, for completing various tasks that could not have been completed in the laboratories at Stanford alone. One of those awards is for developing efficient algorithms and methods of distributing computational problems, thus reducing the environmental costs.

Probably the most notable distributed computing project is the Berkeley-based “SETI@Home” project, which outsources the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence’s computational problems to volunteer workstations with the goal of discovering extra-terrestrial life through the examination of data from radio telescopes. The SETI project has 5.2 million participants worldwide, but alas, has not been successful in finding one positive candidate in space.

The digital revolution as a whole is also moving much faster than the sustainability revolution. The SETI project, while admirable in its mission, comes at a cost to the environment. Since global power grids are not sustainable, the use of battery power and electricity relies foremost on power from coal and other energy plants. In fact, most of the energy produced in the United States still comes from coal

and coke sources. One estimate says the SETI@ Home project alone has cost $500,000,000 in total equivalent energy costs, with no quantifiable results.

Photo Services / Wilson Bailey

Science in Contex t

Elements: The Scientific Magazine

In some sense, this environmental critique is no different than an e n v i r o n m e n t a l This lab is computing away while idle. critique of anything else. We could say that the critique is non-unique in that it applies equally to all sorts of other energy-intensive uses. Distributing computing is not too energy-intensive on a local level, since it does not take priority over other system processes. Yet distributed computing is no worse than less admirable uses of computational power, and hence energy, such as the aggregate amount of energy spent by local computers to view vast amounts of pornography.

The cost of pornography in terms of environmental costs, to my knowledge, has not been calculated, but that activity does not trace its energy back to a single source, like distributed computing does, so it is difficult to hold anyone accountable. The only option would be to shame the entire pornographic community.

While distributed computing projects have not solved the sustainability problem themselves, they should not be singled out as a greenhouse gas proliferator more ‘unique’ than other activities. That problem should be addressed separately, or perhaps addressed directly by distributed computing projects themselves. The most useful distributed computing project at this time would be to solve the problem of creating sustainable energy alternatives. This could be done by distributing algorithmic problems to determine the most efficient way to produce energy from, say, photovoltaic energy cells.

A similar distributed computing program at DARPA uses scalability technology to determine how and when the next terrorist attack will occur, and under what circumstances.

Perhaps the same model could be used to determine under what circumstances our culture will become sympathetic to the damage our activities cause to the environment, and under what circumstances will that culture act on its own behalf. But by the time the algorithms are solved and computational problems reach a standstill, our society’s traditional energy sources will have expired and all our research will have been in vain.

Links:

folding.stanford.edu/ fah-web.stanford.edu/cgi-bin/main.py?qtype=teampage &teamnum=76079 folding.stanford.edu/English/Awards

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of the University of Puget Sound Science in Contex t

Pareidolia on Mars M a rissa J ones

T

hey say the surface of Mars is etched with faces. In reality, the faces are nothing more than arbitrary geological features, but in the human imagination, they take on myriad forms. The phenomenon is called pareidolia and it involves interpreting a vague or random stimulus, such as an image or sound, as significant. The word was coined in 1994 by Steven Goldstein. It comes from the Latin, “para,” meaning amiss or wrong, and “eidolon,” meaning image. It is these misidentified images appearing in clouds, tortillas, gnarled tree roots, and countless other objects that have captured the fancy of religious fanatics, conspiracy theorists, and casual observers. It has especially captured the imagination of Mars enthusiasts, researchers and amateurs alike.

Martian Bigfoot?

The most recent major example of pareidolia was identified by a Japanese blogger who happened to observe a humanoid figure among the rubble of the Red Planet. The alleged Martian appeared in one of the panoramic images taken by the Mars rover, Spirit, in early November 2007. “A man is in the photograph which the Mars explorer Spirit (it stopped transmitting data in 2004) sent,” reads one of two English sentences on the webpage. There may be a more detailed account in Japanese, but it is lost to the English speaking audience. The picture, though blurry, clearly depicts a dark, bipedal form walking out from behind a boulder, a la Bigfoot. The picture spread through the internet like wildfire, reaching thousands of people in a matter of months. Newspapers around the world caught hold of the story, reporting that NASA and other organizations were using this image to further consider the possibility of life on Mars.

The most appealing part of the Martian Bigfoot report is the complete and total implausibility of it all. If readers are not moved by the possibility of rocky Martians roaming the Red Planet, they may still be intrigued by the fact that some people are willing to entertain the notion. Phil Plait, writer and astronomer in charge of the Bad Astronomy blog, explains that the rock is only a few yards from the rover, making our theoretical Martian a towering 4 inches tall. (Bigfoot? More like Littlefoot.) The chances of finding hominids on Mars are slim to begin with, but tiny hominids cannot even enjoy the benefit of bearing an unequivocal similarity to ourselves. They would have to breathe a carbon dioxide atmosphere, survive on the chilly and arid surface, and consume – what? Tiny Martians are downright preposterous and belong in Gulliver’s Travels, not NASA photographs.

The blogger who spotted the Martian seemed to imply that Spirit was prevented from transmitting data shortly after taking the picture in question, presumably due to tampering

by Mini-Martians. Plait comments that while Spirit did stop sending data in 2004, it started up again and is currently transmitting perfectly reliable images of the planet. Plait describes this type of account as “antiscience.” Science relies on natural explanations of the natural world, but its conclusions can be misconstrued when data taken from the natural world are used to defend supernatural or outlandish theories. But really, who can blame the Martian enthusiasts?

In defiance of all things logical and parsimonious, that little rock just looks human!

The Face of Cydonia In 1976 the Viking 1 orbiter returned photographs from the Martian surface that appeared to contain a gigantic human face. The conspicuous albedo feature occurred in the Cydonia region of Mars, at 47°75’ north, 9°46’ west. NASA’s chief scientist in charge of the Viking 1 mission initially determined the face was a trick of the light and sun angle.

NASA

It turns out that NASA was keeping quiet on the subject while numerous conspiracy theorists and Martian enthusiasts were leaping to conclusions – or if not conclusions, at least enough of a story to generate some

interest in alternative views about life on Mars. Conspiracy theory loves company.

Hominid figure in NASA photograph: Is it just a rock?

66 The image was dismissed as inconsequential. However, two NASA engineers, Vincent DiPietro and Gregory Molenaar, independently rediscovered the images and together they developed a method to increase the resolution of the face.

Their attention led others to investigate the face and fueled numerous theories that attempted to reconcile this human visage on the surface of an alien planet.

Richard Hoagland and other commentators latched onto the image and used it to propose that there were ancient civilizations on Mars. Hoagland compared this gigantic face to the Sphinx of ancient Egypt and pointed out that the surrounding hills resembled pyramids. Moreover, the structures were arranged such that the angles between them reflected important mathematical constants, such as pi, e, Phi, and the square root of two.

NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor collected higher resolution images of the face of Cydonia that indicate, beyond what most people would consider a reasonable doubt, that the image is in fact nothing more than a Martian hill. The original images had resolutions of 250 meters per pixel, at the very highest, whereas the following generation of images offered 20 meters per pixel. Instead of intricate metropolitan architecture or crumbling city walls, the feature appeared disappointingly ordinary even from a strictly geological point of view.

In the face of this potentially debunking evidence, Hoagland proposed that these images had been run through filters to distort the civilization and the giant face beyond recognition.

He and many other conspiracy theorists point to a section on page 216 of the Brookings Institution report, Proposed Studies on the Implications of Peaceful Space Activities for Human Affairs, commissioned by the US Government, which entertains the possibility of withholding information about extraterrestrial life in order to prevent society from falling into chaos. The report discusses various religious and antiscience sects. It states that “for them, the discovery of life – rather than any other space product – would be electrifying.” The report does not disclose the government’s official position on promoting or discouraging withheld information about extraterrestrial life, but it does raise the question of whether it would be wise to inform the public if extraterrestrial life did prove a reality. The report merely indicates that further research is needed on the subject. The fact that covering up the existence of extraterrestrial life crossed the minds of NASA’s officials is used to give the theorists carte blanche when it comes to postulating alternatives to the dead planet explanation.

The HiRISE imager on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter delivered images with resolutions of 0.2 meters per pixel that further show a mound with no anthropogenic features. In the face of the high definition images, Hoagland appeared to rescind his previous assertions about the face. Instead he focused on the pyramids and other geometric features as evidence of civilization. Old theories die hard. Several webpages riddled with supporting evidence from astrological events still proclaim the connection between Hoagland, Cydonia, and ancient Martian civilizations.

Elements: The Scientific Magazine Canals of Mars Pareidolia is not limited to faces. It includes any random stimulus that is perceived as significant, such as Hoagland’s pyramids. One of the more famous examples of pareidolia on Mars is the canali described by Italian astronomer Giovanni Virginio Schiaparelli. Schiaparelli was the director of the Milan Observatory in the late 1800s and is credited with perpetuating widespread credence in the idea of an advanced civilizations on Mars.

When Schiaparelli observed the surface of Mars through a telescope, he saw what appeared to be channels crisscrossing the surface. He described them as canali, which in Italian can mean water channels of either natural or man-made origin. Observers of Mars at that time had identified the albedo regions as oceans and land, and also perceived areas with albedo that changed over the year as plants. Schiaparelli observed Mars during the 1877 opposition, when Earth and Mars were as close together as possible. This advantageous astrological alignment led him and others to believe that the canals were visible because of the ideal viewing conditions.

Later, other observers reported canali and recorded their locations on maps of the planet. The canals are not always in the same places on maps drawn by different observers.

On the same night, through the same telescope different observers will not necessarily see them. But as the idea of Mars as a desert planet with polar ice caps became prevalent, people latched onto the idea of intelligent Martians channeling water down from the poles to fuel agricultural projects. It was not until orbiters reached the planet and delivered photographs of the surface that the existence of canals was disproved.

Hardwired to See Faces?

The propensity to see familiar shapes in inanimate objects is not only pervasive among human adults, but also among infants. Newborns have very limited forms of communication, but psychologists have tapped into infants’ physiological and psychological responses in order to devise methods of determining how very young humans process visual stimuli. Newborns have poor visual acuity but their ability to discern fine detail improves drastically during the first eight months of life, at which point it approaches that of an adult. Psychologists can measure “preferred” images based on the amount of time infants spend looking at one picture over another when presented with both simultaneously.

Preferred items include the mother’s face, crude patterns of shapes that do not exceed the infant’s visual acuity, and human faces.

