Flash Paper, Solar Mirrors and more

S1 E1: Flash Paper - Mr. Wizard crumples paper into a ball to simulate a shooting star. He explains that a real shooting star burns because of the friction of the atmosphere as stellar dust enters it. He gives Leila a large sheet of Flash Paper to burn which produces a huge flame. Mr. Wizard illustrates the concept of inertia by showing Christian a cup on top of which is a block of plastic supporting an orange. Using the handle of the broom, Mr. Wizard knocks the plastic out of the way so that the orange drops into the cup. Inertia keeps the orange in place and once the plastic block is started, inertia keeps it moving out of the way. You know where to locate the Panama Canal. It’s the man-made waterway that connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific across the Isthmus of Panama. As the ship leaves the Atlantic to go the fifty one miles to the Pacific, is it going east or west? Hero’s Voice - Scott is given a remote control to a robot. It enters the room and introduces itself. It's name is Hero. Scott attaches the remote control. The side of the robot is opened to reveal the unit which controls speech. Mr. Wizard instructs Scott as he programs Hero. The robot repeats all the sounds of which it is capable. Scott moves the dial that controls pitch and speed. Nipple Expansion - Tanis is asked to guess how much gas is in a 12 oz. can of soda. She makes a guess based on volume marks on the side of a nursing bottle. She pours the soda into the nursing bottle and Mr. Wizard caps it with the nipple without a hole in it. Tanis shakes the bottle. The pressure of the gas released by the agitation expands the nipple until all of the 12 ounces of the liquid flows into the enlarged nipple. Exercise For Cows: Well, cows jog along at two to four miles an hour on a special track developed by dairy scientists at Utah State University and the U.S. Agricultural Service. Years ago, dairy cows moved around in packers but today they are kept in pens and fed a prepared diet. As a result, they’re out of shape. Before putting a cow on a jogging program, scientists check its heart with an electrocardiogram. Doctors recommend a similar test for people before they start jogging. They record data on the cows before and after exercise to find out if there is any correlation between running speed, distance, and milk produc­tion. Reaction Time - Carolyn is shown a simple way to measure reaction time. She is to touch numbered squares out of numerical order on a piece of paper. Her first try times out at 12 seconds. Try #2 is seven seconds. Try #3 is four seconds. Obviously, practice can reduce reaction time. Mr. Wizard holds a ruler with marks that indicate how far it has fallen and thus how much time has elapsed. When he lets it fall, Carolyn is to catch it as quickly as she can. Her reaction time averages about .2 second.