Session 2010-080 with CSU - East Bay

Application

The School

The Class

The Project

Miscellaneous

Live Session Transcript

Connected on 2010-10-14 18:15:00 from Hayward, CA, US

• 6:11pm
• Bugscope Team looks like it's working
• Bugscope Team we are ready to go
• Bugscope Team okay I am getting a drink, and we are ready to go, session is unlocked

• Bugscope Team I am back...
• 6:19pm
• Bugscope Team Michele I am going to log into another computer because here it seems I cannot confer control to you.
• Bugscope Team Okay you should have control now...
• Bugscope Team can you type a message?
• Bugscope Team or drive?
• Bugscope Team or read this :)
• Guest What is this we are seeing?
• Bugscope Team Yay!
• Bugscope Team This is the head of a moth, and you can see its proboscis, partly uncoiled.
• Bugscope Team you can also see its compound eyes, of course
• Guest This is really awesome!What is a proboscis?
• Bugscope Team the tip of the proboscis is broken
• Bugscope Team it's the tongue, in a way
• Bugscope Team it's how it reaches into flowers and gets nectar

• Guest What is this?
• 6:24pm
• Guest where is the magnification?
• Bugscope Team now we are looking at the tip of the proboscis
• Bugscope Team the mag on the 'scope is 528X right now

• Bugscope Team I'm sorry it's not there yet.

• Bugscope Team You can see the micron bar, but I know that is not so helpful.

• Bugscope Team Oh!

• Bugscope Team If you click on More Info, top right, you'll get a readout that shows the parameters, incl. the mag.
• Bugscope Team this is a bumblebee
• Bugscope Team looks like it is related to Don King

• Bugscope Team we see its eyes, its antennae
• Bugscope Team the bumblebee is covered with hairs, called setae

• Bugscope Team they may be mechanosensory, chemosensory, or thermosensory
• Bugscope Team this is the Bee's Knee
• Guest Do things get stuck to the setae?
  Bugscope Team yes they do -- sometimes we find mites there
• 6:29pm
• Bugscope Team and pollen

• Bugscope Team these samples have a lot of mold spores with them
• Bugscope Team some nice looking ones

• Bugscope Team this is a rolypoly, or pillbug, or sowbug, or woodlouse
• Guest Yes- moldy bugs!
• Bugscope Team it is a crustacean, actually, not an insect
• Bugscope Team I think it has seven pairs of legs
• Bugscope Team plus the antennae, which you can see now
• Guest We are going super fast trying to see most of the samples. If you want to comments randomly as we pull images, that's cool!
• Bugscope Team they have gills
• Bugscope Team hey no problem'
• Guest can you show us the gills?
• Bugscope Team I am sorry I was going to say they are near the hindlegs, but we have never knowingly seen them

• Bugscope Team these kind of little dudes are isopods - all of their legs are the same form/shape

• Bugscope Team somewhere down here there are said to be gills

• Guest cool! We are moving to a new bug.

• 6:34pm
• Bugscope Team this is a piece of the wing of a dragonfly
• Guest What is the function of the "lines" in the wings? Are they veins?
• Bugscope Team they are evolutionarily very old

• Bugscope Team they are veins; I believe they have hemolymph in them

• Bugscope Team hemolymph is insect 'blood'

• Bugscope Team the wing veins have what look like little thorns on them at regular intervals
• Bugscope Team we can see some of them now

• Bugscope Team dragonflies may be the fastest flying insects, and they are predators -- they eat other insects
• Bugscope Team speaking of eating
• Bugscope Team these are spider fangs
• Bugscope Team near the tips we sometimes see poison pores, but not on these

• Bugscope Team spiders all feed by injecting corrosive venom into their prey. it dissolves the internal organs and then they suck all of that up like a milkshake
• Guest Are all spiders poisonous to humans?
  Bugscope Team some are much worse than others -- some have mouthparts/fangs too small to bite you with
• Guest CAn you drie us to the spinnerette?
• Guest drive uus
• Guest us
• 6:40pm
• Bugscope Team spiders have this trick they can do called autotomy, in which they can let one or more of their legs drop off if they sense venom entering that leg