It should come as no surprise that infants prefer these items. Faces are the first shapes they are exposed to upon entering the world. There is no psychological incentive for an infant to stare at an image that appears as a nothing more than a grey blur. What is surprising is that newborns that are only several hours old not only prefer faces, but also shapes that roughly resemble faces. Babies appear to interpret vague images as specific ones. For instance, a newborn will preferentially look at the shape of a T in a

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of the University of Puget Sound

images. The regions were all in the temporal lobe, which is the part of the brain associated with speech, hearing, vision, and memory. Moreover, the face-specific processing regions were occasionally stimulated when the monkeys were shown images that only vaguely resembled faces. Apparently, a monkey will think it is seeing a face if a certain number of criteria are met. This research is fascinating because it provides a mechanism for pareidolia.

NASA

While faces may be the most common form of pareidolia, they are not the only type. Takeo Watanabe, a neuroscientist at Boston University, has shown that people presented with a stimulus occasionally become “hyperattenuated” to it and continue to perceive it even when it is not there. He asked people to identify the direction of movement of faint dots across a computer screen. In the first trial, the subjects could not figure out the direction in which the dots were moving. In the second, they were able to follow letters superimposed on the dots to show the direction of movement. In the final trial, the subjects were presented with a blank screen. In this instance, many claimed to see dots. And not only did they see dots, but they saw them moving in the same direction the actual dots had moved in the previous test. Wantanabe explains “As a result of repeated presentation, the subjects developed enhanced sensitivity to the dots,” he said. “Their sensitivity got so high that they saw them even when there was nothing there.”

The Face of Cydonia: Is it just a hill? square over the shape of an upside down T in a square.

If the features on a face are rearranged, infants prefer to look at the combinations that have most information in the top third of the image. Even before they have been extensively exposed to real human faces, extremely young babies apparently interpret top-heavy images as relevant information.

These visual preference experiments suggest that human brains are hardwired to detect human faces, even in images that only vaguely resemble their targets. Perhaps it is more advantageous to perceive faces when there are none than to overlook faces that are present. The brain is prepared to interpret and identify visages even from a young age. As we age, it is reasonable to extrapolate that most significant shapes will be interpreted or re-written by the brain as the stimulus they most closely resemble.

The idea that facial recognition is in some way “hardwired” in the human brain and possibly confers an adaptive advantage has been explored by writers, scientists, and philosophers including Clarence Irving Lewis, Carl Sagan, and C. S. Lewis. These individuals postulated about the possibility of programmed facial and image recognition. Now researchers are using neurological experiments to investigate if it does indeed exist.

Dr. Doris Tsao recently published research on face recognition. Tsao was tipped off by the fact that some people who suffer strokes are subsequently unable to recognize faces, but have no trouble recognizing other objects. The specific loss of facial identification function suggests that there is a distinct region of the brain that is utilized when humans view faces and that this region (or regions) is (or are) integral in processing facial stimuli. Using macaque monkeys as model organisms, Tsao employed functional magnetic resonance imaging to record the areas of the brain that are activated when subjects are presented with a number of visual stimuli. The images included food items, geometric patterns, tools, gadgets, and faces. She found that three regions of the brain were consistently activated when the monkeys were presented with faces, but not with the other

This phenomenon may explain numerous observers reporting canali on the surface of Mars. Once visualized, the brain becomes attuned to the stimulus and continues to register it even though nothing is there. It also may explain the propensity to see faces in random patterns – humans see so many faces on a daily basis that the brain subconsciously invents faces, occasionally delivering a false positive. Dr. Sinha of M.I.T explains, “The information faces convey is so rich — not just regarding another person’s identity, but also their mental state, health and other factors.” Sinha continues, “It’s extremely beneficial for the brain to become good at the task of face recognition and not to be very strict in its inclusion criteria. The cost of missing a face is higher than the cost of declaring a non-face to be a face.”

Facing the Facts For hundreds of years people assumed that the Martian surface supported life. When the first Mariner image returned evidence of a geologically and biologically dead planet, it came as a disappointment to many eager imaginations.

Since then, researchers and amateurs have been attempting to glean information from a surface that is rather dull as far as advanced civilizations are concerned. It is natural for us to see significance in the surface of Mars, for it is something we have always pined for.

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Research Repor t

Harvesting the Future Rain Collection at UPS C a roly n A nders on, M ck enn a K rueg er n a city with 37 inches of annual rainfall, effective stormwater management in the Tacoma region is essential to maintain a safe water supply and a healthy Puget Sound.

The effects of urbanization, including increased pollution and decreased green space, have the potential to create a dangerously unsustainable stormwater management situation. Runoff from urban environments mixes with pollutants such as herbicides, petroleum, and animal waste, and reenters nearby streams, ponds, and the Puget Sound, contributing to increased levels of city water pollution, continued loss of wildlife habits, and erosion of stream banks.

Without sustainable and efficient management practices in place, high seasonal stormwater flows create additional problems — flooding, overflowing sewage systems, and property damage, for example. Furthermore, according to the City of Tacoma website, annual stormwater management costs are nearly $15 million.

In the face of increasing pollution and rising costs, what can the average citizen or university student do to help sustainably manage Tacoma’s stormwater?

In the student-lead project, Harvesting the Future: Rain Collection at UPS, students designed and installed a smallscale sustainable stormwater management system for UPS. Through collaboration with the University’s Facilities Services and the Sustainability Advisory Committee, our group constructed a rain garden and water collection system that serves not only to sustainably manage the campus stormwater runoff, but also to retain excess water for maintenance. The project included the construction of two campus rain gardens, each approximately 400 square feet, and the placement of rain collection barrels around campus buildings to capture the excess runoff. This additionally serves as an educational asset to the university and maintains UPS’s commitment to sustainability.

Building the

Pauline S eng

Harvesting the Future originated in Professor Lisa Johnson’s Fall 2007 Environmental Law course, where students were assigned to write a sustainability-related grant proposal to the EPA. After researching the history and implementation of rain gardens at other universities, the students decided that this was a realistic option for our own UPS campus.

The class turned to the UPS Sustainability Advisory Council (SAC) for realization of this project. SAC members James Vance and Bob Kief of Facilities were particularly helpful in supporting the project. Through the sustainability grant received during Fall Semester 2007, the Harvesting the Future project gained complete funding, and UPS opened a new chapter in campus sustainability.

The addition of the rain gardens to the UPS campus during spring semester 2008 showcases new opportunities in low impact development (LID). LID is a stormwater management technique which focuses on reducing the quantity and improving the quality of stormwater runoff by promoting conservation of the features of the natural habitat. A LID project may incorporate several tools to soak up rainwater, reduce stormwater runoff, and filter pollutants. Some examples of these tools include permeable paving, compostamended soils, vegetated roofs, rainwater collection systems, and bio-retention sites.

Bio-retention sites, in general, are swale drainage sites designed to remove silt and pollution from surface runoff water. Rain gardens, like those installed at UPS, use large drum barrels to capture runoff from roofs or other impervious surfaces, guide this water to the swale of the garden, and become a wetland-like landscape element. As a form of sustainable LID, rain gardens are beneficial for a variety of reasons: not only do they reduce stormwater flow and decrease the amount of pollution from, for example, parking lots or overflowing sewers, but their design and implementation rain garden.

Photo Services / Will McLain

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a nd

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Photo Services / Will McLain

of the University of Puget Sound

Planting the rain garden. can also be tailored to meet the specific needs of the homeowner or corporation, or in this case, the university campus. Moreover, this seemingly small-scale practice, when properly implemented, can result in a trickle-down effect with great benefits to Tacoma’s overall stormwater management practices.

Construction of the rain gardens took place April 2008 and included site excavation with help from campus irrigation technician Tim Putnam. Native Washington plants were selected and ordered with the assistance of Cathy Brown, Grounds Assistant Manager. The choice of native plants provides a much lower maintenance garden once the plant root structure is firmly developed in the soil. Since these plants are adapted to survive the wet winters and dry summers of the Puget Sound region, additional watering is rarely required. They also resist native pests better than nonnative plants. Additionally, planting native plants improves the local water quality, as they require neither fertilizer nor pesticides. Sample native plants chosen for the rain gardens include Symphoricarpos albus (snowberry), Vaccinium ovatum (evergreen huckleberry), Aster subspicatus (Douglas aster), and Polystichum munitum (sword fern).

The locations chosen for the rain gardens were dependent upon soil quality.

According to Tim Putnam and Cathy Brown, much of campus soil is less than ideal for absorption. Based on their assessments, we installed the gardens in two separate sites on Theme Row (behind 1119 N. Lawrence, and between 1102 and 1114 N. Lawrence).

These sites are both located on native soil, which means that they absorb and filter stormwater much more effectively than than the clay found throughout most of campus. Both sites are responsible for draining runoff from significant areas of impervious surfaces. The garden behind 1119 N. Lawrence drains nearly 1900 square feet, and the other garden drains part of the 16,000 square foot facilities parking lot. This water now filters through the campus cleaner than before, thereby benefiting the overall regional water health of the Tacoma community. The water harvested by the rain barrels is used to water the gardens during particularly dry months, thereby representing a cost-saving water usage scheme.

Through community outreach, the project has promoted the sustainability and cost-effectiveness of landscaping with such LID sites. This includes information available directly at the rain garden sites as well as an interactive website linked through the university’s own homepage. Several other college campuses across the nation, such as the University of Minnesota Duluth, Carleton College (Northfield, MN), and Edgewood College (Madison, WI), have implemented similar stormwater management programs. The rain gardens at these campuses both filter stormwater and act as an educational asset to the schools. The UMD rain garden, for example, is comprised of plantings, a drain tile system, and a water level control system. The drain system there can hold as much as 60,000 gallons of water. This is part of UMD’s commitment to protect nearby Lake Superior.

The construction of campus bio-retention sites at UPS is a sustainable method to harness and treat excess stormwater runoff. This collaborative effort benefits not only the campus community, but serves as a model for other universities, community businesses, and local households.

If you are interested being more involved with this new sustainable campus installment — through garden maintenance, for example — please visit the Harvesting the Future Website. Another helpful resource is the Washington State University’s Rain Garden Handbook for Western Washington Homeowners, written by Curtis Hinman.

