Mini Blog Project #3

Photo Credit: Chantel Yip

Today, I did an experiment that involved a toothpick in a balloon without the balloon popping!

To do this you need:

• A sharp toothpick
• A balloon
• Petroleum jelly

To put the toothpick into the balloon without popping, you simply rub the petroleum jelly on top of the balloon with the slightly darker color of the balloon, which has rubber, and you stick the toothpick in the balloon from there. You have to make sure to be careful though because you want to be patient and just gently twist it in.

Science: The petroleum jelly is a lubricant and with the latex rubber of the balloon, it has a long hydrocarbon chain and a long polymer chain respectively. Since rubber has a long polymer chain, it is able to hold its shape with the petroleum jelly.

Mini Project #2

Photo Credit: Nicole Ho

May 18, 2010

Today, I made ice cream using some very simple ingredients. It involved simple materials such as milk, sugar, and vanilla. To make the ice cream, we needed ice and salt to make the milk mixture freeze.

To do this experiment, you need:

1. Milk
2. Sugar
3. Vanilla
4. Ice
5. Bag
6. Salt

Science: The science involved was with the salt.The salt reacted with the ice to lower the freezing temperature of the ice so that it wouldn't melt as fast. As the ice gets colder, the milk mixture can also get colder and eventually make our ice cream!

The experiment overall was really fun and the ice cream was good but I added a little too much sugar so it tasted too sweet and not as great. Not all of the milk froze either so I didn't get a complete mixture of ice cream. Other than that, the experiment was still good and fun.

California Chemistry Standard

10C. Students know amino acids are the building blocks of proteins.

Amino acids combine together to form proteins as amino acids are the building blocks of proteins. The different amino acid combinations depend on the different R groups which are the amino acid's side chain. Several things can affect the amino acids such as the greater the electronegativity means that the bond would be more polar. If there is a higher number of alkyl groups in the side chain or if the side chains have pure hydrocarbon alkyl, then the amino acid would be non-polar.

There are many different amino acids and humans need 10 of the 20 amino acids. When food is digested, the proteins are broken down and then the body uses the amino acids. The body needs certain amino acids that are actually essential such as crysteine, lysine, and tryptophan which can be found in wheat, rice, legumes, and maize. There are also nonessential amino acids that the body actually makes which include aspartic acid, glutamic acid, and glycine.

Here is a list of amino acids.

• The ones that are in orange are hydrophobic and nonpolar.
• The ones in green are hydrophilic and polar.
• The amino acids in pink are acidic.
• The amino acids in light blue are basic.

The amino acids are either hydrophobic or hydrophilic depending if they like or hate water. If the amino acids like water, they will be hydrophilic and if they dislike water, they would be hydrophobic.

Amino acids can also help you by reducing muscle fatigue and give you an energy boost!

Mills Canyon Field Trip!

On April 29th, everyone from Mr. Olson's from every period that he teaches went to Mills Canyon to explore many different things. I liked how we were able to take a day to walk around a canyon with our friends and have a day to explore nature that is actually very close to our own city. The trip was very fun although I didn't like how it rained pretty hard the night before and thus, there was a ton of mud in some parts of the trail, but other than that, the whole trip was pretty fun and I hope that I get to experience this again another day.

View Mills Canyon Park Trail in a larger map

Mini Blog Project

Photo Credit: Andy Wu

May 4th, 2010

Today, I did an experiment that involved very simple things that everyone could do. The experiment involves a little bit of corn starch, water, and it shows what suspension is. It is basically something that can change from a liquid to a solid fairly quickly unless you do some specific things to it.

To do this experiment, you simply need 3 things.

Materials:

1. Corn starch
2. Water
3. A bowl

Science: Suspension is a heterogeneous mixture that can change states such as water to solid which is what happens exactly in the corn starch and water mixture.

The experiment was pretty fun but it was a little messy. The corn starch mixture was able to stay solid if i moved it around my fingers and it would harden on my hands. If I didn't move my fingers at all, it would just slip through my hands. When i washed my hands with water, everything was very easy to get off as it just slid off my hands.

IProposeWe Make Fake Snow

Links: How to make Instant Snow!
How to make Fake Snow!

Materials: Sodium Polyacrylate, Water, and a Beaker

Procedure:

1. Put Polyacrylate into a beaker.
2. Add water to the beaker.
3. Watch the snow come alive!

Safety Precautions:

• Don't eat the snow.
• Don't let the "snow" touch your eyes or mouth.
  

Scientific Principles:

• Conversion of Mass Theory can be used because if you start off with a specific amount of the polyacrylate polymer powder and add water, after the water evaporates, the powder should still weigh the same before water was added to it.

