Connected on 2013-01-09 09:30:00 from Gallatin, Montana, United States
- 8:53am
- Bugscope Team we are ready to roll
- 9:08am
- Bugscope Team good morning, Mr McGeehan!
- Teacher Hi guys - Brian McGeehan here. Kids will come into class around 8:20 mountain time (so in about 10 minutes) and we will start getting them logged in - should be ready to go in about 20 minutes with questions. We have two groups this morning, next group will come in around 9:15 mountain time then I believe we have an afternoon session on Friday. Thanks
- Bugscope Team super cool
- Bugscope Team hello Gorgazol!
- Bugscope Team Gorgazol where are you from? or I guess where are you?
- Guest Hello from France!
Bugscope Team haha Awesome, Hello!
- Guest :-)
Bugscope Team we're getting ready to start a Bugscope session with a school in Montana -- Mr McGeehan's class
- 9:14am
- Guest I am the dad, my son Leo (aka Gorgazol is 9)
Bugscope Team totally cool
- Guest Great. This is our first time here. Looking forward to it. What am I looing at above?
Bugscope Team this is the arm of a beetle Mr McG sent; I am not sure what kind of beetle it is, but it is heavily armored
- Bugscope Team once the kids from the school get on, Mr McG will be controlling the microscope
- Bugscope Team he may or may not allow his students to drive as well, one at a time
- Bugscope Team Gorgazol you can see from the presets on the lefthand screen what else is on the stub for today's session
- Bugscope Team the class will be able to change the magnification, go to other presets, actually drive the microscope to places we did not already save for them...
- Bugscope Team I just clicked on one of the presets myself...
- Bugscope Team this is the venom pore on a spider fang
- Bugscope Team the spider's fang was partially torn away from the chelicer, giving us a novel view today
- 9:19am
- Guest wow!!
- Bugscope Team normally we are not able to see the base of the fang
- Bugscope Team you can see the serrations that help the thicker portion of the fang cut into the prey
- Bugscope Team now we see the opposing fang as well, althought it is harder to make out
- Teacher kids are here now - will start logging them in and driving soon
Bugscope Team super cool
- Bugscope Team we are ready to roll
- Bugscope Team now we see more of the spider's face
- Bugscope Team including some of its eyes
- Bugscope Team hello Jessica and Becca!
- Bugscope Team welcome to Bugscope!
- Guest HI everyone!
- Bugscope Team hello Hattey, Bella, Steve, Forrest, Morgan, phew I cannot type that fast...
- Bugscope Team But Hello Everyone!
- 9:24am
- Bugscope Team Please let us know when you have questions!
- Bugscope Team hi
- Student hi
Bugscope Team Hi Ah!
- Student hi
Bugscope Team Hello Devun, Silas, and Scott!
- Student .
Bugscope Team Melissa!
- Bugscope Team this is a small moth with a 1980's hairstyle
- Bugscope Team you can see its eyes, its antennae, and lots of scales
- Guest ha ha!
- Bugscope Team this is the spider fang. Cate tore its fang out so we could see it better
- Bugscope Team the other fang is underneath
- Student why is there a small hole at the end of the fang
Bugscope Team that is where the venom comes out
- Student WHY IS THERE A SMALL HOLE ON THE END OF THE FANG?
Bugscope Team that is where the venom comes out, and also where the spider sucks up the insides of its prey
- Student What part of the Spider is the fang located?
Bugscope Team on the head by the mouth
- 9:29am
- Bugscope Team the fang is at the end of one of the chelicers
- Bugscope Team now you can see both chelicers, or chelicerae
- Student why are there little lines on the fang
Bugscope Team some of the lines are just the way it formed, and they make it stronger than if it was smooth
- Bugscope Team i think Scot found this spider
- Student what kind of spider is it
Bugscope Team likely it came from my house
Bugscope Team but I am sorry -- we are not very good on spider species
- Teacher trying to move to the assasin bug but not navigating
Bugscope Team looks like that preset is stuck
- Student How does the electron microscope work?
- 9:34am
- Student how does the scope work
Bugscope Team the samples are mounted on a stub and coated with gold-palladium to make them conductive; then they are put in the vacuum chamber of the 'scope; then when the vacuum is good enough we turn on the electron beam, which scans across the samples and gives us the images we see now
- Student what is the bug sitting on
Bugscope Team the bumpy dark background is double stick carbon tape. We also use a little bit of silver paint to act as a glue for the insect to make sure it won't fall off
- Student what type of insect is this?