Links:

asups.ups.edu/students/cganderson/rg/home.html www.pierce.wsu.edu/Water_Quality/LID/

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Elements: The Scientific Magazine

Science in Contex t

Science 2.0:

The Best of the Internet

K e at on W ils on

W

e all do it. The internet has become a source of pop-culture media. Between social networking on Facebook and videos on YouTube, the insane, humorous, and sometimes idiotic behavior of the everyday guy has been thrown into the limelight. Combined with wikis and blogging, the internet has become a cacophony of voices where everyone in the world is shouting. What about science? One might think that scientists, of all people, might be immune to this trend. Wrong. Here are just a few of the examples the web has to offer for you to enjoy.

Deep Sea News

scienceblogs.com/deepseanews Being an avid lover of everything oceanic, I must confess, I have this blog bookmarked. Take some sarcastic, geeky deep sea lovers, and throw in a mix of weird news items, conservation and obscure deep sea biology, and you have a blog that is entertaining and informative. Everything from the latest innovations in floating habitation, deep sea humor in the form of cartoons, to weekly pictures of deep sea creatures like Osedax , bone devouring worms, and the upside down starfish, Brisingids, are found on a blog that is a must for any marine-curious individual.

lolScience

community.livejournal.com/lolscience community.livejournal.com/lolinverts The recent internet craze lolcats, (found at www.lolcats.com, as well as on various facebook pages!) just begged to be copied into various incarnations. The two sites above offer playful, science-minded alternatives to the original. One of my favorites is a picture of what appears to be a normal decapod crustacean, and the caption “All yer reeprodukshun... r belong to uz”. Upon closer inspection, we notice that the caption is referring to the small parasitic organism attached to the decapod. Rhizocephalans. A name that should strike fear into the hearts of young children. These parasitic cousins of barnacles penetrate their host, and grow through the body like a root system, culminating in the production of a sac-like external organ, replacing the host’s own reproductive organs. This reference is the typical kind of humor present on the sites, which are constantly updated and definitely worth checking out.

PCR Song

www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5yPkxCLads Quite possibly the ultimate in science/humor ridiculousness.

PCR, short for Polymerase Chain Reaction, is a tried and true method for replicating a piece of DNA many times over.

As cool as it is, singing about it is over the top. Beautifully over the top. Give it a listen, and impress all your science classmates with your knowledge of obscure internet media.

10 Best Internet Chemistry Videos

lolScience: Now witness the power of this fully operational Large Hadron Collider!

blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/03/top-10-amazing.html If you’ve taken Chem 110, you undoubtedly remember watching the video on alkali metals, as I do. The culmination of this video was the narrator saying in a perfectly calm and easy manner, “Now let’s try Cesium...” This list, compiled by wired.com, is everything you loved about a chunk of

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XKCD: Indulge your inner geek. cesium blowing apart a glass beaker full of water, in different videos. The list has it all, thermite, exploding gummy bears, and even elephant toothpaste. Although most of these demonstrations can be seen at UPS’s annual Halloween Chemistry Magic Show, (and usually to greater effect, as the Wizard is a master at this type of thing) this will undoubtedly tide you over until next October. (Note: check out the comments section as well, as it is full of great links to other science videos!)

Phun

www.acc.umu.se/~emilk/index.html This one is a serious time waster, but at least you can justify it by thinking you are learning some physics. Phun is a Master of Science thesis project by a fellow named Emil Ernerfeldt. At its core, phun is a 2-D physics sandbox, with parameters that are changeable, such as friction, density and motor speed. There are also a series of pre-loaded templates to play with, but the real fun comes in trying to create your own machines and situations. YouTube is full of videos recorded by people who have wasted far more time than most of us probably will, but it is amazing to see what is possible in this program. Fortunately for Mac users, they just released a MacOS version of the Phun 2-D physics sandbox, so you can play with it too.

The Encyclopedia of Life

www.eol.org The brainchild of E.O. Wilson, the renowned biological thinker and conservationist who spoke at UPS in 2006, the recently created Encyclopedia of Life strives to be the definitive Wikipedia-like source for biologists. Although relatively nascent, the few model pages that are active are amazing! Videos, distribution information, natural history, and many more tidbits of information are all at your fingertips. Similar to Wikipedia, EOL will eventually allow users to upload information into the database, with the ultimate goal to have an electronic page for every known species. Unlike Wikipedia pages, which sometimes suffer from a lack of credibility, EOL pages will be subjected

to review by curators, or experts that monitor the pages for credibility. This page will undoubtedly be a great learning resource in coming years.

XKCD

www.xkcd.org/ The tagline pretty much says it all: “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.” This comic is new three times a week and never fails to make truly hilarious comments about life, the universe and everything, with stick figures. The forums are also pretty funny, but not as ridiculous as the comics. FYI, make sure to mouse over the comic to see further amusing commentary about the comic shown.

Elements Radio Podcast

web.mac.com/keatonwilson/Keaton_Wilsons_Page/Elements_Radio/Elements_Radio.html Okay, at the risk of tooting our own horn here, the new Elements Radio podcast is awesome! The first episode, (with many more to come) features a segment on the current Japanese whaling conflict with the IWC, as well as an indepth lecture with physics professor Bernie Bates on aliens, the Fermi Paradox, and galactic colonization by humans. We are hoping to bring science from UPS and around the world into a different media, with the same quality that we place in our magazine. Plan on hearing from President Thomas in our next episode, as well as the answer to Professor Bates’ question: “What will stop us from colonizing the known universe?” Drop a comment on the page, or email us at elements@ups.edu to let us know what you thought about the podcast, or segments you would like to hear.

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Elements: The Scientific Magazine

Science in Contex t

Einstein’s Relativity M at t G e t chell

P

erhaps one of the most celebrated scientific advancements in history is that which was first published by Albert Einstein in 1916: the Theory of General Relativity. We have all heard of relativity, and some of us might view it as the penultimate theory associated with the field of physics.

However, that is very far from the truth. In reality, the theory of relativity acted as more of a gateway between classical Newtonian Physics and what we dub Modern Physics.

speed with which he views the ball traveling inside the train is much greater than the first case.

Wikimedia Commons

The reasoning for this is, before the ball was thrown, or when it was “stationary,” it was already moving at a fast speed by being inside the moving train. So extra speed was added when observer one threw the ball, and it seemed to be traveling faster than the speed of the train, according to observer two. What Einstein’s first rule tells us, is that Up until Albert Einstein’s groundbreaking theory, many con- when you are dealing with the speed of light, this additional speed makes no difference, because sidered scientific advancements in both observers will view the light as physics, and the level of understandAn hour sitting on a park bench with a traveling at the same speed, in both ing of our world, to be at an impasse. pretty girl passes like a minute, but a of their frames of reference.

It appeared that researchers had disminute sitting on a hot stove seems like covered all there was to discover, and an hour.

While this now may seem counterinthey were running out of things to do.

-Albert Einstein, On Relativity tuitive, you have to understand that The theory of relativity changed all what Einstein discovered is that you that, with its first major conclusion being the critical law that all motion is relative, but the cannot think about this subject without somehow changing your understanding of reality. To put it simply, we live out speed of light in free space is the same for all observers. our day-to-day lives in a world governed by classical physThe common reader might accept this law as something ics, and we understand it and it makes sense, because we that should just be a natural rule, “Okay, sure light moves only deal with slow movement. That is the key difference at the same speed, all the time,” but it is actually a little with relativity. Since we are now considering objects that bit more counterintuitive than that. To discuss a simplified move much faster (substantial fractions of the speed of example, let us consider a moving train, with two observ- light), we have to throw out the old rulebook and create a ers, one of them on the train, one of them off the train, whole new set of laws. Another of these new laws stems watching it pass. Now imagine the observer on the train from the one already stated, that light is the same speed in throwing a small ball forward inside the train. He would all reference frames, is that nothing can travel faster than view the ball as moving away from him with the velocity with the speed of light. Sorry, bad news for Trekkies or Star Wars which he threw it, makes sense, right? But if you consider fans, but “warp speed” or “hyper space” just is not posthe observer outside of the train watching it pass by, the sible. Really puts a dampener on the possibilities of space exploration. If it takes light thousands of years to reach us from those faraway stars, then how long do you think it will take us to get there?

Albert Einstein, the man himself.

But then, even there, another issue arises. Imagine that we even had the capability to travel at the speed of light, or even the capacity to travel half of the speed of light. (A side reference, since you are probably wondering, the speed of light is measured to be about 300 million meters per second. That is 675 million miles per hour in the standard system, but the point is that that is way faster than we can even begin to comprehend.) Another law presented by Einstein is that moving clocks run slower than stationary clocks. This effect is only noticeable with incredibly great speeds, ones that are substantial fractions of the speed of light, so no, speeding to work will not cause time to slow down and prevent you from being late. This effect is called time dilation, and it presents the possibility for another interesting example.

We will begin again with two observers, but imagine this time that they are twins. This famous thought experiment is commonly referred to as the Twins Paradox, and in it, we

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Nick Kiest

of the University of Puget Sound

Time passes slower for those not on the train, although minutely. inverse exponential relationship, meaning, as v gets bigger and bigger, or closer to the actual value of c, the more dramatic the relativistic effect. For our example in the twins paradox, the faster the rocket, the slower the rocket-clock, and the greater the age difference between the twins at the end of the trip.

Due to the nature of time dilation, since the rocket-twin is traveling at a substantial fraction of the speed of light, the clock in the rocket ship (which may as well be a biological clock for all intents and purposes of this thought experiment) has been moving much slower than any clock being observed by Earth-twin. The wildest part of this thought experiment is that when rocket-twin returns to Earth to meet his counterpart again, their ages will be different, because they will have experienced time passing at different rates.

The gap in their ages corresponds to how fast the rocket was traveling through this journey, because there is a specific mathematical relationship called the gamma factor (Υ) that is the connection between classical and relativistic calculations. This mathematical relationship, is as follows:

Since time is such an abstract concept in itself, at this point you might be wondering how relativistic rules apply to more concrete things, and the crazy thing is that even physical parameters are affected by how fast the objects are moving. This leads to another law, being that the faster it is, the shorter it is. This effect is called length contraction, and wouldn’t you know it, it uses the same gamma factor relationship!

Matt Loewen

imagine that one of the twins stays here on Earth while the other twin flies away in a rocket ship, capable of traveling at significant speeds. If the twin in the rocket ship travels to a distant star and back, and the twin on earth watches the rocket the whole time, then the passing of time as perceived by each twin will not match up.

