Connected on 2012-01-30 12:30:00 from Johnson, Kansas, United States
- 7:41am
- Bugscope Team sample is pumping down in the 'scope
- Bugscope Team this is a CCD camera view of the specimen chamber
- Bugscope Team we're waiting for the vacuum to get better -- good enough so that we can turn on the electron beam
- Bugscope Team once we turn on the beam, we will make a couple of quick adjustments and then look around on the sample stage
- Bugscope Team that is when we choose elements of the sample that will become presets -- locations on the stage that we think are cool, for the kids to see
- Bugscope Team almost time to start the beam...
- 7:49am
- 7:55am
- Bugscope Team ready to roll!
- Bugscope Team and be right back...
- 8:05am
- Bugscope Team back!
- 8:10am
- Bugscope Team this is a moth's compound eye, and you can see a few scales as well
- Bugscope Team Hi Pam!
- Bugscope Team Can you read this?
- Bugscope Team Hi Sally!
- 8:15am
- Bugscope Team welcome to Bugscope!
- Bugscope Team I see that you had to log on as guests.
- Guest Scott this is Pam but it wouldn't let me sign in as Pam so I did guest and put Pam and it let me in for a second.
- Bugscope Team You are on as Pam, as a guest, and also Sally, as a guest
- Bugscope Team so I have just given you control, as Sally
- Guest Yes
- Bugscope Team you can select from the presets on the lefthand screen if you would like
- Bugscope Team if you click on one, the 'scope will drive to that place on the stub
- Bugscope Team also, where you are now, you can use the controls at the top of the screen to drive -- to change mag, focus, etc.
- Bugscope Team now you are on the yellowjacket stinger
- Bugscope Team you can see that this is live imaging
- Bugscope Team because the image we see does not match the preset
- Guest Mine doesn't show the whole screen but I can change things.
Bugscope Team you can modify the resolution of your computer screen to suit this
- 8:20am
- Bugscope Team you can click within the image to get a feature to center
- Bugscope Team this is an older sample I put in, and samples do not age well unless we keep them in desiccators
- Guest ok - will the students then be seeing the same one? Do the kids ask questions with you or do they ask you to change things?
- Bugscope Team the students will see a brand new sample that we will make just before the session
- Guest awesome!
- Bugscope Team the kids can ask questions by typing in the chat box, and whoever is on the computer at your end can be given control of the microscope if you wish
- Bugscope Team Cate and I will be here to answer the kids' questions
- Bugscope Team today I just grabbed a few things for presets, quickly
- Bugscope Team on Monday we will have more presets
- Guest Okay - they can't change things tho right?
Bugscope Team you mean can they crash the 'scope?
- Bugscope Team one person at a time can drive
- Guest What I'm seeing is how they will see it right?
Bugscope Team that is correct
- 8:26am
- Bugscope Team kids who are logged onto other computers, if there are any, will not see the controls at the top of the screen. only the person driving sees the controls, but otherwise everything looks like this
- Bugscope Team Cate and I can drive as well; we can tweak focus, etc.
- Bugscope Team kids seem to pick up control of the 'scope very easily. it's probably like a super simple video game to them
- Bugscope Team all of the text and the images are automatically stored into your Bugscope members page
- Bugscope Team http://bugscope.beckman.illinois.edu/members/2011-150
- Bugscope Team did you not have the option to log on as a teacher, or as a student?
- Guest I'm in one of the labs and need to check the other 2 labs. Do you suggest I sign on as a guest?
Bugscope Team You will for sure need to log on with a different name, and you can log on as a student if you wish
- Guest I couldn't sign on as a teacher only as a guest
Bugscope Team not sure where the problem is there
- 8:31am
- Bugscope Team but you can do everything you want as a guest, etc., because we will be giving you control manually
- Bugscope Team so Yes try logging in from another lab and leave this open if you wish
- 8:44am
- Bugscope Team Hey! You're a teacher!
- Bugscope Team Welcome back! Is it working for you?
- Teacher Yes! I can't believe it worked.
- Bugscope Team sweet
- Teacher Going to try the other lab!
- Bugscope Team awesome
- 8:53am
- Bugscope Team Bart! Hello! Welcome to Bugscope!
- Bugscope Team Please let us know when you have questions.
- Bugscope Team And Junior, Hello!
- Bugscope Team Bart I just gave you control of the microscope.
- Guest Scott it's me again in the 3rd lab. I signed in as a student to make sure it worked and it told me to log in again. But I guess Bart made it in:)
- Bugscope Team ha Yeah I am not sure what's going on but I am happy to have you here with things working.
- Bugscope Team Junior now has control.
