Download inquiry adventure: biology!

INQUIRY ADVENTURE:
BIOLOGY!
SUPPLEMENTAL QUESTIONS
Overview
Welcome to Carnegie Science Center’s Inquiry Adventure: Biology!
Your curated experience is designed to provide your students with applied experiences to
supplement their understanding of key content areas in biology. In the pages that follow, you will
find questions that you may choose to discuss with your students while they are visiting, watching,
experimenting, or interacting with the many activities here.
These questions are designed to get students thinking on a deeper level: about what they are
doing, how the science that they are witnessing is related to their everyday lives, and why it is
important. In addition to the questions that directly relate to today’s themes, there are also
questions that relate to secondary topics such as engineering practices and careers in biologyrelated fields.
Materials Required
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Additional Resources
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The questions are categorized based on particular exhibits in the Science Center. They are designed
to be open-ended and to stimulate the students’ curiosity, thereby leading them to ask additional
questions about what they are seeing and learning. Included with some questions is an explanation
to assist chaperones in guiding the students with their inquiries.
Additional Notes
Teacher Guide
SportsWorks
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How does the size of an animal relate to its heart rate? Why?
Because the ratio of surface to volume in their large blood vessels and airways is
larger for small animals than for large animals. At the surface of a blood vessel,
blood hardly moves because it is in contact with the vessel’s walls. So the more
surface you have, the harder it is to pump blood. This means small animals have to
work harder than large animals to get blood to each of their cells. But large animals
and small animals use the same kind of pumping machinery (i.e., muscle fibers), so
the only thing small animals can do to make up the difference is to run their pumps
faster.
Why does your heart beat faster when you exercise? What is your body trying to
accomplish by doing that?
When you exercise, your cells are using energy. When they do, they not only require
more oxygen for the chemical processes to occur, but they also generate more byproducts (like carbon dioxide) that need to be disposed of. When your heart beats
-Bathrooms are on located every floor.
-Please use the ramps to move through
the museum and save the elevators for
those who need them.
-In general, you should arrive for shows
at least 10 minutes in advance of the
published start time.
Teacher Guide
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Omnimax:
Mysteries of the
Unseen World
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faster, more blood moves through your body, carrying more oxygen from your lungs
to you cells and more carbon dioxide from the cells back to your lungs to be exhaled.
How would having bigger lungs help you to be a better athlete?
Larger lungs means more surface area where oxygen can be brought into the blood
and carbon dioxide can be removed from it. Therefore, larger lung capacity means
that the transfer of these substances is more efficient. However, the delivery of
oxygen and carbon dioxide depends on more than just your lungs, so a strong heart
and vascular system are also necessary for peak athletic performance.
Why do you think that your heart rate increased more during the jumping jacks
than it did while running in place?
This likely happened because jumping jacks involve more muscles than running in
place. As a result, there was higher total demand for oxygen as well as a greater
amount of carbon dioxide that had to be removed from the body. Therefore, you
heart rate increased more to meet your body’s needs.
Of the exercises you did, which do you think help you to build the most muscle in
your body? Why?
What is meant by the term “cardio workout”? Are you building muscle when you
do “cardio” workouts? Which muscle are you building?
When you do cardio workouts, you are working on your heart muscle – arguably the
most important muscle in your body. You are not building the size of your heart, but
rather its efficiency. The more you exercise your heart, the stronger it will be to
meet the needs of your body.
Why do coaches suggest that athletes eat lots of carbohydrates the night before a
sporting event?
Carbohydrates contain a large amount of stored energy that is easily converted in
your muscles when you do long periods of exercise. This strategy is often used for
workouts lasting longer than 90 minutes to maximize the storage of energy in the
muscles.
What is the connection between the heart rate and the breathing rate?
Your heart rate increases to deliver more blood to and from your body’s cells. Your
breathing rate will increase or decrease as your heart rate does to ensure that there
is enough oxygen for the increased blood supply to also provide a way to eliminate
the increased amounts of carbon dioxide in the blood that is returned to the lungs.
What are some animals that have adaptations we might be able to use for human
purposes?
Why do you think there are so many microscopic forms of life living on us?
What are some careers that work with things you can’t see with the naked eye?
Why are some things that are hard to see with the naked eye?
What’s the grossest thing you found out in MOUW?
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Teacher Guide
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BodyStage: It’s
Alimentary, Watson
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Exhibit Gallery
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What’s the coolest thing you found out in MOUW?
What do you think surrounds you that you can’t see?