Where c is the accepted value for the speed of light, and v is the velocity of the objects in question, measured in terms of fractions of c, the speed of light. The relationship is an

What these laws did for the field of physics was to open up a new realm of research and discovery, and allowed scientists to get over and beyond the roadblock at which they had struggled for many years. Modern Physics leapt into the relativistic, subatomic, quantum realm, and discovered so much more about the universe’s structure and its inner workings, but the ironic thing is, we have once again arrived at an impasse. It appears that we have run out of things to study, and are left to speculate with theories of unification, and nothing else. We are once again waiting for the breakthrough of this new century, and hopefully it will open doors again.

For more information on relativity: Beiser, Arthur. Concepts of Modern Physics. 6th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill Higher Education, 2003.

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Elements: The Scientific Magazine

Science in Contex t

Disaster: Climate Change of the Permian Period E liz a be t h S mi t h

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he End-Cretaceous mass extinction brought about the end of the dinosaurs. It is believed that a great meteor impact could have put enough iridium into the atmosphere to block out the sun and change the climate so that plants would die, thereby causing the food chain to fail. In theory, this could have been the underlying cause of the dinosaurs’ destruction.

But that was nothing compared to the disaster that struck the Late Permian. Two hundred fifty-one million years ago the greatest mass extinction of all time occurred. Ninety percent of all marine life and seventy percent of all terrestrial life died. The exact cause of this extinction is unknown, but the overriding consensus is that this was most likely a climatically driven extinction.

This extinction marks the end of an age and a period. The Permian-Triassic Boundary is a major landmark in geologic time. Early geologists who were trying to date and relate the ages of the various rock layers to one another noticed that there was a large decrease in the number of creatures fossilized within the rock at this point. They saw this as a worldwide trend and in a wide variety of deposits. These geologists also noticed that few species made it through the boundary, and those that did survived only in lower numbers than before and were slow to recover. Many species did not begin to make a comeback until the middle to late Early Triassic.

For example, in Chaotian, South China there were at least four types of ammonoids just below the Permian-Triassic Boundary, which was a decrease from earlier numbers, and by the middle of the early Triassic there was only one species of ammonoid in the region.1 Unlike the giant bang that probably decimated the dinosaurs, this was a slow and drawn out process that leached away at the species of the time, ultimately resulting in the demise of the majority of living things.

The Carboniferous and Permian were times of increasing temperature as the landmasses moved away from the South Pole and centered themselves on the Equator. Life began to flourish. Many plants began to grow and large colonies of shelled animals grew in the seas, especially in shallow continental shelf environments.

The Carboniferous Period, which lasted from 359 to 318 million years ago, was a flourishing, productive period with plants reaching their maximum growth. They became quite large and there was a diverse population. But as the Permian waned, there was a hiccup in temperature and the Earth began to cool again. The geologically induced momentary drop in temperature may have been enough to drastically change the environment. Both plants and animals began to decrease in size and species diversity began to wane.

In the early Late Permian, most of the landmasses had collected together. Gondwana and Laurasia had merged together and created the first version of Pangaea. The mass ranged from just above the Equator to the South Pole where the bulk of the landmasses were below 30ºN.

Fossils of creatures living in the Permian Period

Shallow seas bordered the landmass with wider expanses found on the northern- and eastern-most edges. Evaporite deposits, such as salt and gypsum, started to form around the Equator and in the northern most areas. These deposits demonstrated the “drying out” of the continent. They form where water was once located but remain only as

of the University of Puget Sound

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By the end of the Permian, the land mass had shifted northward so that the bulk of the land was between 30ºN and 60ºS with some land extending as far the North Pole. Evaporite deposits became more extensive at this time and reached into the Southern Hemisphere as well. This was indicative of a worldwide sea level drop, called a eustatic regression. The lowered sea levels increased the amount of exposed land and created larger shallow warm regions for evaporite deposits.

Matt Loewen

small water sinks, like a bathtub, which become increasingly salty as the amount of water decreases but the quantity of ions does not. Once the tipping point is reached, the ions combine to become salts and other evaporite minerals and precipitate out of the brine.

The temperature drop is thought to have been Behold the supercontinent Pangaea! due to the movement of Pangaea toward the decreased the habitat available to these shelled organisms.

North Pole and the eustatic regression. Pangaea’s move- Life was unable to take hold in this environment. This is ment towards the Pole forced low latitude plants and ani- evident due to the decrease in limestone deposits, which mals to migrate to higher latitudes, thereby subjecting them is precipitated calcium carbonate, and the overall decrease to colder temperatures. This was a slow process and the ef- in fossils. fects would have caused gradual changes in the biosphere as those who could not adapt were slowly weeded out. It While this is one of the greatest disasters of all time, there was the eustatic regression that caused the most damage. were some who survived. They mostly did so by becoming smaller in stature and changing the shape and or thickness The gradual drop in sea level led to a decrease in the area of their shells to better cope with the toxic conditions that of land in warm, shallow marine environments, where life were created. This was a time of slow recovery and as the had once flourished, and gave way to the deep sea. This conditions became more stable and less toxic the way was change disrupted much of the marine life and particularly again paved for larger creatures and the eventual appearaffected animals that makes shells. Shelled organisms use ance of mammals. calcium carbonate to create their shells, but calcium carbonate is not resistant and will dissolve in acid, under cold 1. Isozaki, Yukio, Shimizu, Noriei, Yao, Jianxin, Ji, conditions, and under high pressure. For example, if you put Zhansheng, and Matsuda, Tetsuo. “End-permian exan egg into vinegar, the shell will dissolve away. As water tinction and volcanism-induced environmental stress: the Permian-Triassic boundary interval of lower slope increases in depth, the water becomes colder and the presfacies at Chaotian, South China.” Palaeogeography, sure increases, creating an environment in which calcium palaeoclimatology, and palaeoecology. 2007. 252: carbonate is more soluble and will want to go into solution.

218-238.

The decrease in surface area of the warm shallow seas

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Elements: The Scientific Magazine

Research Repor t

Seeing the Invisible: Infrared Photography N ick K ies t

a nd

M ega n K ies t-M c Fa rl a nd

T

Infrared is commonly confused and associated with heat, but infrared light is not itself heat. The heat of an object corresponds to the wavelength of light it emits, because heat is energy, and shorter wavelengths of light are more energetic. Therefore, the hotter the object, the shorter the wavelength of light emitted. The hottest (10,000 K) objects appear blue, while slightly cooler (1,000 K) objects appear red. Most objects are much cooler, and, as a result, they emit light at wavelengths within the infrared range, just below that which is visible.

With the unaided eye, humans cannot see the longer waves of the infrared spectrum. Cameras, however, can see into infrared. More specifically, the sensors in digital cameras can perceive infrared light. Normal imaging sensors in digital cameras can see from 300 nanometers to about 1,000 nanometers, well into infrared. To prevent the images from looking strange, manufacturers use infrared blocking filters to limit the infrared light that hits the sensor.

The camera’s eye is artificially made to match the viewing ability of a human eye.

Nick Kiest

he visible light spectrum, the light humans can see, is only a small portion of the total spectrum traveling throughout the universe. The human range of vision is between approximately 330 nanometers (blue) and 750 nanometers (red). Beyond what we see as red, is called infrared. Infrared light encompasses a very large range of wavelengths – from the end of visible light to 1 millimeter light waves.

Split photograph of a stove on medium. On the left, in infrared, you can see the element glow. On the right, using a normal camera, the stove is too cool to radiate. ing sensor. You can do this with a special piece of plastic that looks black to our eyes, often known as an 87C filter.

Just place the plastic in front of the camera lens. Because the camera still has an infrared blocking filter in place over the sensor, the amount of light that reaches the sensor is limited. To take photographs you will need a tripod, as even on sunny days it can take several seconds to take the photo. Since the visible light is blocked, you will not be able to see through the viewfinder on a SLR camera, and the preview screen on a point and shoot will be very dark.

These filters can be had for only $15, but the slow exposures can be trouble. I tried this several years ago, but the challenges limited the subject matter to mostly landscapes and other “still lifes.”

The simplest, and cheapest, method is to block the visible light coming into the camera so that the infrared light overwhelms the infrared block-

Nick Kiest

Through various methods, the constraint manufacturers have put on digital cameras can be overcome, revealing the otherworldly images of infrared.

The two converted cameras, a Canon 10D Digital SLR, and a Canon G2 Digital Point and Shoot. Note the black -looking filter on the 10D. This filter is clear in IR.

  of the University of Puget Sound The hardcore option is to disassemble the camera to get to the infrared filter inside, and replace it with a different piece of glass. This is what I did this past spring in order to pursue astrophotography. Unlike other photos, astrophotography is greatly enhanced and even requires being able to see into the infrared spectrum. Most nebulae are visible at the edge of visible light and just beyond into infrared. Having the camera see into infrared makes these objects much easier, and sometimes simply possible, to see and allows the images to be much more detailed than if only the small amount of visible light was recorded. Other astronomical phenomena are also enhanced by capturing their infrared light along with the visible, simply because the expanded range increases the amount of information gathered about the object. The extra data makes it easier to produce a good and detailed photograph. Without the enhancement of infrared sensing, most of astrophotography would be very drab and blurry.

glass. The first time it was difficult and quite unnerving.

But when I put the camera back together, it could now see infrared as well as visible light. Making the camera see the “full spectrum� makes everything appear weird and pinkish.

By placing a filter that blocks below 850nm, I was able to let just infrared through, and immediately start capturing photos that piqued my interest. One of the images I took the first day is already in my portfolio. But there are still problems.

You cannot look through the viewfinder to see the scene, the auto-focus system does not work, and you must set the exposure by trial and error. It would be nearly impossible if it were not for the ability to review the photo you took on the digital camera and try again. A tripod is still rather necessary, so that you can compose with the filter off, and then put it on and take the photo. In addition, some camera lenses get odd bright spots due to optical designs not built for infrared. Still, the photos look awesome, when everything works.

The hardest option, but maybe the best, is what I did to an old digital point-and-shoot camera, a Canon G2. I took

Nick Kiest

With the assistance of the UPS Physics Department, using a Canon 10D Digital SLR Camera that I bought for $200 used on eBay, I removed 39 screws, unsoldered two joints, and used an Exacto knife to pry off the old infrared blocking

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A comparison of infrared light from (850nm to ~1000nm) to the normal visible spectrum. Note the different degrees of white in the different types of plants, and the differences in model Lauren Tasaki, including her clothing, glasses, and eyes.

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Elements: The Scientific Magazine not to say that infrared photos simply look pinker or redder than their normal, visible light, counterparts. Infrared photos display hues matching the intensity of infrared light emitted by the objects in the scene, and this tends to be significantly different than the shades found in visible light photos.

