I will add interesting information here from the world of science each week. It could be either something topical (e.g. the launch of a new space craft) or something local or suggested by a students' question .............
It's all about Pluto!!
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The whole world has been transfixed by the amazing achievements of the New Horizons spacecraft mission. It was launched 9 ½ years ago and travelled 5 billion kilometres to Pluto, sending back amazing photographs of Jupiter and its moon Io (on the right) along the way. On July 14 2015, New Horizons became the first spacecraft to explore Pluto up close in a flyby that took it nearly 12,000 km from the surface of Pluto. The successful flyby yielded science results that have already turned many long held ideas about planetary science on their head. Pluto has gone from being just a blur in photographs even from the powerful Hubble telescope to a world of icy plains, mountain ranges and amazing detail. The spacecraft will continue beaming back the results of its mission over the next 16 months as it continues to explore other Kuiper Belt objects.
For more detail on the New Horizons mission visit its website or this great resource from ABC Splash. 
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Icy plains on Pluto
Mountain ranges on Pluto
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Week 7
NASA's Dawn spacecraft has become the first mission to achieve orbit around a dwarf planet. The spacecraft was approximately 38,000 miles (61,000 kilometers) from Ceres when it was captured by the dwarf planet's gravity.
Since its discovery in 1801, Ceres was known as a planet, then an asteroid and later a dwarf planet. It is the largest object in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. It is made of rock and ice and contains a third of all the mass in the asteroid belt. The image on the left is a true size comparison between our (the Earth's) Moon which is the largest, Ceres and Vesta (the largest asteroid) Dawn was launched from Earth in 2007 and spent 14 months exploring the asteroid Vesta (Image on right). Now, after a journey of 4.9 billion kilometres and 7.5 years, Dawn calls Ceres, home. It has already sent back startling images of the dwarf planet and at the end of its mission in 2016, it will have flown as low as 375 kilometres from the surface of Ceres. Scientists already have a mystery to solve. Last month as Dawn neared Ceres, it relayed images of startlingly bright spots on the surface, which could be patches of subsurface ice exposed after an asteroid or comet impact. They also could be deposits of salt or other minerals. |
"Vesta from Dawn, July 17, 2011" by NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA
Bright spots on Ceres by NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA -
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Week 6
We have been having some wonderful discussions in Stage 2 about matter, energy and the universe. There were many questions about black holes and whether they were made of matter or not ...... I promised Ronan that I would try and find something that could explain these very high level concepts. Here is an interesting video (click on the image below) from the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England. Hope it can shed some 'light' on black holes for you.
SPIDER WASPS
Week 5
Zenobia and Alexander Fraser alerted me to the presence of many spider wasps in our school right now. These are distinctive black and orange wasps which may be among the most fearsome predators in our school. But don't worry ......... they aren't interested in us boring humans - they have other predators in their sights ........ Spiders!! Read on..... and watch the video above to learn about the fairly gruesome hunting habits of these tiny assassins.
From the Museum of Victoria and Australian Museum websites ............
Zenobia and Alexander Fraser alerted me to the presence of many spider wasps in our school right now. These are distinctive black and orange wasps which may be among the most fearsome predators in our school. But don't worry ......... they aren't interested in us boring humans - they have other predators in their sights ........ Spiders!! Read on..... and watch the video above to learn about the fairly gruesome hunting habits of these tiny assassins.
From the Museum of Victoria and Australian Museum websites ............
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Spider wasps (family Pompilidae) are solitary wasps. They prey on spiders to feed their larvae or they parasitise other spider wasps. They do not form colonies to defend nests and are not aggressive.
The spider wasps you are most likely to see and hear are female wasps preparing nest chambers for their larvae. They dig a burrow using long spines on their front legs, then search rapidly around tree trunks and on the ground for a spider. On finding the spider, which may be as large as a huntsman or funnel-web and twice as heavy as itself, the wasp stings and paralyses it, and then drags or flies it back to the burrow. She then lays an egg on the spider's body, and seals it in a chamber or cell at the end of the burrow. The larva hatches and feeds on the body of the spider before pupating in a thin silky cocoon in the cell. Some spider wasps sting the spider and lay an egg on it but do not dig a burrow to put it in. The spider is left where it was stung and the larva hatches and eats the spider. 
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Some spider wasps such as the ones featured in the video above, not only paralyse their spider prey but also remove each of its legs before dragging it into the burrow or even seals it into a cells made from mud.
Most members of this wasp family, the Pompilidae, leave the spider intact and paralyse it permanently. In this case, not only does the wasp cut off its prey’s legs, but the venom seems to immobilise the huntsman only temporarily and the spider wakes up after the cell is sealed. And as a side note, spider wasps are ferocious enough to have their own mimics. The Wasp-mimicking Beetle (Trogodendron fasciculatum) looks roughly like a spider wasp, with its black and white body and orange antennae, but its behaviour is almost identical. Moving rapidly over tree trunks with twitching antennae it would, at least, be safe from roaming huntsmans. 
There is even a spider wasp that preys on the deadly redback spider. Interestingly this was discovered thanks to the great observation skills of a nine year old boy from Western Australia. Read this interesting article from Australian Geographic for the full story.
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