At the Tank--Sea-to-See Job Notes

This is part two of a two part series cataloging a portion of what I did with my job at FSU's Sea-to-See which is a program that travels to local elementary schools giving a marine biology presentation replete with touch tanks, interactive activities and video.  Keep in mind it is for kids as young as second grade (it's pretty darn basic stuff and I write it down here mostly to keep for future reference if I ever do something similar again.).  :)  At that age the biggest thing is just to get the kids touching stuff and making observations.

• Sea Urchins
• Hold in hand
• Feel movement of spines and tube feet
• What are spines for? (Defense)
• Why do you think urchins put shells etc. on top of them?
• Some interesting research has shown that it could be for UV protection--much like applying sun tan lotion
• Other possibilities?   
• Camouflage
• Pedicellaria--tiny pinchers to clean bod with.

• Turn over
• Find mouth
• Count how many parts its beak has
• Notice pentaradial symmetry 
• Can you find anything else in the tank with five of something?  What do you think that might mean about them?  (Sea star.  They're related.)
• What do you think it might eat?  (Algae and sea grass.)
• Where are its eyes?
• All over!   
• Concentrated on tips and base of suction cups
• Ask who wants to be a sea urchin?!  Have kids close eyes, look toward a light source and wave hand above eyes.  A shadow will be cast by hands simulating what it is like to see in only shadows like echinoderms.

• Sea Stars
• Pick up
• Touch top
• How feel?
• Sea stars often move in the direction of the arm opposite their madreporite (mother pore) (the trivium arm, as opposed to bivium arms).
• Flip over
• What do you think that orange stuff is?  (Tube feet)
• Touch and watch arm "zip" them up
• Why? (Protect the delicate tube feet.)
• Who wants to "be" a sea star with me? (Kids raise hands.)
• We move by contracting muscle on bones, but the sea star has a very different way of moving--kind of like the exact opposite way!!  Instead of contracting muscles he inflates his arms!!! (Water vascular system)
• Have kids lift arms above head and retract them all the while making sucking noises (to fill up arms as they extend) and farting/deflating noises (upon contraction)
• Guess how they breathe--through their feet!  Can you imagine if you breathed through your feet!!?  Wouldn't that stink, literally!!!
•  They also taste with their feet!!  Imagine tasting your shoes right now!  Or the floor!

• Can anyone find mouth? (At center of arms.)
• How might a scientist test to make sure that really was the mouth? (Put some food there and see if it gets eaten.)
• Discuss how sea star eats by extruding mouth outside of body
• Can you imagine eating that way!?  Imagine your lunch table if you were all sea stars and there where slimy stomachs all over the place!

• Sea Cucumbers
• Pick up sea cucumber
• How do we know it's not dead? (Since it totally looks that way!)
• Kids will eventually say if it moves
• How many sides does it have?  (Five)
• What else in the tank has that and what do you think it means?  (Related to the other pentaradials)
• How do you think it defends itself?
• No spines, no shell, no pinchers, super slow.  How do you think he protects himself??!
• Who here likes scary movies?  (Kids love to act tough and say they do.)
• What you'd do if you were a sea cucumber and you got scared is you'd barf up your guts!!!  Can you imagine if everyone in a movie theater was a sea cucumber and they all got scared and there were guts flying everywhere!!!?!?
• Why do you think they do that?
• Maybe because predator loves guts, eats them and gets full--sea cucumber gets away scot-free
• Or, maybe the guts taste/smell really awful and the predator gets the heck out of there!

• Pearl Fish
• There is a whole species of fish that lives no where else but in the butts of sea cucumbers!!
• Can you imagine living your entire life in a butt!!?!?!

• Hermit Crabs
• See if you can find its two kinds of antennae
• Two long for feeling
• Two short that he flicks through the water to smell
• Who makes a shell a hermit crab or a snail? (Snail.)

Antenna 1 (antennule) is used for smelling.  Other electron microscope pic here.

• Snails
• How do they crawl?
• Cilia
• Tiny hairs that tickle the ground
• Did you know that you have the same thing inside your body!!!?!?!  Guess where?!?!?!   In your lungs and trachea!!! 
• Where's the oldest part on the shell?
• Tip of spire is actually baby shell
• Every day they add a little bit more to shell opening's edge and spiral around

Images from here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Sinuses - You Need Them Like a Hole in the Head

What's the point in having holes in your head?  


Ever had a sinus headache?  Ever have them clog up while trying to dive/free dive?  Ever wish you could drill a hole in your face to relieve the pressure?  Yes, yes and yes.  Why are they there?  I'll save you some time and the summary is that no one really knows, but here are some stabs that I was able to come across

• The 'Air-Conditioner' Face Hypothesis: 

• They filter and humidify the air. Passing through these caverns the air is slowed down and moistened like in a small, warm, gross cilia filled cave. It should be noted, though that it's been calculated that sinuses increase the humidity of the incoming air a paltry 1-1/2 percent.

• The Smell Pocket Hypothesis
• Being slowed down may give the olfactory receptors more time to sample the air and by being moistened we're able to smell more keenly. Some super sniffer mammal's sinuses have receptors in them, but this is not the case in humans.

• The Make-Your-Head-Not-So-Fat Hypothesis

• Apparently evolution is dying to make your noggin not so ridiculously heavy by putting holes in it. I'll quote Cecil Adams from Straight Dope,"Some researchers have estimated that if the sinus cavities were filled with porous bone instead of air, the head would be just 1 percent heavier. Also, many heavy-headed mammals have absent or rudimentary sinuses." It does grow quicker and less costly, though.

• The Crash Test Dummy Face hypothesis
• Cars are build with crumple zones to cushion an impact. This hypothesis says that evolutionary history had so many facial blows that organisms with holes in their face were selected for. Um...no.

• The Echoy Canyon Face Hypothesis

• In singing lingo, using your 'head voice' might not be so bad after all. They just might serve as resonance chambers that may actually be tuned to make your voice more nasally, shall we say? Cats don't have unfilled sinuses and have no difficulty being shrill and annoying, though. Giraffes, which have quite large sinuses, are nearly silent...

• The Hollow Chocolate Easter Bunny Face Hypothesis
• Remember when you were a kid and you'd bite into that massive chocolate Easter bunny and think, "Hey!  It's hollow!  Those cheap skates!"  Maybe sinus holes are just cheap ways to fill in gaps in between different necessary parts of your head.

Summary: nobody knows. Maybe they're just a weird evolution history hold over!

Here's what it'd look like to sniff the underwater mines from Mario

"Just take a little off the front."

This is awkward on many levels.

Here's a look at Dr. Manhattan's sinuses

Only 19.95!!!!...gives new application to the beloved little tea pot song...