In order to make the photos look less strange, infrared photos are usually converted to black and white. Old infrared film cameras originally did this when the photo was “saved” onto the negative, but modern, digital images must be converted on a computer. Even the most mundane things can be dramatically changed when viewed in infrared, particularly once the photos are changed to grayscale.

Nick Kiest

The sky appears starkly black, because the atmosphere does not distort or diffuse infrared light (from the sun) like it does visible light. For this same reason, shadows are far darker and more defined due to the light hitting more directly.

Ivy behind Washington History Museum, in infrared. it apart, which involved fewer screws, but smaller spaces, and replaced the infrared blocking glass with a visible lightblocking piece of glass that I cut out of one of the filters.

This means the camera can only see infrared, but the autofocus, metering, and viewfinder work fine. As this sort of camera has a video preview, you can see the world in infrared live in front of you. This makes composing much easier. Due to a difference in sensor technology, the camera actually seems to be more sensitive to infrared than the larger camera, and takes great photos even though it is a “lesser” camera.

The images that come out of the infrared camera, whether or not it also still captures visible light, are pink. This is, because infrared light is, in a sense, extreme red light. Since red is the color of light closest in wavelength to infrared, the camera sensor perceives it in a similar manner. This is

Completely opposite to what would be found in a traditional black and white photo, plants appear white in infrared. Not all plants are the same shade of white, however. All plants have two types of chlorophyll, A and B, in varying amounts.

These two types of chlorophyll absorb different portions and amounts of the electromagnetic spectrum. Underneath the chlorophyll layer, plants have a reflective coating which reflects all of the light not absorbed by the chlorophyll.

This reflection system prevents the plant from overheating and becoming desiccated. This reflected, unused, light is what appears in an infrared photo. Due to similarity in structure, various classes of plants have similar amounts of chlorophyll A and B, and therefore similar appearances in infrared. Smooth, deciduous plants reflect the most, and appear the whitest, while evergreens are a darker white, but still abnormally light.

People both look quite normal and entirely different in infrared. Infrared penetrates further into the skin than visible light before it reflects back out. This eliminates surface imperfections such as freckles, wrinkles and blemishes, thereby giving everyone a baby-soft complexion regardless of age. The greater depth of penetration of infrared light also causes eyes to be varying degrees of solid black. This radi-

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Nick Kiest

of the University of Puget Sound

Infrared shot of Wheelock Student Center, Trimble, and the Giant Sequoia, at 4 o’clock in the afternoon.

Many dyes in clothing are artificially designed in labs to look right to human vision. As a result, their infrared performance is extremely erratic. Many synthetic clothes are very light or even transparent in infrared despite being a dark color in visible light. The visible light color of a fabric is no indication of any kind as to what shade it will be in infrared. Even natural dyes are unpredictable, because the infrared shade relates to the infrared reflectivity of the original natural material(s) used to make the dye, be it plant or animal based.

While no object’s appearance in IR is predictable prior to taking an IR photo, all IR photos are bizarrely different from their black and white equivalents. Be it the illusion of snow in summer or demonic pets, IR images play with our perception of reality. It is a glimpse of a world that exists side by side with our own, visible universe, and that we unthinkingly interact with every moment. If you are interested in experimenting with IR photography, the converted Canon 10D is now the property of the UPS Physics department. Contact Professor Bernie Bates for information if you would like to borrow the camera.

For more information: kiestphoto.com - Nick’s website with a large gallery of infrared photos lifepixel.com - Best resource for step by step instructions on converting your camera to IR. kleptography.com - Introduced me to the concept years ago, great instructions for specific cameras, and great galleries of photos

Nick Kiest

cal difference relates to the purpose of eyes. Eyes absorb visible light in order to allow sight. Due to simplification of design, eyes also absorb infrared light, since it is easier to absorb everything on the surface and then filter all but visible light through the rods and cones of the eyeball. Since eyes absorb the infrared light, nothing is reflected and the entire eye looks black. Different eyes absorb more than others, even among humans, but all eyes look very dark in infrared if not completely black.

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Elements: The Scientific Magazine

Science in Contex t

Inside the Slater Museum M a rissa J ones

E

nter the Slater Museum of Natural History and you will find that there is much more than meets the eye.

At first glance, there is little to betray the diversity of organisms present in the museum. A stuffed Cooper’s Hawk perches on a stick by the door, wings slightly outstretched as if frozen in the process of taking flight. A wild boar’s head stares open-mouthed at the ceiling from the top of one of the cabinets. Mammal sculls are scattered across a table, on which a whale vertebra holds down a stack of papers. While several displays are visible, the majority of the 75,000 Slater occupants are hidden from view. Open one of the stark white cabinets, and you will find trays upon trays of preserved animals that hail from around the world. Today, the Slater collection contains mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, plants, and fungi.

This converted storage room holds the beginnings of what will later be known as the Slater Museum of Natural History. By the early 1930s Slater’s work and collection began to receive national acclaim in the field of herpetology. In 1930, ornithologist Gordon D. Alcorn came to work at the College of Puget Sound for a few years and added birds to the budding museum, converting the herp-only zone into a multi-taxon collection. Six years later, E. A. Kitchin, a local collector and the namesake of the Kitchin Library, augmented the ornithological specimens by moving his personal assortment of bird skins (dart-shaped, de-boned birds stuffed with cotton), eggs, and nests to CPS. The addition of numerous birds, eggs, and nests to the original small amphibian and reptile collection made it clear that a lodging upgrade was necessary. The museum relocated to a larger attic room at the east end of Howarth. Slater and Kitchin “scrounged” cabinets to house the specimens from the wholesale automotive store where Kitchin worked.

No two cases were alike. Yet these hodge-podge cabinets were better than nothing; the growing collection of animal specimens had to be protected from the hazards associated with this new room.

Whitewash fell constantly in flakes from the ceiling. Water dripped from exposed pipes with finicky seals. Blobs of tar dropped occasionally from the roof. The upgraded room was far from classy, but it provided a home for the growing collection.

Tanya Rogers

Now step back eighty-two years in UPS history. The campus is settling into its new location at North 15th and Warner, after moving from its old residence on 6th Avenue and Sprague two years before, and is enjoying the addition of a new science building. The campus grounds now hold Jones Hall, the gymnasium, and the newly constructed Howarth Hall. Beyond the campus, the city of Tacoma bustles with industry. The waterfront teems with the business of lumber.

Much of the surrounding area is undeveloped, and its biota relatively unstudied. The College of Puget Sound (CPS) is marked by not one, but two giant sequoia trees.

Up in the attic of Howarth Hall, biology Professor James Slater sorts through the beginnings of his collection of herpetofauna. He stores the amphibians and reptiles he collects in formalin-filled jars that line the shelves of a small room. The room is painted black with a sink in one corner and two bare light bulbs hanging from the ceiling. Slater uses these specimens to study systematics: he describes new species.

Pressed plants like these two species of Hydrophyllum are preserved in the herbarium

Alcorn returned to the College of Puget Sound for a permanent position in 1946. He continued to add to the bird collections, and with the help of several students, made the first standardized cabinets for the museum. The College ral-

21

Tanya Rogers

  of the University of Puget Sound

The Slater collection includes bird wings like this one taken from a Monk Parakeet. lied behind his efforts to organize the animal collections and spruced up the attic room where the specimens were stored. The number of specimens and donors grew steadily through the 1970s. Murray Johnson, a physician in Tacoma, and his associates added nearly 30,000 mammal specimens to the Slater collection. Botanists compiled a herbarium, a collection of dried and pressed plants, fungi, and algae. Numerous private collectors bequeathed their skins and skeletons to the museum in wills. The cabinets kept the specimens clean and accessible, both for research and teaching.

The collections began to play a key role in many classes, including vertebrate biology, field studies, and evolution.

Students at the College maintained the museum, and the curators (Slater, Alcorn, and Johnson) strived to keep them involved. Although he was never a faculty member at the University, Murray Johnson was instrumental in running the museum and getting students to participate. Students would go over to his house and enjoy a big meal with him and his wife followed by a specimen skinning party in the basement.

When marine mammals washed up, beached and bloated on the Washington shoreline, Johnson would troop out with his flatbed truck to collect the carcasses. For some of his larger specimens, including Willy, the juvenile gray whale skeleton currently floating over the Harned Atrium, decomposition was slow. Too massive to have their flesh consumed by beetles, the typical method used to prepare smaller skeletons, the larger marine mammals were forced to decay the old fashioned way: exposed to the open air or buried under the ground. Willy the Whale was left to molder out behind the UPS baseball field. There he became a bountiful prize for neighborhood dogs that came to roll in his putrefying remains and gnaw on his colossal skeleton.

The tooth-marks of one such gleeful canine are still visible on his jawbone today, as he swims eternally in the science center.

The Slater Museum moved to the third floor of Thompson in 1967 and there it remained until the renovation in 2006.

While the number and variety of organisms in the Slater Museum grew during the latter half of the twentieth century, the quality of the museum did not fare as well. Professor Peter Wimberger, the current Slater Museum director, visited the museum in the 1980s as an undergraduate at the University of Washington. Wimberger used the data slips associated with bird eggs in the Slater collection to investigate the amount of plant material incorporated into nests.

Wimberger hypothesized that volatile compounds in green plants would deter parasites. Chicks raised in these nests would experience a lower parasite load than chicks raised in nests without greens. Wimberger confirmed his prediction, but he was less than impressed with the state of the museum itself. The museum was in what Wimberger described as an “abominable state of curation.� The specimens were in disarray and the whole operation suffered from neglect.

Despite the less-than-perfect state of curation, the Slater Museum persisted and its collections continued to be used for teaching and research. Edward Herbert was director from 1972 to 1975, followed by Eileen Solie from 1975 to 1978. Alcorn was director for a second time, from 1978 to 1983. Murray Johnson maintained an active role in the museum, but not as director, because he was not a UPS faculty member. Terrence R. Mace was the director from 1983 to 1989.

In 1990, the university hired Dennis Paulson as full time director of the Museum. Paulson brought on Gary Shugart as part-time collections curator. Paulson and Shugart brought the museum up to its present standard of organization.

