Science of Pancakes

Scientific American has an article on “The Scientific Secret of Fluffy Pancakes” that nicely covers the chemistry of gluten. The article includes a recipe, but I tend to prefer buttermilk pancakes (Cook’s Illustrated has a great buttermilk pancake recipe that I find tastes even better if you leave out the sugar).

My wife has been experimenting with gluten-free pancakes and I’ve discovered that I like hers even better because of all the ground nuts it includes. However, in the gluten-free recipes, crucially, Xanthan gum is used to replace the gluten in capturing the carbon dioxide bubbles created by the baking powder reacting with the acid in the recipe. While the gluten is sensitive to how much the batter is mixed (stretching out the proteins), the quantity of Xanthan gum is more important in the gluten-free recipes.

↬ Maggie Eisenberger.

Global Warming and the War in Syria

Reds and oranges highlight lands around the Mediterranean that experienced significantly drier winters during 1971-2010 than the comparison period of 1902-2010. Credit NOAA.
Reds and oranges highlight lands around the Mediterranean that experienced significantly drier winters during 1971-2010 than the comparison period of 1902-2010. Credit NOAA.

A 2011 article from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration linked recent severe droughts in the Mediterranean to anthropogenic climate change. Now Francesco Femia and Caitlin Werrell assert that the drought (and agricultural mismanagement) lead to the displacement of a million and a half people in Syria, which helped spark the current civil war.

Additional links:

ᔥ The Dish

A Projecting Microscope

A fly's wing seen using the projecting microscope.
Using the projecting microscope.

A parent (thanks Dr. E) found this old projecting microscope at a microscope store in town. The optics are arranged upside-down relative to normal: the light is at the top and the objective lenses are upside-down and below the slide. The light coming through the objective is reflected onto the screen using a simple mirror.

It needs a dark room to see some of the more detailed, lightly stained. However, higher-contrast slides show up reasonable well in our classroom, despite its large, unblocked windows.

Embedding more Graphs (using Flot)

Here’s another attempt to create embeddable graphs of mathematical functions. This one allows users to enter the equation in text form, has the option to enter the domain of the function, and expects there to be multiple functions plotted at the same time. Instead of writing the plotting functions myself I used the FLOT plotting library.

The Eyes of the Spider

Close up of spider.
Close up of spider.

I’m taking a small group of kids hiking/cross-country running for Physical Education this quarter. With the heat wave of last week, and having to clear the trail up the hillslope, today was the first day we actually got all the way to the top of the ridge. On our way back down, one of my students had stopped to look at a frond of tiny, pretty flowers when she spotted this beautiful, yellow spider with its brilliantly, iridescent catch. We brought them back to the lab to look at it under the microscope. It’ll also be interesting to observe what the spider does with the fly.

The eyes of the spider.
The eyes of the spider.
A spider with its rather large catch.
A spider with its rather large catch.

White Blood Cell Hunts Down a Bacterium

One of my biology groups is doing a presentation on the immune system in the next few days. They decided that they needed to wander around the school asking any teacher they could find for interesting games they could use for a presentation. Mr. Schmitt, our new math teacher, recommended the neat video above of a white blood cell hunting down a bacterium. It’s pretty dramatic.

Community Supported Agriculture

Popcorn on the stalk at the CSA.
Popcorn on the stalk at the CSA.

This year we signed up for a CSA – Lee Farms in Truxton, Missouri – and we had the chance to visit this Sunday.

CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture, and the way it works is that you sign up (and pay) ahead of time and the farmer gives you a box of produce from the farm every week for the growing season (May to October in Missouri). It helps the farmer by providing some more stable income, since the CSA members pay the same amount whether it’s a good season or not. The members get an interesting variety of fresh produce every week.

It was neat to see the farm, especially since they’re trying to minimize the amount of fertilizer and pesticides they’re using by working with etymologists and agriculturalists from the universities in the area. It would be a good place to visit with a class.

Investigating the Heart Online

BodyXQ has one of the most impressive interactive apps of the heart that I’ve yet seen.

Observing the heart with BodyXQ.
Observing the heart with BodyXQ.

You can explore the heart in 3D while it’s in motion. You can see the valves open and close, while hearing the beat. I’m going to have to show this to the class tomorrow.