Koch Lab:Outreach

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2007 December 7 Middle School Outreach
Participants: Alex Cimino-Hurt (Menaul Middle School) and his science students. UNM: Steve Koch, Diego Ramallo-Pardo, Nas Manole, Anthony Salvagno, Larry Herskowitz.

24 students from Menaul Middle School visited the CHTM for about 2 hours on Friday afternoon, December 7, 2007. Students were divided into two groups. One group had a Q&A session / presentation about nanotechnolgy and its potential impact on the biological sciences, and specifically a discussion of the nanomanipulation tools and experiments performed in the Koch lab (i.e. optical tweezers and DNA unzipping). The other group participated in interactive demos in the Koch lab, led by graduate students. These involved classic fun science demos, including corn starch and water, crush the can, and or course liquid nitrogen. Also, slides were borrowed from the UNM Cancer Center microscopy facility so students could observe cells under epi-fluorescence microscopy. These cells were stained specifically for cytoskeleton and cell membrane. The two groups then switched activities. Finally, a brief tour of the CHTM was given to all.

Lesson learned and improvements for next time are not yet listed on this public wiki, but we have notes on our private wiki.