- Bugscope Team this is the edge of the antenna over the compound eye, to the right
- Bugscope Team you can see the placoid sensillae in/on the surface of the antenna
- Guest I agree:) The 6th graders are going to love this.
Bugscope Team I think it's a good age to work with.
- Guest I need to go but will talk to you Monday. I'll sign in around 11:45 on Monday and hopefully everything is working.
Bugscope Team Totally Cool. Look forward to seeing you Monday!
- Bugscope Team Thank you, Pam!
- 9:02am
- Bugscope Team shutting down, for now...
- 11:17am
- Bugscope Team Hello!
- Bugscope Team Sample is now pumping down for today's session -- Monday, January 30, with Holy Trinity School in Lenexa KS.
- Bugscope Team once the sample chamber reaches vacuum, we will turn on the electron beam and start making presets.
- Bugscope Team ..
- Bugscope Team ..
- Bugscope Team ..
- Bugscope Team ..
- Bugscope Team ..
- Bugscope Team ..
- Bugscope Team ..
- 11:22am
- Bugscope Team vacuum is almost ready
- Bugscope Team and now we can start working on presets for this session
- 11:28am
- 11:33am
- 11:39am
- 11:47am
- 11:52am
- 11:59am
- Bugscope Team we are ready!
- Bugscope Team the aphid's cornicle is also called a siphunculus
- Bugscope Team we are ready here
- 12:05pm
- Guest I'm with Holy Trinity but signed up as a guest in one of the labs.
- Bugscope Team hey Cool
- Bugscope Team Welcome to Bugscope!
- Bugscope Team Sally please let us know if you would like to drive, to test things out. We are finished making presets and thus ready for the session to start at any time.
- Bugscope Team I just gave you control of the microscope
- 12:11pm
- Bugscope Team absolutely
- Guest paml is now signed on as a guest on this computer - can this computer have control?
Bugscope Team you now have control
- Guest Thanks - it is me (Robin - another teacher with Pam). The students will be with us about 12:30 or a little after. What will we be looking at?
- Bugscope Team Please feel free to check out the presets, on the screen you can access by clicking on the lefthand arrow.
- Bugscope Team If you click on one of those, the 'scope will drive to that place, and you can explore from there -- take the mag up or down, change focus, click on a feature to center it, etc.
- Bugscope Team Only one person can drive at a time.
- Guest What are presets?
Bugscope Team they're places on the stub we prepared for you that have specific cool or interesting stuff we thought the kids would like
- Guest Can we let a student take the controls?
Bugscope Team yes just let us know who
- 12:18pm
- Guest Can this be done by changing the computer that is in control since we are in 3 different lab rooms? Do we just let you know whose name can control it?
Bugscope Team yes please, just let me know who you would like to drive.
- Guest Som eof the terms are unfamilar to me... like mag?
Bugscope Team magnification or how zoomed in we are
- Bugscope Team or let us know -- Cate can give you control as well, of course
- Guest It would be great if we could have 3 computers in control, then we could have 1 in each lab and just invite students up to work it.
- Guest So all of these are in the microscope now?
Bugscope Team yes they are. and they are all dead and in a vacuum
- 12:25pm
- Guest Great (very cool stuff!) so when the students come, do you give them an intro or us?
Bugscope Team you can tell them that today they have the opportunity to see insects in a way they've likely never seen them before, and that when they have questions for us to feel free to relay them to you.
- Bugscope Team you're driving a $600,000 scanning electron microscope from your school
- Guest Guess i asked another question without waiting for your reply. Can we have 3 computers in control?
Bugscope Team only one at a time -- otherwise there's chaos
- Bugscope Team but we can confer control to whomever you'd like, and you can still ask us questions and see the replies
- Bugscope Team please do check out the presets; whoever has control on your end can click on any of them, and the 'scope will put it on the central screen here
- Guest We cant break it can we? We will just switch computers then about every 20 min so each group can do it, if that works.
Bugscope Team ha Yeah you can'
- Bugscope Team t break it...
- Bugscope Team all good -- do what's best to make it work for you, and let us help whenever we can
- 12:33pm
- Bugscope Team this is a wasp
- Bugscope Team you can see the compound eyes, the mandibles that open side to side, the bases of the antennae
- Guest We are here and our students are signing in now.
Bugscope Team totally cool!
- Bugscope Team hi everyone!
- Guest Students, we will invite one at a time to control the microscope and then take one question from each class.
- Bugscope Team yes Hello!
- Bugscope Team hello AbbyW, MollyY, MeganL, ReganL, AllisonC, SophieS...