Pokemon

Yesterday, I finally got the game I wanted for my entire life. I finally got Pokemon Soul Silver. Not only did I get the game, I also got the Poke Walker. I can train my pokemon while walking so during track practice, i get to train my pokemon and myself. There's no downside to this. I was excited when the first Silver version came out but now that this re-make is out, it makes me love pokemon even more. Now I can be fast in track and a pokemon master.Gotta catch 'em all.

Golf

This week, we started to play Golf for PE and I don't think it is that fun. It was pretty fun while we were able to hit the golf balls in the gym, but when we had to play in the wet grass in the morning during 1st period, it is a problem. I had to bring an extra pair of socks everyday and it takes a little longer to change. For example, i was late this morning to 2nd period because i had to spend extra time to change socks and shoes. Besides that, it's really fun playing golf because I think that I can hit the golf balls pretty far. When the cones, or holes, get too close, I'm not as good because a lot of the grass is in the way.

Mills Track Meet

Yesterday, we had a track meet at Mills and it was our first home meet in 7 years. It was a meet against Carlmont. It was really weird because I was a distance runner and out of all the distance runners, i was the only one running the 400, 800, and 4x400 while everyone else were forced to run the 800, 1600, or 3200. The meet was pretty fun but i was a little disappointed at how we only left class at 2:00 because i thought that we needed much more time than that to set up the hurdles, polevaulting, and other things. Overall, the meet was very fun and I hope that I run faster in other events.

David Webb

David Webb went to our class this week to show us his vacuum. It wasn't a vacuum for cleaning things but it showed us pressure and how it can change different things at different pressures. I learned a lot of about pressure because we were able to visually see all the different things at higher levels of pressure. It was cool to see how the marshmallow started to expand and get bigger but after he released the pressure, the marshmallow shrunk and it was basically deflated and didn't have any of its air left. Brandon gave some of the marshmallow to me and it was very chewy so it wasn't like a regular marshmallow which made it kind of disgusting but it still tasted the same. Overall, the presentation was very good and i wish that he could present more things to us.

Terra Nova Track Meet

Today, I was at the track meet at Terra Nova. The races were all really intense as everyone was really fast. I was running the 400, the 800, and the 4x400. I thought that I could've done better for the 400 and the 800 because before those races, I felt really dehydrated and that I couldn't run any faster than I could. If I drank more water the night before, I think that I would've gotten better times for my races. The 4x400 was a little different for some reason because I felt like I actually ran that a lot faster than the 400 and 800. Maybe it was because I ate a lot of food before the race and then I had more energy. Overall, the meet was pretty fun but it was always a little scary right before the race because it seems that everyone else is so much faster than me.

Academy of Villains

On Friday, there was a rally and it was really good. I thought that it got even better when the Academy of Villains performed for us. They were really good at dancing. there was a lot of surprises that they did. i thought that they had the best performance because they were really good at dancing. They should perform more for Mills.

Exhausted

i have been exhausted this week. this track season seems to be a lot more difficult than last year. i feel sleepy every day this week during school. its really hard to stay focus during school because i'm just so tired and i just want to sleep during class. luckily, there is a three day weekend and i'm looking forward to relaxing and catching up on some sleep so that i can pay more attention in all my classes.

Chinese New Year Project

This week, I had to work on a Chinese New Year Project with Aaron Lee, Brandon Ip, and Andy Wu. We had an extra week to work on the project but Aaron had to go to Disneyland and slack off so we had to get it all done within three hours. We finally finished it in three hours and we thought that we did a really good job. Apparently, we had a little problem with explaining our project so Andy added more things to the video and I thought that our final project was really good!

Track

This week, I start the Track season. I've been out of shape because I haven't done anything for about two weeks, or maybe a month. The first day of practice wasn't that bad because I was able to push it and run the times. On the second day, it was really tough because both my legs were entirely sore. I felt like I don't even know how to run anymore. At least when I get back in shape, I can finally be faster.

Like Dissolves Like

3. That is silver mixed with water.

Dissolve

Dissolving is when a solid mixes with a liquid, it is combined into one liquid. Like dissolves like is basically saying that something polar would not dissolve with anything that is nonpolar. An example of that is oil is nonpolar and water is polar, oil sits on top of water because they don't dissolve each other. Like Dissolves Like.

Winter Conditioning

Winter Conditioning is horrible. I don't like winter conditioning right now because I'm out of shape. I've been really sore this week so far and it's very hard for me to wake up during the morning. When I am able to wake up, I'm still really tempted to go back to sleep. During school, I can barely focus because I feel so tired. I guess staying up everyday during winter break was the worst idea possible.