Bugscope Team it is a true bug, and it is the kind that stalks and kills othe r insects
- Student what type of insect is it
Bugscope Team it is an assassin bug, and it is a hemipteran -- they have piercing/sucking mouthparts
- Student is it pousinis
- Bugscope Team that was a very sketchy description of how the microscope works; there is more available from the web page
- Student i cant spell
Bugscope Team haha me neither
- Bugscope Team we are beaming electrons at the specimens, and we get what are called 2ndary electrons back that give us the images we see
- Student why does he have weird hands
Bugscope Team those help him hold onto his prey so he (or she) can bite it
- Bugscope Team we use electrons instead of light to image. electrons are much smaller than the wavelength of light so we can see much smaller things (around 2 nanometers).
- Student what are the hairs on the leg and what do they do
Bugscope Team they are sensory, for touch, smell, hot/cold....
- Bugscope Team imaging with electrons we also don't get color images unless later we color them ourselves
- Student what is the black splatter
Bugscope Team that is a place where some juju is coming out of the tarsus and messing up our imaging ability
- Bugscope Team the black stuff is probably hemolymph, which is insect 'blood'
- Teacher Next up the flying ant!
Bugscope Team this is a male ant
- 9:39am
- Bugscope Team most ants, almost all of them that we ever see, are females
- Bugscope Team but if you see a flying ant it is either a queen or a dude
- Bugscope Team this is the compound eye, made of lots of lenses -- facets called ommatidia
- Student are those teeth? and if so, why do they need such large ones
Bugscope Team insects do not have teeth, but they do have hardened mouthparts; this is the eye, however, and the little spines or bristles are probably mechanosensory, like cat or rat whiskers
- Student why are there bumpes on his eye
Bugscope Team the bumps are the individual facets -- the ommatidia
- Student it looks like they have multiple eyes...does that mean they see like flies?
Bugscope Team yes it does
- Student why is there hair on the eye
Bugscope Team it helps the insect sense touch, and also wind speed
- Student Why are there hairs on the eye?
Bugscope Team they are sensory, often to help the insect gauge the speed of the wind it may be flying into
- Bugscope Team compound eyes have some advantages over our kind of eyes
- Bugscope Team compound eyes are domed, usually, and sometimes they cover most of the head, so they give the insect very good peripheral vision -- it does not have to turn its head to see something
- 9:45am
- Bugscope Team also, compound eyes are very sensitive to changes in the visual field -- that is, motion
- Student what causes the crystals
Bugscope Team they are some kind of dried salts, and we do not know where they came from
- Student What are the crystals for??
Bugscope Team the cricket must have gotten into some salty liquid that then dried
- Bugscope Team oh I know where we are now
- Bugscope Team this is one of the cerci
- Student what are those things that look like spikes? and what are they for?
Bugscope Team probably insect hairs, also known as setae (pronounced see-tee). They help the insect feel what is going on around it, kind of like cat whiskers
- Bugscope Team this is the tip of the cricket's abdomen; the cerci -- one of the things they do -- help the cricket sense when something is coming up behind it
- Bugscope Team cockroaches have cerci as well, and they induce an automatic running response when they are touched
- Bugscope Team this is a housefly
- Student WHAT I
- Bugscope Team haha
- Teacher Hey - is that David Lee Roth?
Bugscope Team I was thinking it was like, um, Cindy Lauper
- 9:50am
- Student why is it so hairy
Bugscope Team the things that look like hairs are setae; scales are actually modified setae as well
- Bugscope Team the spider's arm is on top of David Lee Roth's head
- Student are those a type of feather?
- Student what is on top of it's head
Bugscope Team one of the spider's arms
- Student what are the scales 4
Bugscope Team if you had scales, like a butterfly or moth or silverfish or mosquito, they would help you out if you flew into a spiderweb, because they come off so easily
- Student why is it not in color
Bugscope Team we are using electrons rather than light to collect these images; electrons are smaller than the wavelengths of light, so we see the images as signal, as greyscale
- Student how big is this moth in real life?