- Bugscope Team wow
- Bugscope Team please let us know when you have questions
- Bugscope Team this is the base of the antenna of a wasp
- 12:38pm
- Bugscope Team and this is what it's whole head looks like
- Bugscope Team they have big compound eyes that wrap around their heads allowing them to see almost 360 degrees around
- Bugscope Team these are live images, although the wasp is dead
- Guest hi I am joe
Bugscope Team Hi Joe -- Welcome to Bugscope!
- Bugscope Team who would like to drive?
- Student hi
Bugscope Team Hi Regan!
- Bugscope Team Hi Ben! Thank you for connecting with us today!
- Guest hola muy bien
- Guest hi how are u guys!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Bugscope Team we are good; it's quiet here
- Guest hola
- Guest hola
Bugscope Team Hola!
- Guest hi
- Student hi
Bugscope Team Hi Jake!
- Student hello
Bugscope Team Hello Clairever!
- Guest wassssupppp!!!!
Bugscope Team haha
- Student mary margret!\
- Student hi
- Guest hi
- Student hi
- Student hi
- Student hi regan
- Student hello
- Guest hI
- Bugscope Team Hello Quinn, and Cos!
- Guest hello people
- Guest hI ARE YOU
- Guest What are we going to look at?
Bugscope Team this, right now -- can you see it? -- is a flying aphid
- Student good
- Bugscope Team aphids are plant pests, and they often do not have wings
- Student cool
- Student hi sj
- Student omg brady
- Guest we are not in mexico
Bugscope Team Dude where did that come from? You're in, like greater Kansas City, right?
- Guest cool!
- Student who is cos
- Bugscope Team aphids suck the juices out of plant leaves and cause a lot of damage
- 12:43pm
- Student claire sasenick
- Bugscope Team so aphids are those annoying little pests that ladybugs are known for eating
- Bugscope Team ants sometimes attack aphids, for which aphids have at least one defense, and sometimes ants 'farm' aphids
- Guest this is cool
- Student mexico really mexico
- Bugscope Team you can see that the aphid has piercing/sucking mouthparts
- Bugscope Team the bumpy part on the right is one of the aphid's compound eyes
- Bugscope Team to the left you could see one of its six arms/legs
- Bugscope Team the individual facets of the eye are called 'ommatidia.'
- Bugscope Team the background with the dark lines and sometimes bubbly look is the carbon tape we use to stick the insects on
- Bugscope Team the bits of stuff on it are not part of the eye. It could be dust or dirt or from the drying process we put it through
- 12:49pm
- Guest What is a COMPOUND eye?
Bugscope Team it's an eye that has many lenses, of facets -- what are called ommatidia -- to collect the images that the insect sees
- Student asdfghjkl;'
- Bugscope Team compound eyes are really helpful to have because, for one thing, they help the insect see changes in its visual field very quickly, and thus help the insect get out of danger
- Guest what is a flying aphid?
Bugscope Team most aphids do not have wings and just live on leaves; but sometimes, especially if they are running out of space, new aphids will hatch with wings, which then let them fly elsewhere to eat
- Guest hello
- Bugscope Team i usually notice aphids i think in the later part of summer when the ladybugs come in abundance. They kind of look like little gnats and stick to you.
- Bugscope Team this is the hatch where the mexican jumping bean moth comes out
- Guest q
- 12:54pm
- Guest what is your favorite specimen to look at?
Bugscope Team it changes, for me, but I really like weevils, earwigs, and leafhoppers
- Guest how long have u worked with microscopes?
Bugscope Team i have been working with them since 2005, and a bit longer for Scot (SJ)...
- Guest This is Mrs. Wooten (Mrs. Luby's helper). Can you turn the controls over to this computer now.
Bugscope Team got it!
- Guest Hi, is it fun to work with microscopes? And what are mandibles
- Student what made you start Bugscope
- Bugscope Team this is the wasp's tongue, and you can see the tiny flat-ended setae that help it pick up liquids
- Guest how much could you magnify a bug
- Bugscope Team and Maddie you can of course also ask us
- Bugscope Team and Maddie you can of course also ask us
- Student do you know how many specimans you have looked at ?
Bugscope Team hard to say. We use fresh specimens for each bugscope session, and we have done hundreds of sessions!
- Bugscope Team d'oh
- Student what is that
- Student how thats a lot of specimans
- 12:59pm
- Student What is the highest magnification this microsope can go to?
- Guest what is a aphid??
- Guest is that its nose
- Student yrhzd
- Student what do wasp eat
Bugscope Team depends on the species, but often it is sugary liquids, such as nectar from flowers
- Guest were those jagged things, are those his teeth?
- Guest what is a aphid?
