This hands-on activity will provide students with an understanding of the issues that surround environmental clean-up. Students will create their own oil spill, try different methods for cleaning it up, and then discuss the merits of each method in terms of effectiveness (cleanliness) and cost. They will be asked to put themselves in the place of both an environmental engineer and an oil company owner who are responsible for the clean-up.

This introductory video addresses key points as well as pros and cons of oil as an energy source for transportation.

Explore an active area of research in optical physics: producing designer pulse shapes to achieve specific purposes, such as breaking apart a molecule. Carefully create the perfect shaped pulse to break apart a molecule by individually manipulating the colors of light that make up a pulse.

Did you ever imagine that you can use light to move a microscopic plastic bead? Explore the forces on the bead or slow time to see the interaction with the laser's electric field. Use the optical tweezers to manipulate a single strand of DNA and explore the physics of tiny molecular motors. Can you get the DNA completely straight or stop the molecular motor?

Did you ever imagine that you can use light to move a microscopic plastic bead? Explore the forces on the bead or slow time to see the interaction with the laser's electric field. Use the optical tweezers to manipulate a single strand of DNA and explore the physics of tiny molecular motors. Can you get the DNA completely straight or stop the molecular motor?

This is a computer and outdoor lab based activity in which students design two bottle rockets that are designed to reach maximum height. Students will calculate maximum height and terminal velocity for each rocket launched.

This interactive diagram from the National Academy of Sciences shows how we rely on a variety of primary energy sources (solar, nuclear, hydro, wind, geothermal, natural gas, coal, biomass, oil) to supply energy to four end-use sectors (residential, commercial, industrial, and transportation). It also focuses on lost or degraded energy.

This Java applet allows children to explore a balancing tool and thus build their algebraic thinking about equivalency. By placing shapes on each side of the balance and finding equivalent sets of weights, students discover the weight of each shape in one of six built-in sets or a random set.

This activity is an experimental investigation in which students use paper helicopters to examine types of variables and how to manipulate variables in experimental design.

This activity is a hands-on lesson that shows how air resistance affects how things move and how air is all around objects.

Survey of current research in High Energy Physics. Topics include electron-positron and proton-antiproton collisions; electroweak phenomena, heavy flavor physics, and high-precision tests of the Standard Model. Other topics include searches for new phenomena (compositeness, supersymmetry, and GUTs), discussion of our new experimental results (e.g. the Top Quark), and expectations from future accelerators (B factory, LHC). 8.811, Particle Physics II, describes essential research in High Energy Physics. We derive the Standard Model (SM) first using a bottom up method based on Unitarity, in addition to the usual top down method using SU3xSU2xU1. We describe and analyze several classical experiments, which established the SM, as examples on how to design experiments. Further topics include heavy flavor physics, high-precision tests of the Standard Model, neutrino oscillations, searches for new phenomena (compositeness, supersymmetry, technical color, and GUTs), and discussion of expectations from future accelerators (B factory, LHC, large electron-positron linear colliders, etc). The term paper requires the students to have constant discussions with the instructor throughout the semester on theories, physics, measurables, signatures, detectors, resolution, background identification and elimination, signal to noise and statistical analysis.

Students are presented with a short lesson on the Coulter principle—an electronic method to detect microscopic particles and determine their concentration in fluid. Depending on the focus of study, students can investigate the industrial and medical applications of particle detection, the physics of fluid flow and electric current through the apparatus, or the chemistry of the electrolytes used in the apparatus.

Play with one or two pendulums and discover how the period of a simple pendulum depends on the length of the string, the mass of the pendulum bob, and the amplitude of the swing. It's easy to measure the period using the photogate timer. You can vary friction and the strength of gravity. Use the pendulum to find the value of g on planet X. Notice the anharmonic behavior at large amplitude.

Play with one or two pendulums and discover how the period of a simple pendulum depends on the length of the string, the mass of the pendulum bob, and the amplitude of the swing. It's easy to measure the period using the photogate timer. You can vary friction and the strength of gravity. Use the pendulum to find the value of g on planet X. Notice the anharmonic behavior at large amplitude.

This video highlights the Pentagon's focus on climate change as the military examines potential risks, strategic responses, and impacts of climate change on future military and humanitarian missions. In 2010, for the first time, the Pentagon focused on climate change as a significant factor in its Quadrennial Defense Review of potential risks and strategic responses. Rear Admiral David Titley, Oceanographer of the Navy, explains why the US military sees clear evidence of climate change and how those changes will affect future military and humanitarian missions.

This activity is an investigation into the period of a pendulum where students will write an equation for a pendulum experiencing simple harmonic motion.