finding the scientific method in science news

Finding the Scientific Method in

Science News

Objective

• Identify applications of the scientific method in published scientific journalism articles.

The Scientific MethodElements of Scientific Method

Ask a question or state problem.

Gather background information.

Form a hypothesis.

Design and perform an experiment.

Draw a conclusion. Publish results.

Reformulate.

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Science Journalism Articles

• Science journalists often write articles about new, interesting discoveries in science.

• Reading these articles can help us better understand our highly technological society.

• Looking closely at science journalism articles we can see the scientific method being applied.

Finding the Scientific Method in Science News

By happy accident, chemists produce a new blueBy KENNETH CHANGPublished: November 23, 2009 in New York Times

Mas SubramanianVariations of a blue pigment were developed at Oregon State University.


By happy accident, chemists produce a new blue (continued)

Blue is sometimes not an easy color to make.

Blue pigments of the past have often been expensive (ultramarine blue was made from the gemstone lapis lazuli, ground up), poisonous (cobalt blue is a possible carcinogen and Prussian blue, another well-known pigment, can leach cyanide) or apt to fade (many of the organic ones fall apart when exposed to acid or heat).

So it was a pleasant surprise to chemists at Oregon State University when they created a new, durable and brilliantly blue pigment by accident.

Ask question or state problem

Gather background information.

Draw a conclusion.



The researchers were trying to make compounds with novel electronic properties, mixing manganese oxide, which is black, with other chemicals and heating them to high temperatures.

Then Mas Subramanian, a professor of material sciences, noticed that one of the samples that a graduate student had just taken out of the furnace was blue.

“I was shocked, actually,” Dr. Subramanian said.

Formulate a hypothesis.

Design and perform an experiment.

Draw a conclusion.



In the intense heat, almost 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit, the ingredients formed a crystal structure in which the manganese ions absorbed red and green wavelengths of light and reflected only blue.

When cooled, the manganese-containing oxide remained in this alternate structure. The other ingredients — white yttrium oxide and pale yellow indium oxide — are also required to stabilize the blue crystal. When one was left out, no blue color appeared.

Design and performance an

experiment.

Draw a conclusion.

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The pigments have proven safe and durable, Dr. Subramanian said, although not cheap because of the cost of the indium. The researchers are trying to replace the indium oxide with cheaper oxides like aluminum oxide, which possesses similar properties.

The findings appear in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

Ask a question or state a problem.

Formulate a hypothesis.

Publish results.

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Finding the Scientific Method in Science Ned

• Now, in our small groups, we will see if we can find examples of the scientific method.

• Read science journalism article, How to Bug Bugs, and see if you can identify the scientific method at work.

• Circle the part of the article that your group thinks shows the scientific method being applied.

• Then go back and label the text your group circled with the step of the scientific method your group thinks most applies.

• Each group will orally present the step of the scientific method applied and their reason for this choice.


How to bug bugs By Laura SandersPublished: August 25th, 2010 in Science News

Jim Gathany/CDC/Wikimedia Commons


How to Bug Bugs (continued)

Insights on insect repellents may help reduce spread of disease.

Bug dope is loathsome to insects in all sorts of ways, new research finds.

Insects are known to intensely dislike the smell of the common repellent DEET, but they also hate the taste of it, a study appearing online August 25 in Neuron shows. And the lemony-fresh molecule citronellal stinks in two very different ways, a study appearing the same day in Current Biology finds.

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A thorough understanding of exactly what makes these repellents nasty could lead to a new generation of bug dopes in the future, which would more effectively reduce the spread of diseases such as malaria and dengue fever.

The research “hopefully points more and more toward a new horizon for replacements for things like DEET that will have higher effectiveness, lower toxicity and more environmental friendliness,” says molecular neuroscientist Laurence Zwiebel of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn., who was not involved in the current studies.

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DEET, the main component in popular insect repellents, has been warding off mosquitoes for about 50 years now. It works presumably through its smell, but exactly how it repels insects has remained unclear, says Craig Montell of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, who is a coauthor of both studies.

Using fruit flies as stand-ins for mosquitoes, Montell and his colleagues wanted to know whether insects might be able to taste the repellent as well as smell it. Flies avoided drinking sugar water laced with DEET, the team found. To rule out the sense of smell, the researchers genetically engineered fruit flies that lacked a functional version of an important smell receptor. Those nonsmelling flies still avoided the DEET-laced sugar water, suggesting that some other sense was also at work.

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Finding the Scientific Method in Science Journalism Articles


Further experiments showed that three specific proteins — all of which respond to bitter tastes — responded to DEET. When the researchers disrupted these taste receptors, the flies no longer stayed away from the DEET, suggesting that normally, the flies were tasting the nasty chemical. The results, published in Neuron, show that DEET is “working though two senses, not just one sense,” Montell says.

When a female mosquito lands on skin, she uses special taste neurons on her body to determine whether there’s good eating to be had. Since the mosquito tastes before she chomps down, she might be persuaded to leave without eating.

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“The first line of defense is you want to keep the bugs away from you,” Montell says. “But even if they do land on you, because DEET is also detected through the sense of taste, it also provides some protection by preventing them from biting.”

Although the DEET study was done on fruit flies, which are easier to genetically engineer than mosquitoes, the researchers think that mosquitoes and other biting insects, such as ticks, fleas or chiggers, may also taste and smell repellants in a variety of ways.

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Montell’s Current Biology study focused on a different bug deterrent: citronellal, the lemon-scented botanical chemical that is common in tiki torches and outdoor candles. Vapor containing citronellal repulses fruit flies in two very different ways, the researchers found. One way is through a smell receptor, and the other is through a receptor called TRPA1. TRPA1 is also found in mosquitoes and humans, and it senses other noxious stimuli, including painful cold sensations, sharp needle pokes and the spicy compound in chili peppers. When the researchers genetically interfered with either TRPA1 or the smell receptor, the flies no longer avoided citronellal, suggesting that both were required for the aversion.

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Knowing exactly how DEET and citronellal are repulsive to bugs could allow researchers to uncover better repellents that trigger the same reaction, Montell says. “This opens the possibility of screening through literally hundreds of thousands of compounds to find more effective repellents.”

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Summary

• We can find the scientific method throughout scientific journalism articles.

finding the scientific method in science news

Documents

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poisonous cobalt blue