My SSEP experience

1. Define

We need an experiment that can be done in micro gravity that is going to really catch the reader and be beneficial to todays world.

Micro Gravity is where there is asserting of next to no gravity or very weak gravity such as in a orbiting spacecraft, or when something is moving very quickly from up to down in the air, there is micro gravity then too.

The control groups in this area are how much of each substance we are going to use and the amount of time we are going to keep the substances together for observation. The experimental group is the setting because when we do the experiment on earth the setting will be with gravity however on the ISS it will have no gravity.

The way that are experiment well win out is by writing out our proposal with all the benefits that science will get by  doing our experiment so we have to find an experiment that is going to benefit science. We also need a why because when there is a why it makes the proposal more powerful.

   2. Dream

Starting out my group and I brainstormed so many different ideas: Plants and their growth time, electricity and being able to power places from space, things with liquid nitrogen, gas reaction, cooked food, cooking food, if substances could develop in space, perishable foods, electronics, boiling water, lighting  a match, tying your hair, static electricity, can your phone work, tv with antennas, water balloons, bacteria and stem cells, all in micro-gravity settings.

One of the subjects that stood out very boldly for me was substances developing. My group wanted to go towards the substances bacteria or stem cells. In the end we researched two big ideas, if we could develop stem cells in space and if we could infect bacteria with harmless viruses could infect bacteria. With the stem cell research the question we wanted to propose had already been done a couple of months ago so we looked into bacteria, pili, auto-agglutination and how viruses could help to kill of bacteria.

Here is a ton of research done on stem cells ad bacteria.

      3. Document

The steps of this project went as follows:

•Introduction to the program: We were introduced by our teacher Mr. Robinson

•Attending the SSEP Workshop: at the workshop we got lectures by SFU students talking about what happens to the human body in space, bacteria in space and the look of earth from above. We also learned about what happens when you light a match in space which  was something I had been interested in so it was so cool to see, then we learned about living organisms in space and what happens to them in micro gravity. I took lots of notes for later so that I could take them back to by group.

•Putting the proposal together: We wanted to include viruses in our proposal, so reaching out to  SFU student Miguel we were inspired to do the question can a harmless virus infect bacteria in a micro gravity setting. This question was going to take a ton of research in finding out the right information so we got straight to work and with a lot of effort we came to deliver our proposal.

4. Design and Deliver

Like I said before I learned about this opportunity through my science class from my teacher Mr. Robinson. With a few of my classes I attended a SSEP camp on  a pro-d day to learn about a few of the experiments that had been tried in space from SFU profs and students. We learned about the kind of projects that they are interested in.

With a few of my classmates we did a research project on dividing root cells in micro-gravity.  Which was a SSEP project won by a grade 7 class in flagstaff Arizona in 2014. Their objectif was to see if onion root cells would divide with zero gravity and if the experiment was a success, they wanted to see if there are any mutations during the replication of DNA when on the International Space Station. I reached out to the teacher of the class Susan Brown from Northland preparatory academy, she was very helpful and answered our questions in a few emails back and forth. This was a very amazing experience for me being able to talk to someone about research that they had done someone that lives in a whole other country.

We have chosen to research and propose to the SSEP competition is too see the effects of a harmless viruses infecting Vibrio Choleria which is a Bacteria, in a micro gravity section. This is because we think that it can be a very good medical breakthrough helping preventing many bad bacteria from infecting our bodies.  We believe It could start a new topic in scientific and medical research which is very important.

We reached out to Miguel a student at SFU a contact given to us by Mr. Robinson, Miguel helped us with some of our re search explaining many of the components of what the bacteria has to produce so that the virus can infect it. He also generously offered to provide us with the substances we needed.

We then wrote an experiment, I wrote the paragraph on our coverage about the begging of our proposal, the page and a bit about the question we are addressing and some of the experiment design. Writing the proposal took a lot of research and work but it was really beneficial to have everything written out so that we could read through our whole plan which was finally coming together.

We have now shared our experiment with the school bored who edited it and a few more staff at our school, my whole group contributed to adding corrections to this document and it is now fully together which is a really accomplishment for my group and I.

5. Debrief

I have enjoyed this project a lot because it has given me many opportunities, being able to learn how to put together a 10 page proposal, how to research independently with no text books to guide you only the internet and a million different search options as well as how viruses are able to infect bacteria which was super advanced considering this research is currently being done by students at SFU and I am only in grade 9. The process went fairly well we had a good time coming up with ideas for this project and amazing responses from our contact at SFU. In my opinion the dividing of the work could have been more fair however in the end we all had a part in it. Everyone did have something to contribute to our group. What went well was really our drive as a team because we were really into making this project the best we possibly could and are looking forward to seeing results come out of this. I also think it was excellent being able to email Miguel because again learning from an SFU student is pretty cool! This has been something so new to me so I am very proud of our teams successful completion of this proposal. We ended up making it to the top 30 out of 280 proposals. Which is an awesome accomplishment for only grade 9’s.

Here is a PDF version of our proposal if you are interested in reading it.

ssep-final-proposal

 All of the comics were created by Ashiana Sunderji using storyboardthat.com .