Bugscope Team it's about 8 or 10 mm long, very small
- Bugscope Team yes it may look huge in these images, but it is very small
Bugscope Team it is so small that I did not know what it was until I looked at it using the SEM -- the scanning electron microscope we are using today
- Bugscope Team this is the yellowjacket's stinger
- 9:55am
- Student why does it look like it has dust on it
Bugscope Team it may be dust. some of the stuff could also be dried bug blood or dried venom
- Student does a yellow jacket die after it stings
Bugscope Team honeybees die when they sting mammals because mammals have thick skin that the stinger barbs get caught in; the stinger gets torn out of the bee, and the bee dies
- Student is the stinger retractable
Bugscope Team yes it is!
- Student why is the stinger so small
Bugscope Team it comes out a little further; we are only seeing part of it
- Student does the yellow jacket die after it stings
Bugscope Team no- she can keep on stinging however many times she wants
- Student what are the hairs for?
Bugscope Team insects have hairs, or setae, because they do not have skin like we do with nerve endings in it. instead, they have an exoskeleton, like a shell, or like if we were wearing armor
- Student whats your guys background..are ya'll insect experts
- Bugscope Team we don't have a degree specializing in insects, but we do have science degrees. We have been working with bugscope for many years, so we are like junior entomologists
- Student whats your guys background..are ya'll insect experts
Bugscope Team Cate has a physics degree, and I have a degree in English and biology
- Bugscope Team so the setae can be mechanosensory, chemosensory, thermosensory; they can be used for proprioception; on and on
- Student why does his mouth look like triscuits
Bugscope Team haha I think that is the brushlike nature of the tongue
- 10:00am
- Bugscope Team this is one of the spiracles, through which insects breathe
- Student what is this called and what is it used for
Bugscope Team it is called a spiracle, as in reSPIRAtory
- Teacher sebastion is asking about the spiracle
Bugscope Team spiracles are connected to tracheae on the inside of the body; the tracheae deliver oxygen to the various organs
- Bugscope Team when have have an insect that is broken open, we can see the tracheae; they look like corrugated tubes
- Bugscope Team it is good for us that the insect respiratory system is not very good
- Bugscope Team if insects and other similar arthropods have much more efficient respiratory systems, they could become quite large
- 10:05am
- Bugscope Team silverfish like sugar and starch, so we might find them in our food or around bookbindings, if anyone has books anymore
- Bugscope Team this is a flat heavily armored beetle; I thought it was a giant bedbug at first
- Bugscope Team as Cate mentioned, some of the spines or spikes or bristles we see are self-sensing -- they help the insect feel if it is hyperextending one of its limbs, for example
- Student what are his mandibles used for
Bugscope Team they are used to chew food or bite into things
- Student why are his fangs hollow
Bugscope Team they may allow some liquid to flow toward the mouth; really we are not sure
- Student why are the mandibles dull and not sharp?
- Student what is the microscope normaly used for?
Bugscope Team our job is to train researchers -- mostly graduate students and postdoctoral scholars -- to use the instruments to study their own samples; we work with biologists, engineers, all kinds of people. yesterday Cate worked with some people who were looking at particles they ahd caught on air filters
- 10:11am
- Student mo
- Bugscope Team oops 'had' caught
- Bugscope Team the microscope has other functions we do not see today; for example it can be used to perform elemental analysis of samples, to let people know what their samples are made of and where those elements are
- Bugscope Team this is a whole large suite of a variety of microscopes, and we are using just one today
- Student thnx
- Student tahnk u that was awesome
- Student thank you
- Student thank you we have to go now
- Student thank oyu that was a good leasson
- Student thank you bye!
- Student awesome
- Student thank you good bye
- Student thank u cvf\]
- Student thank you we have to change classes now! good bye
- Bugscope Team thanks for using bugscope with us this morning
- Student bye bye
- Bugscope Team Thank You, Everyone!
- Student Thanks you that was awesome! We have to go to a new class!
- Teacher Round one is over - we have a second group starting in about 5 minutes
- Student thank you that was cool!!!!!!!!!!!!
- Bugscope Team We had a good time, and thank you for the great questions
- Student thanks for the ansures
- Student thank dude!
Bugscope Team haha Thank You!
- Bugscope Team this is the fly claw...
- Bugscope Team brb
- 10:17am
- Student i
Bugscope Team Chase!