Beginning with birds, the collections were cataloged and made available online in Manis, a mammal database, and Ornis, a bird database. They involved students in the task

22 of georeferencing the collection, including online latitude and longitude data for the collection site of each specimen. Wimberger became director in 2005, and Paulson and Shugart director emeritus and collections curator, respectively. The museum moved from the third floor of Thompson to its current position at the central hub on the second floor. Just in time for the big move, the Slater Museum received one quarter of a million dollars from the National Science Foundation to purchase sleek new cases to replace the old ones, including the oak cabinets that Alcorn had made over a half-century before. The new cases are insecttight, standardized, and completely accessible. Sometime in the fall of 2008 the museum will be fully settled into its new home.

Since their inception, natural history museums have catalogued and identified new species. In the earliest collections from the 1700s, one or two individual specimens were chosen to represent the species as a whole. In 1859, Charles Darwin famously proposed that variation between individuals was the raw material for natural selection, and more emphasis was placed on the scope and breadth of variations within species. Natural historians now ponder the characteristics that define one species as distinct from another closely related type, and the boundaries that prevent species from fading into vague clusters of interbreeding hybrids.

Slater himself was doing research in systematics when he started the museum in 1930. Similar studies continue today with one important distinction. Natural history museums provide invaluable information for studying the effects of pollution, climate change, and habitat destruction on a wide variety of organisms. Because the specimens are preserved for many years, they provide a historic control group or snapshot into the past that can tell researchers what conditions were like years ago.

Alcorn described a study on eggshell thickness that took place in the 1970s. Researchers used the Slater Museum’s vast oology collection to look at the historic thickness of

Elements: The Scientific Magazine bird eggs. Eggs from the 1890s were compared to eggs in the 1970s to determine whether there was a correlation between pollutant levels and eggshell thickness. As we now know, pollutants do reduce eggshell thickness. These types of studies played a key role in the science responsible for removing dangerous toxins, such as DDT, from the market.

The Slater Museum is a repository of genetic information for the red wolf recovery project. Red wolves once roamed widely across the southeastern United States. They were declared extinct in the wild in the 1980s as a result of hunting and habitat loss. At that point, fourteen red wolves were successfully integrated into a captive breeding project. DNA collected from skulls in the Slater collection was analyzed to determine the amount of genetic variation within the original breeding population. The historical genetic variation was compared to that of the captive population in order to find the intensity of the population bottleneck and predict the red wolf ’s chance of survival. In an odd twist, the main threat to red wolves that have been released into the wild is not inbreeding, but outbreeding. In some places, the red wolf hybridizes with the more common coyote. Researchers fear that by shuffling its deck of genes with the coyote’s, the red wolf will dilute its genetic distinctness and be assimilated into the ranks of another species.

In other cases, a species on the brink of extinction is intentionally crossed with individuals from a different subspecies in a process known as genetic rescue. Washington’s pygmy rabbit, the smallest native rabbit and the only rabbit to dig its own burrows, was once common on the sagebrush steppe in central and eastern Washington. Through habitat fragmentation, disease, and predation, many populations were reduced to dangerously small numbers. In the Columbia Basin, the pygmy rabbit began to suffer from deformities and reproductive failure, caused by inbreeding in a small population. Genetic work done on museum specimens revealed that the Washington species was genetically similar to the Idaho populations, which had greater genetic diversity. Through a combination of captive breeding and release efforts, some Idaho pygmy rabbits were successfully

Tales from the Slater Museum...

The Slater Museum is rife with lore. For a while, the collections even included some human remains. Rumor has it that the museum was once the proud owner of a mummy. Yes, that’s right, a mummy: sarcophagus, desiccated remains, white gauze, ancient curses, the whole nine yards. Unfortunately, the mummy is no longer part of our fine collection here at the Slater Museum of Natural History. No one knows where it went, but if I had to guess, I would venture that it is currently roaming the Halls of Thompson, riding the service elevator and terrorizing beleaguered late-night studiers.

The other human specimen was no less creepy than the mummy. Sometime in its proud history, the Slater Museum was given a bona fide shrunken head. Shrunken heads are traditionally prepared by the Jivaro clan of the Amazon River Basin.

Through repeated bouts of boiling and drying, the skin of a human head is reduced to the size of a soft ball. Believe it or not, these miniaturized heads have become immensely popular as tourist trinkets and can fetch a good price on the international market. Popularization has led to an influx of artificial shrunken heads made from animal skins artfully crafted to resemble the real thing. In case you were wondering, the best way to tell a real shrunken head from a phony is to look at the eyelashes, eyebrows, and whiskers. On a fake, these will be glued on, but in a real head they will stick right out of the skin. Though the head has shrunk, the hairs remain their original size, giving the it a squinty, long-lashed look. If you happen upon the Slater Museum’s shrunken head, check it out – does it pass the test of authenticity?

23

  of the University of Puget Sound integrated into the Washington population, adding genetic diversity and increasing reproductive success. The genetic differences between the Idaho and Washington populations shrunk as a result, but the pygmy rabbit was rescued from extinction, at least for now.

Tacoma was once home to the Tacoma pocket gopher, a subspecies of the Mazama pocket gopher. Now extinct from the prairies of South Puget Sound, the Tacoma pocket gopher cannot be saved, even through drastic measures like genetic rescue. But historic data can be used to determine how similar the Tacoma pocket gophers were to other species of pocket gophers, and which populations, if any, would be appropriate for reintroduction.

gests, these little critters dine on dead animals, and they have big appetites. Adult beetles fly into cabinets to lay eggs in the skins. When the eggs hatch, the larvae begin to chow down on the precious specimens. They can completely strip the skin, fur, and flesh off of a mouse or vole in a matter of weeks. Infestations of carrion-eating beetles will decimate drawers of skins, leaving only piles of stuffing in their wake. Eggs can lay dormant for a while, which makes invasions of these beetles hard to squelch.

The old wooden cabinets had gaps that the beetles could fly through and made the museum more susceptible to damage than it is today. Years ago, the museum combated beetles with a cocktail of toxic chemicals, including carbon tetrachloride, paradichlorobenzene (PDB), and aresenic paste. They later hired one student whose principle job it was to comb through the collection, one drawer at a time, in search of beetle infestations.

Matt Loewen

Researchers can analyze stable isotope ratios in museum specimens to determine what organism historically ate compared to their present place in the food chain. Marbled Murrelets, for Today, the museum takes an inexample, once ate mostly fish.

Trays upon trays of bird skins tegrated approach to pest manWith the decline in fisheries, agement. The new cabinets are they now eat lower on the food chain, consuming more small crustaceans. Travis Horton, airtight and prevent adult beetles from entering in the first who worked at UPS for several years, began a similar study place. If a drawer is breached by beetles, it is placed in a using polar bear skins. He hypothesized that polar bears freezer until the beetles are dead. The eggs can withstand were also eating lower on the food chain, hunting more fish freezing, however, so the tray is allowed to thaw. When and fewer seals. Fishery declines would ripple up the food the beetle eggs hatch, it is back to the freezer with them, chain, resulting in fewer seals, and fewer polar bears with and the cycle repeats until all beetles and eggs have been less food to eat. Polar bears today are eating more fish eradicated. than they did one hundred years ago, which has significant Threat # 3: Mistreating Specimens. This unfortunate pracimplications on their ecology and chances of survival. tice includes a wide range of crimes that tie back to adNone of these studies would have been possible without ministrative neglect. Teaching specimens, which are often natural history museums. The Slater Museum is an impor- manhandled by students with less-than-clean hands, must tant resource, not only for students and professors at the be kept separate from the research specimens. Specimens university today, but for future researchers. Unfortunately, must be kept clean and organized; a collection of stuffed natural history museums face a number of threats, which animals is fairly useless unless you know who they are, the museum staff works to stave off. Wimberger described where they are from, and when they were collected. Museum collections, like libraries, represent irreplaceable stores of these threats in order of importance: information. Once lost, they can never be regained.

Threat #1: Administrative neglect. Neglect is the principle risk to natural history museums. Museums require active In 1974, Gordon D. Alcorn wrote that, “It is obvious to museefforts to protect the specimens and make sure that they um personnel that what is present in the museum today will are accessible to teachers, students, and researchers. Dur- be of even greater importance and value fifty years from ing its history, our own Slater Museum saw good times and now.� His words apply today more than ever. The collections bad. Through the work of Dennis Paulson, Gary Shugart, must be maintained so that studies like those mentioned in and Peter Wimberger, the Slater Museum currently receives this article can continue. The Slater Museum has been moving along a ramp of ascending organization. From its first the attention it needs. days in the attic of Howarth, through the age of administraThreat # 2: Insect Damage. Carrion-eating beetles are the tive neglect, and now into the new era of online databases major scourge of museum collections. As their name sug- and conservation biology, the museum lives on.

24

Elements: The Scientific Magazine

Research Repor t

Climb to Safety in Case .. of Jokulhlaup

C hris t ine C h a n

T

ravel back in time roughly 18,000 years to the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). The LGM represents the last time that ice reached its southernmost extent. Imagine a large ice mass covering the Puget Lowland, the region between the Olympic and the Cascade Mountains. Tacoma would be under about half a mile of ice.

Although today’s climate is considerably warmer than the last major glaciations, the fact that ice sheets still cover Greenland and Antarctica indictates that we are living in the midst of an ice age. By definition, an ice age is a prolonged period of temperature reduction that results in the formation of ice sheets and glaciers.

Continuing with the story that took place during the Last Glacial Maximum, the Puget Lowland was occupied by a sheet of ice, known as the Puget Lobe which reached its southern-most position roughly 16,950 years ago. At its maximum extent, the Puget Lobe rested against the Cascades, blocking the westward drainage of alpine rivers. As a result, many of the rivers including the focus of this study, the Carbon River, were impounded into glacial lakes. A glacial lake formed in what is now the modern-day Carbon River Valley. It is estimated that the maximum depth of Glacial Lake Carbon was 1,520 feet and held between 107-10 8 cubic feet of water.

As the Puget Lobe retreated, water from Glacial Lake Carbon was released catastrophically. This type of catastrophic release is known as a Jökulhlaup, which is the Icelandic word for a glacial outburst flood. The Jökulhlaup eventually incorporated old lahar, or mudflow deposits, from Mount Rainier. With the addition of the sediment material, the flood became a viscous or thick debris flow. The sediment of the Puget Lobe is characterized by rocks with large quartz and feldspar crystals, known as granites, surrounded by a matrix ranging from clays to sand and gravel. Collectively, this is known as glacial till.

