Middle School

Microbes are all around us! Microscopic living organisms thrive in the depths of the ocean, to the most familiar of places like our food. The less than 1% that cause disease give microbes a bad reputation, but a majority have no or even a positive effect on humans. Stop by for an all-ages interactive experience on the microbes in our life! Brought to you by UCSD scientists currently studying the diverse way microbes can interact (on cheese!), engineering microbes to produce fuel, and more.

The UC San Diego Eating Disorders Center for Treatment and Research and the Center for Healthy Eating and Activity Research (CHEAR) are teaming up to recruit for various research studies on healthy eating and skill-based learning. Our research integrates brain imaging modalities to understand brain structure and function in eating disorders. CHEAR develops and provides treatments for promoting healthy eating and weight management to children, adolescents, adults through science and innovation.

A variety of NASA's planetary and Earth science missions, including Mars Science Lander, Jupiter orbiter Juno, and asteroid orbiter Dawn, will bring displays, exhibits, and hands-on activities to engage students and adults.

The Center for Selective C-H Functionalization will have a booth for the Expo Day with simple demos to educate K-12 students and beyond about synthetic organic chemistry. We will have Center graduate students volunteering for 2 hr shifts to engage with the participants. The demos are designed to be 2-3 minutes.

We will have several hands on demonstrations to provide participants with a view of the scale of the universe as well as the methods we use to observe it. Activities will include play-dough planets to build scale models of the solar system, an activity illustrating gravitational lensing, and some models and experimental devices from the lab to show the ins and outs of modern telescopes. We will also have an informational poster describing the ongoing research activities at CASS.

Cardboard Video Game Controllers! Students will make their own video game controllers that interface with a computer to play a preloaded video game(e.g. Super Mario). In Station 1, kids will color, cut, & decorate their controller design using markers, cardboard, and foil paper. In Station 2, they will connect their custom controllers to our laptops using our Makey Makey computer interface boards. Kids learn about circuits (closed v. open) & computer engr. design cycles (prototype & test).

Biology in 3D: The Protein Data Bank is the single worldwide resource for the 3D structures of proteins and DNA. You will learn about two basic building blocks of life: DNA and Proteins and then build a model of each. You will also see computer animations of 3D protein and DNA structures and learn how medicines work.

This year we will be trying to explain acceleration and velocity through Marble Roller Coasters where children will get the opportunity to construct their very own roller coaster using a marble and a other materials. Different materials will be presented to the children such as paper, PVC piping, tape, and etc.; the objective will be to use these materials to construct a track for the marble to roll on and to keep the marble rolling for as long as possible!

UCSD's BMES Outreach program hopes to create interest in bioengineering to children and students by having hands-on activities and demonstrations at our booth. We will have a heart-pump activity, a lung capacity activity, and a craft depicting how the lungs work. We also plan on having an organ-matching board, for the younger students. For the high school students, we plan on having poster boards about some of the research in UCSD and about college tips, in general.

Science demos to encourage youth towards STEM fields. Demos straight from the graduate students of UC San Diego with a passion for science. These students are all involved at the frontier of STEM research at UC San Diego and are here to show you science can be super fun if you know where to find it!! In addition, if you want to know more about a career in science, these enthusiastic volunteers are excited to share their experience of STEM research with you!