- Bugscope Team okay back
- Bugscope Team Gorgazol are you still here?
- Student i
Bugscope Team hello Domaneek and Sami!
- Bugscope Team goodness! Hello Everyone!
- Bugscope Team this is pretty cool
- Bugscope Team the ridges that follow the curve of the fang strengthen it
- Bugscope Team the serrations at the wide end help it cut into the spider's prey
- 10:23am
- Bugscope Team you can see the venom pore as well
- Bugscope Team the other fang is below
- Student What's the little hole in the fang for?
Bugscope Team that is where the venom comes out, and also where the dissolved internal organs of the prey are sucked into the spider's stomach
- Student what are the hairs for?
Bugscope Team they are sensory, in a variety of ways, including vibration
- Student How do electron microscopes work?
Bugscope Team they are cathode ray tubes, like an older TV, except the back of the TV is at the top
- Bugscope Team electron microscopes use a filament that has a current passed through it in a vacuum, like a light bulb; but they also have electromagnetic lenses that take the filament image (the electron beam) and pass it down a column, where it can impinge upon a sample, also in the vacuum
- Student what are the small spikes on the legs
Bugscope Team those may be sensory -- they may be self-sensory; we are not sure
- 10:28am
- Bugscope Team not sure what that is at the bottom of the abdomen
- Bugscope Team still do not know what this is; it looks almost like a mite
- Teacher What do you think it might be? It looks like a parasite...
- Student chat
- Student How large are the specimens that you are observing?
Bugscope Team you can get an idea by looking at the scalebar at the lower left. 500 microns is a half millimeter
- Student hey i think i saw that moth in a van halen video
Bugscope Team haha Exactically
- Bugscope Team bactera are usually about 2 micrometers long; we can see them easily with this 'scope
- Student WHAT IS THE STUFF ON IT?
Bugscope Team some of what we see are fine hairs called setae
- 10:33am
- Student why is the hair so long on its body
Bugscope Team probably helps with thermoregulation, also is useful, as are the scales, if the moth gets caught in a spiderweb
- Student what are the small structures called? what are they for? and why are there so many?
Bugscope Team the flake-like things are the scales -- what we feel as powder when we rub a moth's wings
- Bugscope Team the facets we see now are ommatidia -- the individual facets of the compound eye
- Bugscope Team the ommatidia are lenses
- Student how far in can this scope zoom in on the moth
Bugscope Team we can bring it up so high that nothing really makes sense anymore
Bugscope Team when we use the microscope for research and work at shorter distances from the polepiece to the sample, we can get useful images at 200,000x
- Bugscope Team we can get useful, publishable images at 200,000x, sometimes
- Bugscope Team this is the ball and socket joint of the cricket's antenna
- 10:38am
- Bugscope Team you can see the compound eye to the lower left
- Student can you clear that up to see the atomic level
Bugscope Team not with this microscope; we can when we use the AFM, but if the sample is not super clean we will see atmospheric water, which is of course also made of atoms
- Bugscope Team when we want an electron microscope that will work at a higher magnification and higher resolution than this one, we use the transmission electron microscope (TEM)
- Bugscope Team some TEMs can get atomic resolution
- Bugscope Team this is the head of the yellowjacket
- Bugscope Team you can see its mandibles, which open side to side like a gate
- Bugscope Team you can see tiny feelers around the mouth, called palps
- Bugscope Team and you can see the tongue, which is called a glossa\
- Student what else is this scope used for
Bugscope Team we train people to use it for their research: biology, materials, food science, atmospheric science, geology...
- Student when do you normally use an afm scope
Bugscope Team when you have a super flat sample with super tiny features on it; when you start to reach the atomic scale, the distances are so great it is easy to get lost
- 10:43am
- Bugscope Team Cate and I, plus three other microscopists down here, train people (graduate students and postdoctoral scholars, mostly) to use a variety of microscopes to image their samples
- Bugscope Team you can see the atom molecules, but they usually end up looking like bumps on the surface
- Student can you clear that up to see atom molucuels
Bugscope Team you can with the AFM; if you want to see atomic-scale imaging at normal atmosphere you can image freshly cleaved mica
- Student Why is is called the assassin bug?