The story, however, becomes more complicated, because in the paths of the debris flow there is a different type of rock known as andesite. Andesites are specifically associated with Mount Rainier and are composed of amphibole, plagioclase, and pyroxene. These andesite boulders could not have been transported to their current locations by glacial transport. It is therefore hypothesized that the boulders originally from Mount Rainier (as is evidenced by their composition) must have been transported by mudflows. Understanding the significance of the mudflow and its route of transport was the study of two geology students last spring as a part of their senior theses.

The Puget Lobe glacier covered UPS and the surrounding area 18,000 years ago.

25

Brit Parker

Brit Parker

of the University of Puget Sound

Zoe “Little Kapuka” Futornick

Brit “The Glaciator” Parker

Two seniors, Brit Parker and Zoe Futornick took on the challenge of mapping countless boulders in an attempt to determine the drainage path and infer something about the volume of material transported by the debris flow. Futornick focused on the upstream end of the flow around the town of Eatonville. This area is characterized by deep, narrow channels and high relief. Parker mapped the downstream portion of the mud flow, which had a much more subdued topography with shallower, broader channels.

At several, if not most, of the areas of study, they would crack open some of the rocks with a rock hammer. (I highly recommend this activity, as it is a great opportunity to release pent up frustration. Be warned, however, to not smash your fingers.) The pattern of driving, stopping, and observing different areas of interest continued until exhaustion would hit, or an absence of sunlight or until the weather conditions hindered the geologists from seeing their limbs.

The project of mapping the specific pathways of the debris flow, known as the Tanwax-Ohop mud flow, from the Glacial Lake Carbon was started in 2000 by geology Professor Barry Goldstein and fellow geologist Pat Pringle. Initially, all that was known was that the Tanwax-Ohop mud flow traveled westward across the state of Washington. The geology students started their theses based on this knowledge.

On a typical day out in the field, Parker and Futornick began by mapping out a game plan to figure out which features they wanted to see. Once an area of interest was chosen, the seniors wrote down the latitude and longitude of the location. They would then proceed out to the area and see if there was any evidence of a debris flow. The proof that they were looking for was the presence of andesite boulders. If andesite boulders were present, the two seniors would record the size and shape of the boulders, as well as take photos of the location. They would also record any other usual information about the location that could remind them of the area at a later time.

You might be thinking that this all seems easy enough and you now feel inclined to go out in the field to map the drainage path of the Tanwax-Ohop mudflow yourself, but be warned that there are many challenges that the two seniors encountered.

For example, the senior geologists needed to determine how they would pick one potential pathway and reject another.

They also had to account for discrepancies in the volume of material being transported in different parts of the pathway and explain how andesite boulders, the size of futons, could have traveled so far or high up.

Though the details of the Tanwax-Ohop mudflow are complicated, the basic storyline is that a massive flood occurred when the ice-dammed Glacial Lake Carbon was released, which picked up rocks originating from Mount Rainier and carried them westward around the nose of the massive ice sheet still occupying the Puget Lowland. The debris flow ultimately drained out of the Chehalis River to the Pacific Ocean.

26

Elements: The Scientific Magazine  

Science in Contex t

Threats to Deep Sea Coral Reefs Ta n ya R og ers

T

Alberto Lindner, NMSF

he deep ocean, once thought to be a lifeless desert, is now known to contain a wealth of fascinating biodiversity. Water deeper than 1000 meters covers over half the planet, and only a tiny fraction has ever been explored.

Beginning with the HMS Challenger in the 1870s, every scientific voyage investigating the deep sea has made remarkable new discoveries, including unique ecosystems like hydrothermal vents, cold seeps, gas hydrates, and cold water coral reefs. Far out of sight, however, people are rarely aware of the extensive habitat destruction now occurring in the deep sea from human activity.

Deep sea reef community in the Aleutian Islands.

As coastal, shallow water fish stocks have become depleted and technology has advanced, more and more fishing is occurring in the deep ocean. Bottom trawling fisheries present the most serious threat to deep sea benthic communities and ecosystems. In many ways, benthic trawling to catch fish is like clear cutting an old growth forest to catch deer. Trawls and dredges, generally referred to as mobile fishing gear, are weighted nets towed behind a vessel and dragged along the seafloor to capture commercially valuable bottom-dwelling fish and shellfish species. Although trawling fisheries represent only a small fraction of the global fish catch, their impact is disproportionately high. Not only does trawling rapidly overexploit and deplete many target fish stocks, it is also incredibly destructive to the benthic habitat.

Trawling severely disturbs the seabed, damaging and killing a multitude of non-target species known as bycatch.

Widespread and largely unregulated, trawling eliminates structural habitat complexity, reduces fish and benthic species diversity, decreases benthic biomass, changes community structure, and alters sediment and other ecosystem processes.

Cold water coral reefs are one unique deep sea ecosystem threatened by trawling fisheries. Like more familiar tropical coral reefs, cold water reefs provide a biogenic, structurally complex habitat supporting high levels of biodiversity and providing shelter, feeding grounds, and

nurseries for many inhabitant species. Unlike their shallow water counterparts, cold water corals exist far below the photic zone, and so lack symbiotic photosynthetic algae.

Although their true global distribution is unknown, deep sea reefs have been found to exist on many seamounts, fjords, banks, and the edges of continental shelves. Deep water currents encountering these submarine features are deflected towards the surface, upwelling nutrients and exposing hard substrate, leading to the development of highly productive ecosystems and rich communities of suspension feeding benthic invertebrates. These reefs are definite hotspots of diversity in the deep ocean, supporting numerous benthic and pelagic species in a relatively small area. Because commercially valuable fish often congregate around cold water coral reefs, they have also become major targets for deep sea trawling. Trawling completely decimates the reefs, essentially eliminating the coral reef community and leaving little but rubble or bare rock.

Deep sea ecosystems, especially cold water reefs, are particularly vulnerable to devastation by trawling because natural disturbance levels in these areas are extremely low. Species are not accustomed to disturbance and cannot recover quickly or easily from human disturbance, if at all. Deep sea species are also highly K-selected, which means they grow very slowly, have long lifespans, reproduce at older ages, and produce few offspring. The orange roughy, a deep water fish from seamount reefs around Australia and New Zealand, can live to be 150 years old and does not reach reproductive maturity until 20-30 years old. The cold water corals themselves can be many thousands of years old, and are very fragile relative to tropical corals. These sorts of life histories make deep sea populations susceptible to rapid depletion by overharvesting and collateral damage.

The need for trawling restrictions around cold water reefs and other deep sea habitats could not be more clear.

Whether a sustainable, commercially-viable deep sea fishery can even exist is questionable. Establishment of marine protected areas around these highly diverse, fragile, and threatened ecosystems has been extensively promoted. The Marine Conservation Biology Institute and similar Non-Governmental Organizations have advocated massive international trawling restrictions. Some reserves and restrictions have been put in place by the United States, Canada, European nations, Australia, and New Zealand, but trawling still continues in many parts of the world.

The loss of such valuable, largely unexplored ecosystems like deep sea coral reefs would be tragic, and they most certainly deserve conservation attention and priority.

You can help deep sea ecosystems by not purchasing the following unsustainable, trawl-caught fish:

Orange roughy Chilean seabass/Patagonian toothfish Grenadier/Pacific roughy Monkfish Rockfish

of the University of Puget Sound The Allium

Electron Theory A nne P e w

C

hemistry’s Electron Theory has many applications beyond the conventional. Its rules also apply quite well to human interactions. Each person is essentially an atom with his or her heart as the nucleus. Their “electrons” are what measure the intensity of attraction towards others. Whenever an “atom” comes into contact with another “atom” their electrons may move to higher energy levels, based upon the strength of the other’s “electronegative pull.” As the attraction between two atoms increases, their electrons will correspondingly jump to higher energy levels, thus causing a sense of instability and overall giddiness within the pair.

There are three main types of bonds that relationships can be classified as: Ionic, Covalent, and Metallic.

Covalent

27 Metallic

Also known as the “Sea of Electrons,” metallic interactions can best be described as Free Love. A person’s electrons are a part of a free-floating environment that intermingles with other unhindered individuals. Atoms who are in this state do not belong to just one other partner but rather, form less special bonds with multiple people.

Besides the three major bonds, there are numerous smaller interactions that can happen between two atoms. Probably one of the most common are Van der Waals forces. More of an attraction than an actual bond, these forces occur between two slightly polar atoms and only last for a brief amount of time due to the weak nature of their connection.

This type of attraction is like seeing a cute boy or girl from across campus. An electron or two might jump an energy level for a second or two, but then immediately falls back into place once the person of interest is no longer in sight.

Nick Kiest

Covalent bonding is the ideal relationship for two atoms to Another aspect of chemical be in, because it involves a bonding is resonance. Bemutual sharing of electrons. cause an atom’s electrons The equality of the partnercan be fairly fluid, a moleship enables the individuals cule’s structure can stay the to exist in a higher state of same despite the constant energy while still remaining relatively stable. An actual Think of each person as an atom with their heart as the changing of its bonds. For bond is formed and there- nucleus. Here, a covalent bond holds them tightly in love. example, two atoms can have a stable covalent bond while fore prevents the connection between the atoms from easily dissolving in stressful situ- the intensity and strength of the connection continually fluctuates. Friends with benefits have a resonance-esque ations. quality to them, because even though there is a solid relationship (covalent bond) the specific attraction between the Ionic Considered to be more of a lustful obsession, ionic bonds individuals always changes. The friendship can never quite are characterized by the hogging of electrons by one atom. be defined due to the numerous fuzzy and inconsistent The unfortunate individual who gets caught up in an ionic interactions of the lovers. relationships will lose all of his or her electrons to the highest energy levels, which consequently induce wild mood By applying basic chemical rules to human relationships, a swings and temporary insanity. If not quickly reined in, person can learn a lot about the types of romantic interacthese electrons will attach themselves to the desired atom tions they have experienced and which bonds best fit their and form a connection that is deemed to be more of a personality. No longer will a lovesick individual be at a loss strong attraction than a concrete bond. The lack of reci- for words when attempting to describe the intensity of their procity seen in the electronegative atom’s unequal sharing feelings to a friend. All they need to do is define the nature of electrons results in the relationship’s quick dissolution of their bonded electrons in order for the listener to immediately know everything about the other’s emotional state. when placed in difficult situations.

Do you think that UPS should have a science magazine?

Do you read the Trail with a red pen in hand to make corrections?

Is Thompson Hall your second home?

Do you have a copy of CosmoNerd in your bedroom?

Is Elements cooler than Crosscurrents?