What are some things you’d like to see, but can’t?
How do your eyes see things?
What creatures can see different wavelengths of light that we can’t?
Bees. Mosquitoes.
What technologies can help us see wavelengths of light we can’t?
Thermal (infrared) cameras. X-ray machines.
How do dead things help living things?
What’s unique about a dragonfly?
That all four wings move independently of one another to control its flight.
How does a gecko climb up smooth glass?
A gecko’s climbing ability comes from the molecular attraction between the hairs on
a gecko’s toes and the surface that it is climbing.
What are some facts about spider’s silk?
It is proportionally both stronger and more flexible than steel.
What is the ‘nanoworld?’
What is the purpose of the GI Tract?
The gastrointestinal tract is an organ system is responsible for the consuming and
digesting of food, absorbing important nutrients, and expelling waste. It begins at
the mouth and ends at the anus.
What is the importance of saliva, bile, bacteria, and stomach acid?
Each of these help to aid in the digestive process. Saliva is composed of the enzyme
amylase, which breaks starches into sugars. Bile helps to break down lipids (or fat),
stomach acid helps to break down proteins, and friendly bacteria in the large and
small intestines can help to break down plant materials.
What is a sphincter and can you name one?
A sphincter is any of the ring-like muscles surrounding and able to contract or close a
bodily passage or opening. There are many to name such as the lower esophageal
sphincter or the anus!
As your body digests food, what types of things are absorbed?
Carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, nutrients, and water. All the remaining nonnutritional items are expelled.
Find a robot in roboworld that is able to see distance. How is the way that it sees
distance different from the way that humans do?
Humans (and animals) require two eyes to gauge distance because our brain uses
triangulation. This means that, based on angle between the object and each eye, our
brain can calculate and estimate how far away an object is. Robots send out a pulse
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of light or sound and measure the time it takes for the reflection to return to their
sensor (like sonar or radar). Encourage students to close one eye and try to gauge
distance. They will recognize that humans require both eyes to triangulate the
distance of an object. The LIDAR robot uses UV or IR light. LIDAR can be used to
determine an object’s distance or speed. Bats and whales use a similar method of
navigation called echolocation. The animals emit sounds and can determine the
range of objects by the sounds echo. Echolocation allows bats to fly and feed in total
darkness and it allows whales to find food, avoid obstacles, and even detect
predators.
Why do you think that the basketball shooting robot has a much higher scoring
percentage than humans?
Head to the Terrain Navigation exhibit. Explore the different types of wheel
configurations to determine how a robot car will travel across various terrain.
What animals do you think inspired the different types of wheels? Extra: watch a
video how robots have taken on the shapes of snakes, lizards, insects, fish, and
dogs in order to serve a required function.
Hoops, the basketball robot, is a great example of the mixture of robotics and
biology. Take a close look at this robot, can you guess the connection?
The ABB arm has six axes of movement. Another versatile arm is the human arm;
humans can move their arms in six axes. The ball and socket joint in your shoulder
allows your arm to move vertically, horizontally. The hinge joint at your elbow along
with the biceps and triceps allows for raising and lowering the forearm. The radius,
ulna and forearm muscles control rotation of the forearm and your wrist controls
vertical movement of your hands. Your hands are like versatile end effectors that
can squeeze, touch, and otherwise manipulate objects in your environment.
Can you think of an application where light waves are used to measure the
distance to an object? Radar in airplanes.
How about sound waves? Sonar with ships and submarines. Echolocation used by
bats to “see” in the dark and by dolphins to locate prey underwater.
Can you think of a way that a thermal camera could be used to lower energy
consumption?
By looking at a building from the outside on a cold day, a thermal camera can “see”
the warmest spots on the building. These are the areas where heat is leaking from
inside the building to outside and are the places that, if insulated properly, can
reduce large amounts of energy loss.
I Spy…. Are there things that happen too slowly for the human eye to see and
recognize?
Can you find the following joints on robots that are not shaped like people:
a. Hinge joint
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Teacher Guide
b.
Ball and socket joint
Engineering
Practices
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How are a helicopter and a dragonfly similar?
How are they different?
If you were going to build a machine that could climb anything, what kind of
animal might you look to for ideas on how to do it?
Career Awareness
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What is a career where you might do all of your work looking through a
microscope?
What are jobs that are now done by robots that used to be done by humans?
What are some jobs that are now done by humans that will likely be done
exclusively by humans in the future?
Can you think of 3 different jobs where you would need to understand biology?
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