Bugscope Team it eats other insects. Probably called assassin by the way it usually camouflages in its environment before attacking the insect
- Bugscope Team this is a hemipteran; it has piercing/sucking mouthparts and sort of half-coverings over its wings
- Student what is the mouth used for
Bugscope Team it jabs the end into the insect and drinks out the insect's blood
- Bugscope Team assassin bugs and ambush bugs operate much like spiders
- Bugscope Team the insect's blood is called hemolymph
- Student does the assassin bug have any predators?
Bugscope Team yes -- birds, for example; mice and rats
- Bugscope Team lizards and birds might like to eat them
- 10:49am
- Student why does it have so much hairs on its legs
Bugscope Team the hairs are called setae (seetee) by entomologists, and they are usually sensory: chemosensory, mechanosensory, thermosensory; they can also be used for proprioception, which is mechanosensing
- Bugscope Team i think they can be found in most places of the US except for the desert areas
- Bugscope Team and very cold
- Student do you know if there are assassin bugs in Montana?
Bugscope Team yes they are pretty much anywhere other insects are found; do you ever see wheelbugs, with the large gear-looking thing on their backs?
- Bugscope Team this is the head of the centipede
- Bugscope Team we can see that it has fairly poor eyes
- Bugscope Team a wheelbug is a kind of stegasaurus of the insect world
- Bugscope Team centipedes are kind of nasty
- Bugscope Team you can see its fangs now
- Bugscope Team and its antennae
- Student are centipedes vemomous? if so how much?
- Bugscope Team the tropical centipedes are the more dangerous ones, which thankfully we don't have much of
- Student how many legs do they really have
Bugscope Team they are said to have from under 20 to more than 300; this has probably 28 or 30
- Student why do they have so many legs?
Bugscope Team the legs help the centipedes move quickly
- 10:54am
- Student *venomous
Bugscope Team these have smaller, shorter fangs and are physically smaller, so the venom does not go as far if they were to bite one of us
- Student may i please zooooooooooooooooooooooooo
- Student ;
- Bugscope Team here we can see the spider's face
- Bugscope Team its eyes, like 4 of them, are at the top of this view
- Bugscope Team the vertical things wer
- Bugscope Team ooops
- Bugscope Team these are chelicerae
- Bugscope Team they open outward, and the fangs are at the tips
- Bugscope Team spiders may or may not see very very well, but they have a very well developed ability to sense vibration
- Student what type of spider
Bugscope Team it is some kind of house spider; I am sorry -- we are not very good at identifying spiders
- Bugscope Team this is the silverfish
- Bugscope Team they like to eat starch and sugar
- Bugscope Team you might find them around your bookbindings, if you happen to have any books
- 11:00am
- Bugscope Team we cannot quite see the eyes on this silverfish
- Bugscope Team silverfish have scales, like moths, butterflies, mosquitoes, and few other insects
- Bugscope Team these are sensory setae
- Student ahhhhhh than
- Bugscope Team this is one of the spiracles on the flying ant's thorax
- Student what is that hole for?
Bugscope Team it is a breathing hole for the insect, kind of like a nose to us
- Student bgvyhv
- Student THANK YOU!
- Student thank you a lot
- Student Thank you so much!!!
- Student Thank you so much!! :)
- Student thanks that was really cool
- Bugscope Team thanks for your great questions!
- Student thank you for all the information!
- Student it was awesome!!!!!!!
- Student thanks sooooo much!!!! have a great day bye :)
- Student thanks! we are going to r next class.
- Student :):):):):):):):):):):):)
- Bugscope Team glad you all had fun
- Student wonderful!!!!
- Student thanks sooo much!!!!!! bye!
- Student thank you :) see you later!!!!
- Student thanks! we are going to our next class!
- Student Thank you very much! This lesson was very intriguing!
- Student ahhh thank you ahhh thanks so much that was awesome that was incredible ahh thanks so much!!!!!:)
Bugscope Team Thank You!
- Student Thank you so much, this was really awesome and amazing. It was very intriguing. Thanks :-) B-)
- Student hey thank you so much we had a great time talk to you soon you rock ya buddy
- Teacher That's all the classes for today, we appreciate you letting us join you for some microscopy. We'll see you again on Friday!
Bugscope Team see you Friday!
- Student ttyl
- 11:05am
- Bugscope Team see the ocellus?