Bugscope Team it's a tiny insect that feeds on leaves and can actually damage them
- Bugscope Team you can see that we are looking at the wasp's face now, way up close
- Student what are those little hairs
Bugscope Team the little hairs are called 'setae,' and they can be touch sensitive, or smell or scent sensitive, or hot/cold sensitive
- 1:04pm
- Guest was that its nose
- Student what is your favorite bug to look under the microscope?
Bugscope Team probably mites
- Student what is your favorite thing about microscopes???
Bugscope Team it is cool to see things that are super small in great detail -- things we could not see before
- Student how come wasps have hairs on their noses?
Bugscope Team the hairs help them sense their environment, because they don't have skin like we do -- their exoskeleton is kind of like wearing armor
- Guest how do you choose the specimans to look at ?
Bugscope Team we try to make a nice assortment of what we have 'in stock'
- Student can you see colorful specimen in this microscope
Bugscope Team Abby we cannot see color because the images come to us as signal from electrons, which are smaller than color. It's a way of imaging that has no color, which comes from light, whereas we are using electrons rather than light
- Student I was wondering in the picture of the flying aphid, it looks like it's on top of another wing is it ?
Bugscope Team yes, Piper -- it is on its back and has its wings spread out behind it. I hope that is what you meant...
- 1:10pm
- Student hi
- Student what makes a wasp stinger poisenous
- Bugscope Team things are really slow right now -- we're sorry
- Student Do you like looking at living thins better or worse than non living things.
- 1:15pm
- Guest what is the total magnafication that you can put on a bug
- Guest what are you studying right now with the wasp's head
Bugscope Team it is just a sample, but we are interested in the pores on either side of the head, called anterior tentorial pits.
- Student how long does it take to prepare a specimen
- Guest How long does it take to prepare a specimen?
Bugscope Team 20 minutes to a half hour, maybe
- Bugscope Team those are talons, in a way -- they're a fly
- Student What makes a wasps stinger poiseouses
Bugscope Team they have a venom gland inside the abdomen that produces the venom, or toxin
- Guest Are those talons.
Bugscope Team kind of -- they are claws
Bugscope Team
- Student This is Mrs. Wooten again, can you please turn over control to this computer now?
- Guest What is the smallest bug you can see on the electron microscope?
Bugscope Team we can see mites, easily, and on this stub there are bacteria, which are much smaller; we can see them no problem
- Guest This is Mrs. Wooten can you please turn over control to this computer
Bugscope Team I turned it over to you as LaurenL
- 1:20pm
- Bugscope Team Mrs Wooten we have a lot of lag because so many people are on. I am sorry. But please be sure to let us know how we can help.
- Student how about this ocmputer
- Student how did you fall in love with microscopes
Bugscope Team it wasn't too hard
Bugscope Team Abby once you see what is possible it gets to be so exciting to see what everything looks like.
- Guest slide chose by jw
Bugscope Team totally cool. these are moth scales, up close
- Student LaurenL is not connected any longer. how about this one
- Student Zarn H is now Mrs. Wooten
Bugscope Team you have control now!
- 1:25pm
- Guest how long does it take to prepare a specimen?
Bugscope Team 20 minutes to maybe 30 minutes; we use a sputter coater to put gold-palladium on it so the sample will conduct electrons
- Student do you have to buy the gold
Bugscope Team yes we buy it as an alloy with palladium, so it actually looks silvery
- Guest what are weevils, earwigs, and leafhoppers? and have you ever looked at a ladybug?
Bugscope Team weevils are plant pests with long snouts, mostly; they are kind of cute. Earwigs are also plant pests, and they have pincher tails. Leafhoppers are small, with pointy heads, and they are super rad looking. We have looked at ladybyugs as well.
- Guest This is Mrs. Luby - thank you for all your time. We have to go in about 3 minutes. Thanks Bugscope!
Bugscope Team Thank YOU!
- 1:33pm
- Student what are the hairs on it?
Bugscope Team the hairs are called setae, and some of them are like cat or rat whiskers -- they are used to sense touch
- Student how do you get the gold(by abbyw)
Bugscope Team we order it from the company that makes the sputter coater. it is expensive but we do not use much per sample
- Student how many specimans do you have
Bugscope Team at a given time we usually have a few hundred, but some are quite small, like tiny ants
- Guest sup
Bugscope Team Eric things are going slowly because we have so many people connecting at once. Next time we will do one group at a time.
- 1:38pm
- Bugscope Team hello!
- Bugscope Team we are thinking about closing down now -- is anyone still on?
- Bugscope Team Anyone still there?
- 1:44pm
- Bugscope Team we are shutting down...
