Great Lakes SPIE Regional Chapter



	Great Lakes Science Tour for High School Students Many high school students find themselves on a crossroad making a choice that will determine their future and, maybe, also the future of our Country. Some of them will choose Low and Finance as these give well paid jobs, others will become doctors. Many of the students will simply find jobs not requiring much additional education, such as in McDonalds. Unfortunately, not so many high school students decide to relate there future with Science and Engineering. In the Great Lakes Region, the shortage of domestic students in the hard core sciences is even larger because many of them leave to the Universities on the East and West Coasts. We propose giving the students a Tour through the scientific centers of the Great Lakes Region that is aimed to make the students interested in Science and Engineering. Historically, the Great Lakes Region gave the World some of the most famous inventors such as Thomas Edison and scientists such as Albert Michelson (the first American ever to receive a Nobel Prize). It also was the Birthplace of Aviation and modern Automobile Industry. It is amazing how many more Big Names the Great Lakes region gave to the World’s Science and Engineering. We hope that the tour will help to bring the most talented students to Science and Engineering and among them new Michelsons, Edisons, Fords, and new Wright Brothers. The Tour will be organized by the Great Lakes SPIE Regional Chapter, the SPIE student chapters from the region, and also the local sections of the Teachers associations. Several Student Chapters from the Great Lakes Region (from Kent, Dayton, Norte Dame, and Pennsylvania State University) agreed to participate. The high school students will travel between the scientific centers by bus and stay one day in each University. The graduate and undergraduate students will share their excitement from doing research, show the state-of-the-art research facilities of their Universities, do introduction to modern directions in Science and in Technology, and also tell a story about famous Scientists, Inventors, and Entrepreneurs that comprise the scientific Heritage of the Great Lakes Region. The partial list of the things to show provided by the Student Chapters is following: Kent State University “Magic Window Tour” through the state of the art research facilities of the Liquid Crystal Institute 3D immersion into the world of liquid crystal molecules (using a specialized classroom in the chemistry department) Basic optics introduction and demonstration using kits designed on our own and provided by SPIE Introduction to what are the liquid crystals (with lots of beautiful pictures) Introduction to the unique optical properties of liquid crystal Liquid crystal structures and textures Tutorial on how to make a Liquid Crystal Display and a tour through clean room facility A lecture on how liquid crystal can be used in electronic and photonic devices. This will include electronic holography, tunable lasing, free space laser communication, skin cancer detection, virus detection etc. University of Dayton Interferometric lithography; Introduction to diffraction gratings; Introduction to spectroscopy: lasers, diodes, and others non-coherent sources. University of Notre Dame Semiconductor waveguides and lasers, III-V semiconductor heterostructures Photonic integrated circuits Cutting-edge semiconductor devices fabricated by advanced oxidation technique The basic principles of a LASER and ultrafast femtosecond laser demonstration Pump-probe laser technology (1999 Nobel Prize) How to synthesize metal nanoparticles and why the metal nanoparticle solution looks colorful? Beautiful Au and Ag nanoparticles in different shapes Pennsylvania State University Holography demo – How is “everything” recorded Fiber optics introductions and tour to fiber optics communication and sensing research lab. Demonstration of color imagery from black and white film – white light signal processing From laser to white light – super continuum white light source Laser as a probe for the atmosphere – Laser remote sensing, including tour to Lidar research lab and field facilities. Optical Tweezers – demonstration of using lasers to manipulate small particles and biological species Miniature photostrictive actuator demonstration, tour to International Center for Actuators and Transducers (ICAT) at Penn State Demonstration on writing Photonic Crystals with Holographic methods Optical Properties of the Atmosphere – Blue Skies and Red Sunsets Thin Film Sculpture with Lasers Ultrafast Lasers – Femtosecond pulses and Heisenberg uncertainty principle We are also considering the possibility of bringing the students to the places like the Cleveland Science Center during the Tour. The most important part of this activity is that the tour will be conducted by students only slightly older than the high school students. This gives us the hope that the students will find a common language, the excitement about Science and Engineering will flow from the students-members of the Chapters to the high school students with no barriers. The main emphasis will be put on the Introduction of the students to the Optical Science and Engineering. We will use optics kits provided by the SPIE, OSA, and also the kits that we already built or will build on our own. We will show the students documentary movies, tutorials, and, most importantly, give them hand-on experience when doing some little experiments. One example of an experiment that the high school students will conduct with the help of the members of the SPIE student Chapters is measurement of the speed of light using the Michelson-Morley interferometer. Let us recall the history of one of the greatest scientific breakthroughs. This experiment was originally conducted by Albert Michelson. Understanding light and its relationship to other physical phenomena was a major goal of 19th-century physics. Many scientists believed that light waves needed a medium on which to travel through space. They called this medium" lumeniferous aether," literally a light-bearing gas that they believed surrounded the planet. The famous Michelson-Morley interferometer experiment conducted in Cleveland led to understanding of the nature of light. In 1879, physicist Albert Michelson measured the speed of light at 186,350 miles per second (plus or minus about 30 miles per second). This experiment proved the non-existence of ether and gave circumstantial evidence to substantiate Einstein's Theory of Relativity. In 1907, Michelson became the first American scientist ever to receive a Nobel Prize, recognizing his "optical precision instruments and the research carried out with their aid." The high school students will repeat the original Michelson’s experiment and measure the speed of light. Telling the history of this scientific breakthrough, especially that this measurement was first done in the nearby Cleveland, will increase the excitement of the students from doing the experiment. Some more experiments like this could be designed as well. We have a contact with the local sections of the National Science Teachers Association in the states of Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia, and the New York State. They will help us to sign up the high school students for the tour and maybe also assist by various other means. The Universities in the Great Lakes Region (especially the PhD programs) currently have shortage in domestic students that would be willing to do Science. The Tour will make the students interested in Science and Engineering rather than other jobs and bring them to these Universities. It will hopefully help them to become a next generation professionals rather than dishwashers in the restaurants.

Last update - October, 2007