If you answered YES to any of the above questions, Elements Magazine may be right for you! We are looking for editors and writers to fill all positions in 2008-2009. No experience is needed. The creators of the magazine have graduated with no heirs apparent to the Elements legacy. Is it YOUR destiny?

Email elements@ups.edu for more information.

28

Elements: The Scientific Magazine

The Allium

New Classes at UPS M at t L o e w en

I

t has come to Elements’ attention that the UPS science curriculum could use a few updates. We have taken it upon ourselves to have these classes approved by the registrar and incorporated into next years schedule. Enjoy!

PHYS 466

PHYS 466 Destruction

This pompous-sounding course is designed especially for pre-med students looking for an impressive sounding curriculum as opposed to a genuine learning experience.

The format of the course is designed to maximize pain and suffering, and to insure that students and faculty can brag that it is the most hard-core class offered at the University. Lectures will meet 5 days a week at 7 a.m. Each exam will be formatted like a cumulative final starting at 6 a.m. Labs will be 6 hours long and will only be offered between 4 p.m. and 10 p.m. on Friday. Absolutely no eating or bathroom breaks will be allowed.

of

Mass

Physics has always been at the forefront of gruesome weaponry. This class will explore the technical framework of the development of the nuclear and hydrogen bombs.

Students will also familiarize themselves with weapon transportation technology such as intercontinental ballistic missiles and space warfare. Students will complete group projects that design their own weapon of mass destruction.

CHEM 253/254

CHEM 253/254 Medical Applications of Organic Chemistry

Weapons

GEOL 498

GEOL 498 Regional Field Drinking This course explores the essential geologic techniques of alcoholic consumption in the field. Students will become familiar with beverage types, drinking techniques, traditions, safety considerations, and proper etiquette. In addition, special emphasis is placed on regional sources of alcohol with geologic themes. With completion of the course, students will be able to identify such specimens as Cinder Cone Red, Obsidian Stout, and Black Butte Porter.

Field trips to Deschutes Brewery and a rock outcrop of student’s choice is mandatory.

Prerequisite: Must be over 21 years of age.

CSCI 101 CHEM 499

CSCI 101 Virtual Woman Design This class teaches students the skills necessary to create their own virtual woman. Emphasis is placed on programming body form, seductive voice tones, and erotic actions. Upon completion of the class, students will no longer need to date or marry, as they will have created their own personal companion capable of all forms of physical and emotional stimulation.

BIOL 377

BIOL 377 Bioterrorism This course will explore the theoretical and practical aspects of a successful bioterrorism campaign. Studies will draw from all disciplines of Biology. For example, genetic applications can help design more effective viruses. Population ecology helps to create the most effective distribution strategy. Physiology and cell biology can aid the most effective pathogen mechanisms.

Prerequisite: Terrorism background check.

MATH 232

MATH 232 Basic English This class is required for all will be on fundamental use use of numbers or complex strictly forbidden. The goal better communication and studying mathematics.

incoming math majors. Focus of the English language. The mathematical thought will be of the coarse is to facilitate basic life skills in students

CHEM 499 Dangerous Chemical Reactions Dangerous chemical reactions are a fundamental cornerstone of the Chemical Sciences. Applications have been utilized throughout history for warfare, personal vendettas, and to cause mass chaos. This class explores various ways in which one can seriously injure oneself or others. Special emphasis is placed on exothermic reactions. This class is useful for both majors and nonmajors as it can be applied by disgruntled employees and for vengeance in all occupations.

Prerequisite: Wizard background check.

approval,

criminal

and

terrorist

BIOL 296

BIOL 296 Evil Ecology Ecologists have long dealt with the challenges of invasive species, hybridization, and anthropogenic pollution. This class approaches the subject from a new perspective: examining common ecological challenges instead as mechanism for advancing the competitive dominance of the human species. Topics will include environmental engineering to better suit human needs and eradication techniques of large carnivores and pest species while finding a way for human uses to fill those animals niches.

Prerequisite: Ecology.

of the University of Puget Sound The Allium

Elements Quiz W hich P l a ne t

a re you ?

1. You decide to go to a big party on Friday night.

What happens next?

a. You spend the evening as the center of attention, surrounded by a circle of your friends. As the night wears on, you even make some new acquaintances who are drawn to your wit and charm. b. You are dressed to a tee and strike up many conversations. People seem surprised and intrigued by your fiery temperament. c. You show up very fashionably late. You’re not so into the music that is playing, so you pop in your headphones and start rocking out to your favorite electronic guitar solos. d. You are SO ready for the party and think about it all day.

But when you get there, you decide that it is actually pretty lame. You leave in a huff. e. You are surprised by the number of people who wanted to talk to you, despite your guarded demeanor. The whole “mysterious” look must be in these days.

2. What do you want for your next birthday?

a. Robots, science kits, and maybe a of couple satellites delivered right to your doorstep. b. A trip to Hawaii! Volcanism always made you feel right at home. c. Rings. Lots of them. d. A nice cold beer. And a party! e. Appreciation. Credibility. Respect... You get the idea.

3. When you look up at the stars, what do you see? a. b. c. d. e.

Glorious halos of light.

People looking back at me.

What stars?

The endless abyss.

It burns!!

4. How do others respond when you get mad?

a. People always seem to expect you to get angry easily, but you generally keep your cool. You are not as volatile as your exterior would suggest. b. You don’t take competition well. Fortunately, many are drawn to you and will follow you wherever you lead. That’s got to be reassuring. c. Oh, sure, you look calm and peaceable. But beneath that imperturbable facade, you have a feisty temper. Few can weather your emotional storms and even fewer attempt. d. No one notices when you’re mad. Nobody checks in.

Nobody cares. Sigh. e. Your temperament changes so drastically that others have a difficult time keeping up with you.

5. Let’s talk interpersonal relationships.

a. You feel distanced from others. It’s like they’re standing on firm ground and you’re way out in space. b. Lots of people are drawn to you, but few make it into your inner circle. c. Eh, relationships aren’t really your thing. You prefer to have the freedom to make radical life changes without factoring in other people’s needs.

29 d. It’s easy for you to attract attention, but hard to get close. Some even seem a little frightened by you. e. You have a few loyal friends, but not too many. Some say you’re a little cold.

6. Would you say you receive due credit for your accomplishments?

a. Absolutely. And if you forget, your friends and relations are there to remind you of your importance. b. You get a lot of attention for your accomplishments, maybe even more than you deserve. But you’re easy going and approachable, which makes you a hit. c. You have certainly made a name for yourself by jumping from one extreme to another. It is quite impressive and escapes no one’s notice. d. You are often noted for your energetic personality and feisty temper. e. You are often discredited. You’re small, cold, and kind of out there... so what? It’s just not fair!

7. You are going to class on a sunny October day... what are you wearing? a. Something comfortable, like Birkenstocks and socks. b. Your greek letters, you are proud of who you are. c. A flowing sun-dress. d. You don’t believe the weatherman, so you opt for shorts, a down jacket and tennis shoes. e. You are going to class 15 minutes late with your shades on, drinking an espresso and popping advil…it was a late night.

8. You are on your first date. How do you plan on wowing your true love? a. You plan on winging it, you have all the confidence in the world. b. You don’t plan on taking anyone out soon, you like my loneliness. c. You plan on enchanting your date with delicate lines of poetry. d. A long walk through the park, hopefully then your date will get through your cold exterior. e. Wowing your true love? Your date will need to wow you.

9. You are stuck on a desert island. What must you have?

a. Dante’s Inferno, One Hundred Years of Solitude and iced tea. b. An axe, rope and a sail. You are NOT getting stuck on an island. c. Incense, candles and kambucha. d. You don’t need anything but yours truly for hours of entertainment. e. A chessboard, deck of cards and anyone, it would be interesting to meet someone new.

1) 2) 3) 4) 5) 6) 7) 8) 9)

a a a a a a a a a

= = = = = = = = =

3, 4, 3, 4, 5, 3, 5, 4, 1,

b b b b b b b b b

= = = = = = = = =

2, 2, 4, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 5,

Key: c = c = c = c = c = c = c = c = c =

5, 3, 2, 2, 1, 1, 2, 2, 2,

d d d d d d d d d

= = = = = = = = =

1, 1, 5, 5, 2, 2, 1, 1, 3,

e e e e e e e e e

= = = = = = = = =

4 5 1 1 4 5 3 3 4

30

Elements: The Scientific Magazine

Mercury (38 - 45)

Known for your changeable personality, you are hot or cold, but rarely in between. You can never make up your mind and always flit from one extreme to another. Some call you antisocial, and say that you don’t play well with others. You just say you like your space and the clarity of solitude. You’re prone to stubbornness and keep your face firmly pointed in the same direction at all times. This makes you misunderstood to most and mysterious to a few who pursue despite your protests. Just remember, being too impenetrable can get you burned or leave you out in the cold all alone.

Venus (31 - 37)

Your wispy, ethereal exterior hides a somewhat volatile personality, which comes as a surprise to the unwary.

For those who get to know you well, you are thoroughly enthusiastic and energetic – a delight to have around.

Those who are only acquaintances do not know how to handle your depths. They prefer to focus on the misty surface that paints you as ineffective and dismissible.

You should not let the world disregard you. Let some of your inner fire out and show everyone what you are truly made of.

Saturn (24 - 30)

The life of the party, you are constantly surrounded by a coterie of admirers. Everyone is drawn to your energy and force of personality. You do not take kindly to rivals, especially from within your own circle, and will do anything to stay in the spotlight. Fortunately, your own uniqueness and vibrant personality prevents people from turning to someone else for entertainment. You are never upset for long - your inner core of strength sees you through until you can find a way to bring the focus back to you.

Mars (17 - 23)

Everyone thinks your red top means you have a fiery temperament, but you’re really a cool dude. Nothing fazes you, because you’re secure in who you are. People are attracted to that confidence and your hidden depths, so you like to play the field, but you never get too serious. Very few can get really close, but when they do you stick with them forever. That caution about opening yourself up serves you well, but it can also cause you to miss opportunities. So, try something, spend time with someone, a little different once in a while.

Pluto (9 - 16)

Generally without a cause, you are determined to be a rebel. You are certain of yourself, even when the rest of the world disagrees with you. You adamantly refuse to fit in and accept the label others put on you. You remain on the outskirts of the social scene. Unwilling to be drawn in by the people who are determined to classify you as lesser, you remain separate and on the fringe. Your efforts are for nothing, however, as they continue on without you. Even if you think you are right, disconnecting yourself only harms you.

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