Hilton Pond 12-29-07 (Bird Banding Summary)
Our "bonus" installment of "This Week at Hilton Pond" for 2007
is a summary of bird banding totals for the Center during the
12-month period.
For photos, graphs, tables, and an analysis of birds banded at
Hilton Pond Center during the just-finished year, please visit
our essay for 29-31 December 2007 at
<<http://www.hiltonpond.org/ThisWeek071229.html>>
Included are a few nature notes, links to previous years'
banding summaries, and a tally of birds banded and recaptured
the last three days of December 2007.

Hilton Pond 01-01-08 (Broad-billed Hummingbird)
We've never before posted TWO installments of "This Week at Hilton
Pond" on the same day, but after banding South Carolina's second
recorded Broad-billed Hummingbird on 7 January we wanted to get a
full report on-line as soon as possible for folks who might want to
go see it. To our knowledge this is the first time this species has
been banded or photographed in the Palmetto State.
To read about this amazing out-of-range bird, please visit our photo
essay for 1-7 January 2008 at
<<http://www.hiltonpond.org/ThisWeek080101.html>>
As always we include a tally of birds banded and recaptured at Hilton
Pond

Tides and Water Levels
examines the complex systems that govern the movement tides and water levels. Learn what causes tides, what determines their frequencies and variations, and how they're monitored and measured. Find lessons on forces that affect tides and how lunar cycles affect living organisms. Use the "roadmap" to find data and predictions regarding water levels and coastal currents -- information on which maritime activities throughout the world depend.

NOAA Discovery Kits
presents tutorials, lessons, and multimedia activities for learning about corals, estuaries, ocean currents, tides, and pollution from diffuse sources. Learn about corals and threats to them; causes of ocean currents and how currents affect people's lives; estuaries, the waters and habitats where rivers meet the sea and form some of the world's most productive ecosystems; and geodesy, the science of measuring and monitoring the shape of the earth and the location of points on its surface.

Biology
explores biological molecules, self-assembly, and DNA. Zoom in on the macromolecules from which living things are made. Discover how, on the molecular level, things can assemble themselves. Learn how genetic information stored in DNA is read by cells and used to build proteins that cells need. Find out about protein folding, protein-substrate docking, and the important role of shapes and charges in self assembly.

Chemistry
presents online simulations of thermodynamics, states of matter, water, and reactions. See interactive visualizations of Brownian motion, Maxwell's speed distribution law, diffusion and osmosis, ion transport, distillation, motion of greenhouse gases, gas laws, liquid-solid comparisons, intermolecular forces, salt dissolving, chemical reactions, explosion, and more.

Case Method of Teaching Science
features case studies for use in teaching anatomy, chemistry, environment, evolution, medicine and health, microbiology, molecular biology and genetics, physics and engineering, plant science, psychology, and other sciences. Cases focus on dozens of topics, including carbohydrates, cloning, diabetes, drug dosages, energy drinks, global warming, heart attacks, irradiation, the nervous system, nuclear power, pesticides, skin cancer, wetlands, and others.

Nanotechnology
shows animations of molecular crystals, material strength experiments, different phases of liquid crystals, shockwaves, interatomic interactions in the soft v. hard materials, a microscopic model of friction, atomic motion across a liquid-solid interface, water molecules moving through carbon nanotubes, nanobud (a newly discovered material), nano machinery, nano differential gears, a molecular sorter, a nano conveyor belt, and more.

Microbial Life
focuses on the ecology, diversity, and evolution of micro-organisms. Learn about marine microbes and extremophile microbes that live in inhospitable environments. Explore the Gulf of Mexico Dead Zone and the red tide through case studies. Find out about microbial observatories and extreme environments, including Mono Lake (a lake in California's Eastern Sierra), Octopus Spring (a hot spring that is home to various thermophiles and microbial mat communities), and others.

Physics
provides more than 40 online interactives that demonstrate concepts in mechanics, fluid mechanics and dynamics, electromagnetism, and quantum physics. Watch simulations of a pendulum, suspension bridge, charged particle in a magnetic chamber, hourglass, Archimedes' Principle of Buoyancy, electrical fields, gears, light-matter interactions, Cradle, pulleys, springs, water flow when a dam collapses, and more.

NOVA

Absolute Zero: The Race for Absolute Zero"
Broadcast: Tuesday, January 15, 2008
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero
(NOVA airs on PBS at 8 p.m. ET/PT. Check your local listings as
broadcast dates and times may vary. This program can be used up to
one year after it is recorded off the air.)

Watch the Program
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/program.html
Watch the entire program online after the broadcast date.
(Quicktime or Windows Media required.) (Grades 6-8, 9-12)

Absolute Hot
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/hot.html
Learn in this article why whether there is a corresponding
hottest hot to the coldest cold is not the easiest question to
answer. (Grades 9-12)

A Sense of Scale
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/scale.html
Explore in this interactive the range from absolute zero to the
theoretical highest possible temperature. (Flash plug-in
required.) (Grades 6-8, 9-12)

Milestones in Cold Research
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/research.html
Trace the trajectory of scientific discoveries in cold in Kelvin,
Celsius, and Fahrenheit scales, from Galileo's invention of the
first thermometer-like device in the late 1500s to a
low-temperature experiment in 2003 that came within a
ten-billionth of a degree of absolute zero. (Flash plug-in
required.) (Grades 6-8, 9-12)

The Conquest of Cold
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/conquest.html
Read about the impact of refrigerated railway cars on native
cultures in this excerpt from Tom Shachtman's "Absolute Zero and
the Conquest of Cold," the book on which the NOVA program was
based. (Grades 9-12)

How Low Can You Go?
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/howlow.html
See if you can choose the right combination of gases to liquefy
oxygen in this online three-step cascade experiment. (Flash
plug-in required.) (Grades 9-12)

States of Matter
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/matter.html
Adjust the temperature and pressure of three common substances to
see how changing those variables affect their states of matter.
(Flash plug-in required.) (Grades 6-8, 9-12)

A Matter of Degrees
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/degrees.html
Create your own temperature scale then see how it compares with
the Fahrenheit, Celsius, and Kelvin scales. (Flash plug-in
required.) (Grades 6-8, 9-12)

Anatomy of a Refrigerator
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/refrigerator.html
Tour this clickable refrigerator to learn the three basic
principles used in cooling food. (Flash plug-in required.)
(Grades 6-8, 9-12)

The Ice Trade
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/trade.html
Select the right combination of ice load and insulation for 10
ice ships traveling to Florida, Brazil, or India to earn the
title of "Ice King." (Flash plug-in required.) (Grades 6-8, 9-12)

Ultracold Atoms
http://www.pbs.org/nova/zero/atoms.html
Learn the ins and outs of a new form of matter called a
Bose-Einstein condensate in this interview with researcher and
physics professor Luis Orozco. (Grades 9-12)

Teacher's Guide
http://www.pbs.org/nova/teachers/programs/3501_zero.html
In this classroom activity, students build and calibrate their
own bulb thermometers. (Grades 6-8)

Program Transcript
http://www.pbs.org/nova/transcripts/3501_zero.html
The site includes a complete narration for this program.

In the coming weeks:
Jan. 22 -- Family That Walks on All Fours (repeat)
 http://www.pbs.org/nova/allfours

Teaching Intelligent Design  vs Evolution in the classroom. Is intelligent design religion or science?


Jan. 29 -- Secrets of the Parthenon
 http://www.pbs.org/nova/parthenon

Feb. 5  -- The Mummy Who Would Be King (repeat)
http://www.pbs.org/nova/mummy