• Bugscope Team sorry I had us halfway to the spinnerettes
• Bugscope Team they're south of here, of course
• Bugscope Team we mount almost all of the critters dorsal side down
• Bugscope Team I used the microscope to take us right to the spinnerettes
• Bugscope Team Spiderman would not be so 'sexy' if he had spinnerettes coming out of his back end like a real spider.

• Bugscope Team the abdomen is soft, and when the spider dies and it dries out it wrinkles quite a bit

• Guest These are awesome specimens! I like the new format! THanks for driving - it gave us time to talk a little and draw a few things.

• Bugscope Team crane flies look like very large mosquitoes
• 6:45pm

• Bugscope Team but they are harmless

• Bugscope Team compound eye

• Bugscope Team if you had compound eyes you would have excellent peripheral vision

• Bugscope Team but it would be hard to buy sunglasses

• Bugscope Team still, you would have another advantage

• Bugscope Team which is being able to register changes in the visual field very quickly
• Bugscope Team which is important if you are trying to live in a world like that of insects
• Bugscope Team in which things happen so quickly
• Guest HA1!

• Bugscope Team this is the ladybug's tarsus -- the claw is one of the tarsi
• Guest So -are we able to access the chat dialogue and images that correspond after this session?

• Bugscope Team you can see fungal hyphae and mold spores
• Bugscope Team see the claws?
• Guest very cool!
• Guest foot fungus!!
  Bugscope Team eeuuw yes
• Guest Scott - sorry we were so rushed this time - we learned a TON though. My students LOVE this! They all just had to leave though. SO - we can end anytime. My sessions on Monday and Tuesday next week will be an hour though.
• Guest I enjoy this format! Do you like it?

• Bugscope Team we are still tweaking it. I am really glad you like it
• Guest these images seem so much better!
• 6:50pm
• Bugscope Team Chas did all of it and is still working on it, of course.

• Guest I like it! Will there be autofocus?

• Guest Ooh....nice focus on the spores
• Bugscope Team autofocus takes a long time; we might put a few more steps into the focus, though
• Bugscope Team I pulled that up using the SEM itself
• Guest Ah - the power you have!
• Bugscope Team one thing to remember about Bugscope is that we image from a long working distance so you can see as much of an insect as possible at low mag
• Bugscope Team and being at a long working distance we do not have the highest resolution capability
• Guest It is good to see the entire insect. We discuss learning content in CONTEXT and seeing the big picture
• Guest I REALLY appreciate you hauling to our session!
  Bugscope Team did my best. we cannot do that often because it ties the 'scope up for hours
• Bugscope Team this evening we have someone else who wanted to hitch a ride on this session
• Guest i hear you.
• Guest Did they hitch a ride?
• Bugscope Team in a way
• Bugscope Team I'm not sure. I am waiting for Tony Clishem and don't see that he's here yet.
• Guest How do I access the link to our chat session? From our homepage?
• 6:55pm
• Guest Good! Bugscope is getting popular!
  Bugscope Team we are actually becoming victims of our own success after 11+ years

• Guest Success is double edged
  Bugscope Team heh yeah the first few years it was difficult
• Bugscope Team we have one classroom in HoHoKus NJ that has been with us for 9 years
• Bugscope Team and you have been with us for about that long, it seems
• Guest I have been doing this since 2000 I think. Well, I am a fan and will always be ready to support you! I am going to log off and see you all on MOnday and Tuesday next week.
• Bugscope Team Hey Thank You, Michele

• Bugscope Team See you next week!

• Guest See you later! Michele
• Bugscope Team Lindsey are you there, still?
• Bugscope Team I gave you control of the 'scope