Derby Hats!

Since this is Kentucky Derby weekend, it seemed like a good idea to post pictures of hats on display at the Louisville Science Center.  These hats were carefully selected from the larger apparel collection stored at the Louisville Science Center.  It is part of an exhibit entitled "Hats! Reflections in Time".  All the hats have labels describing the specimen and listing the donor.

Since the Louisville's star attraction, The Kentucky Derby is on Saturday, May 7, 2011, the Louisville Science Center is closed so for visitors still in town on Sunday or beyond visit the science center and view this classy exhibit in the Discovery Gallery on the second floor.

Learn more that the Louisville Science Center web site.

Louisville Zoo Polar Bears Need Our Help

Yikes!  Would not want to be on this bear's Thanksgiving menu.

The Louisville Zoo of Kentucky is building a section called Glacier Run that provides habitat for the seals and sea lions plus the polar and grizzly bears.   If all the money is raised it will also house snowy owls, Steller's sea eagles, and arctic foxes. [Note: No photographers were harmed taking these pictures.]

The zoo has till January 1, 2011 to raise the final $820,000 of $7,700,000 in order to receive a $900,000 challenge grant from the non-profit Kresge Foundation of Troy, Michigan.  The entire project overall has raised approximately $23.9 million.  Parts of the Glacier Run exhibit are already open (the living area for the seals and sea lions).

Allowable matching funds are tax-deductible and can be in the form of

cash or pledges from corporations, foundations and individuals.  Donations can be mailed to:

Jill Kaplan, Director of Development

c/o

Louisville Zoo

1100 Trevilian Way

Louisville Ky. 40213

For information call 502-459-2181 or read the full story at the Courier Journal web site.

These stuffed polar bears are on display at the Discovery Gallery at the Louisville Science Center.  The polar bears were donated back in the 1970s to the museum.

Wolfe Creek Meteorite

Here are some pictures of a meteorite found at the Wolfe Creek Crater in Australia. It is on display on the second floor of the Louisville Science Center in the Sky Tracker exhibit area.

It is thought that it is part of large meteorite that hit the Earth over 300,000 years ago. It was discovered by science in 1947 during an aerial survey.

Earth Day at the Louisville Zoo

It was a big party at the Louisville Zoo today with $1 admission to celebrate Earth Day and the 40th birthday of the Louisville Zoo. I believe it was called Party for the Planet and there were a lot of people there. The Louisville Science Center had a table on the hill near the MetaZoo. I was volunteering and helping show visitors what owls eat by dissecting owl pellets. We found small leg bones, some skulls, pelvic bones, spines, and jaw bones with teeth. St. Joseph's Childrens Home was next to us letting the public know the need for foster homes for 40 or so children in their care. The Red Cross was on the other side of us making the public aware of emergency preparedness.

I arrived before the Zoo opened and there was a crowd waiting to get in. When I left the line seemed 10 times as long and cars were backed up trying to get in and out of the Zoo. Nice sunny day with some wind gusts.



Here is a little owl that only has one wing. It was hurt and brought to the Zoo to be taken care of. The handler was gracious in letting me take its picture. Its natural camouflage is amazing how it looks like tree bark. The tie in with the Louisville Science Center activity worked out as well too.

This picture is of a star attraction at the Zoo, a baby elephant named Scotty. Scotty is now 2 years old and is the cover page article in the May 2009 Louisville magazine.

I heard some loud aircraft noises while at the Zoo and saw this helicopter after I had finished my volunteer shift. This is a United States of America helicopter that looks like one the president uses. I am not sure if a high level official was visiting the area today or not. It flew by as I was trying to take pictures of lemurs so I did not get the best angle. The picture is pretty good with a out of focus branch in the foreground, a steeple of some Zoo building in the middle ground, the helicopter in the background and a backdrop of blue with cloud sky.

A bird with nice golden crown, maybe a crane of some sort.

I found the Louisville Zoo a great place to take pictures. I hope to return soon and take some more photographs.

Louisville Science Center NanoDay

NanoDay was at the Louisville Science Center on April 4, 2009. The Science Center is located in Louisville, Kentucky overlooking the Ohio River and is near the Louisville Slugger Bat Factory and Kentucky Center for the Arts.

It was a full day of presentations by researchers from the University of Louisville, Indiana University Bloomington, and University of Kentucky.

I helped out with a number of events. One was pictured below which is Dr. Cohn from U of L taking about "The Nanotechnology Poster Children". This took place in the Chemistry Kitchen and another presentation that was shown in the same lab was Dr. Gobin of U of L speaking on "Tissue Welding Using Light and Nanoparticles".



I stopped by main entrance point to the World We Create exhibit and learned about an optics company in eastern Louisville that makes equipment and materials to create eyeglass lens that anti-reflective properties. They had a nice demo of exposing a lens to a strobe light and it instantly turns tinted.

Students from the University of Louisville Institute for Advanced Materials and Renewable Energy and The ElectroOptics Research Institute & Nanotechnology Center were on hand. One demo showed using solar cells to perform electrolysis (breaking water into hydrogen and oxygen) and then using the hydrogen component for fuel. The other demo was using plasma to create nanomaterials.


The tech forum had a number of lectures which I was only able to attend one: Dr. Kang of U of L speaking about "Nanoparticles for Biomedical Diagnosis and Treatment". It involved gold nanoparticles heated by magnetic fields to kill cancer tissue.

Outside the forum was a demonstration of clean room technology and devices to see very small particles. Also Indiana University Bloomington Nanoscience Center had a popular exhibit making images using silver nitrate on glass plates. It was some real wet chemistry going on.

There was also a professor that teaches organic chemistry at Indiana University talking about using nanotechnology to treat cancer tumors. She was using jello models to demonstrate this in the Discovery Gallery. In addition some students from Indiana University were demonstrating memory wire and nanocloth that was hydrophobic.

Removing Power Line Structure

Here are some cranes that are removing the power line structure that is between the Ohio River and the Louisville Science Center. It should be a great Thunder of Louisville this year with this viewing obstacle out of the way. So it is a great time to get tickets to the Louisville Science Center Thunderblast event because eventually the enormous (by Louisville standards) Museum Plaza building and its parking deck will block the view of the river from the Louisville Science Center building.

Happy PI (3.14159...) Day (03-14-2009)

I volunteered at the Louisville Science Center on PI day and there were a number of activities for visitors. An event that attracted a lot of visitor attention was the pie or PI eating contest. Four staff members and one volunteen competed by trying to eat as much whip cream/chocolate pudding pie without their hands in 3 minutes and 14 seconds. The manager of the gift shop won in a close contest with one of the floor managers.


On the third floor where I was working, we had visitors place a number on a color strip that represented part of the number PI (3.14159...). It was printed out to the first 1000 digits and we began to go sequentially down the list. Here is a picture of the early version where the number chain was still making its way past the second floor. When I left, we had about 100 digits in the chain and when I finished volunteering at 4 PM it might have been toward 200 digits and almost to the floor of the 1st level.


The following picture is one of a banner hanging from the 3rd floor.

Louisville Science Center - Whose DNA? Experiment

I helped with a BioLab at the Louisville Science Center that was teaching some high school students about DNA.

They learned about DNA as the basic building blocks of life and then how to use a pipette. They then loaded polarized dye into wells in a gel pack in this tray. The case was closed up and then 125 V DC was applied for about 15 minutes.



Here is one of the trays powered up and processing two of the four groups samples.



Here are the finished product of the four groups. Each sample was given two columns and there were three samples A, B, and C. A and C are the same and they paths match.