The 20 Big Questions in Science

A big question of science I am interested in is are we alone in the universe? This questions interests me because everyone on the Earth goes about their lives thinking that the Earth is all we have and there is no other option or other way of living. If there are other planets that sustain life out in the universe that leaves me to wonder about the technological advancement of the planet and what ideas and concepts they hold that we have yet to discover. I wonder what the life there looks like, would there be humans ? A current hypothesis for this question could be: If scientists don't know what exists in the majority of the universe, then there is a possibility that life on earth is not the only life in the universe.

My 20 Big Questions:

1) What is the purpose of life?
2) Could a computer have a mind?
3) What happens after death?
4) What is reality?
5) Do we have free will?
6) Will we ever have a theory of everything?
7) What comes after homosapiens?
8) Who am I?
9) What is time?
10) Is there such a thing as fate/destiny?
11)Why do we suffer?
12) Is there a God?
13) Will the world end?
14) Where do germs come from?
15) Is aging inevitable?
16) How are bodies able to repair themselves?
17) Why have humans evolved music?
18) How are there so many types of materials?
19) How did life come about?
20) Are there other universes?

Identifying Questions and Hypotheses

I found an experiment about how the brain encodes time and place. This experiment, done at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology identified the "where" and "when" components of memory. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/09/150923134112.htm>. The question of the study was what brain circuit processes the "when" and "where components of memory? They reached the hypothesis that if the entorhinal cortex seperates location and time, then the "when" and "where" information of memory is split even before it reaches the hippocampus. Prior to this experiment, it was believed that the memory storage part of the brain, the hippocampus, separated the timing and context information. However, this hypothesis was based on the idea that the circuit, which connects the hippocampus and a region of the cortex known as entorhinal cortex, separates location and timing into two streams of information before it reaches the hippocampus. 

Unit 2 Reflection

Unit two was all about chemistry and understanding concepts about everything from parts of an atom to enzymes and how they create chemical reactions. The chemistry we learned about all relates directly to biology and will help us better understand life. One main topic covered in two different vodcasts were the four macro molecules. This included carbohydrates, Lipids, Proteins, and Nucleic acids. An essential concept that I had success remembering was the structure and function of each macro molecule. We also covered material about basic chemistry such as different types of bonds and acids and bases in the first vodcast. These concepts are harder for me to remember and are one of my weaknesses in this unit. Finally we went in depth about enzymes and how they speed up chemical reaction using activation energy. We completed a lab during which we made cheese from milk and rennin while testing many different pH and temperature variables. During this lab I learned that enzymes get activation energy from warm and highly acidic environments. This relates to real life examples of cheese companies and laundry solution companies who use enzymes on a daily basis to make their product. This unit made me a better student today because I feel that the HOT questions and relate & reviews made me think about the concepts more in depth and I now remember the material better. I also learned about being aware of possible error in an experiment while I am doing the experiment. During the cheese lab Mr. Orre reminded us to be thinking about what errors could be happening and I wrote them down, making it easier for me while I was completing my conclusion because I already had my errors thought of. This unit leaves me thinking about how many aspects of life the four macro molecules are found in. They are the four big groups of molecules and so I am left to wonder if they are literally in every organic material or just in a few. I also wonder how these macro molecules were discovered and who analyzed them to figure out there were four types. This unit taught me lab skills as well as crucial chemistry concepts.

Cheese Lab Conclusion

In this lab we asked the question what are the optimal conditions and curdling agents for making cheese. We found that chymosin is the best agent and is optimal in a hot and acidic environment. Chymosin curdled 5 minutes faster than rennin in a pH controlled environment and curdled in 20 minutes in a base environment while rennin didn’t curdle at all. Chymosin makes products very quickly, making it the most efficient curdling agent for making cheese. Chymosin is made from rennin and rennin is extracted from calf stomachs where conditions are very hot and highly acidic. This is why chymosin is optimal in warm acidic conditions and supports our claim that chymosin is the best agent in a hot and acidic environment.

Our data contradicts the expected results because of the uneven timing of heating and checking our test tubes. A possible error was when we took the test tubes out of our armpits to check for curdling every 5 minutes. The curdling may have occurred in 3 minutes but we didn’t know because we only checked after 5 minutes of being in our armpits. This affected our results and made them inaccurate because our data states that chymosin, rennin, and buttermilk all took 5 minutes to curdle in an acidic environment, however, chymosin might have curdled faster than rennin and buttermilk but we don’t know for sure because we only checked 5 minutes into the curdling process. To improve this lab you could check the test tube every minute instead of every 5 minutes to find more accurate results about the exact time the curdling occurred. Another possible error is that people have varying body temperatures and when putting the test tube in your armpit, everyone is putting their test tubes in different temperatures. Not only are body temperatures of everyone different, but depending on how many layers of clothing everyone had one, the temperatures varied. This affected the results because one of the constants of the experiment was the temperature the test tubes were in and with that constant becoming a variable, the results become inaccurate. In the future of this experiment the biologists should immerge all the test tubes in a pot of hot water or a different heating source where they all the test tubes are heated at the same temperature.

This lab was done to demonstrate what the optimal conditions and curdling are for making cheese. From this lab I learned that curdling occurs in very warm and acidic environments which helps me understand the concept of activation energy and finding the right conditions for activation energy to cause enzymes to begin making products. Based on my experience with this lab if I am ever baking and the recipe calls for buttermilk I can just add lemon juice to regular milk and I will have buttermilk. The acidic lemon juice makes bacteria appear and enzymes form and begin to make chemical reactions, giving it a sour taste.

Time in minutes
Curdling Agent:	chymosin	rennin	buttermilk	mik (control)
Acid	5	5	5
Base	20
pH control	15	10
Cold
Hot	5	5
Average	10	10

Sweetness Lab Analysis

1. The structure of a carbohydrate affects its taste because the more rings on a carbohydrate, the less sweet is will be. Monosaccharides are the sweetest of the carbohydrates with degrees of sweetness ranging from 60 out of 200 to 200 out of 200. Disaccharides are semi-sweet carbohydrates with degrees of sweetness ranging from 10 out of 200 to 100 out of 200. Polysacchrides are carbohydrates that are not sweet and all have a deggree of sweetness of 0 out of 200. For example, fructose is a monosaccharide that has a sweetness of 200 out of 200 while starch is a polysaccharide that has a sweetness of 0 out of 200. This data support the fact that monosaccharides are the sweetest carbohydrate, disaccharides are semi-sweet carbohydrates, and polysaccharides are carbohydrates with no sweetness. My hypothesis was supported that if sucrose is naturally found in fruits and vegetables, it will be sweet. Sucrose is a disaccharide that has a sweetness of 100 out of 200. This hypothesis also supports my reasoning that disaccharides are semi-sweet carbohydrates.

2. The structure of carbohydrates are rings of hydrogen, carbon, and oxygen. Different types of carbohydrates have different numbers of rings for different purposes. For example, cellulose, a polysaccharide, has multiple rings which it uses to make cell walls. Since there are many rings, there are enough to build an entire wall around the cell. Monosaccharides, however have more simple uses because they only have one ring. Glucose, a monosaccharide is used by cells as a primary source of energy. The structure of carbohydrates suggest whether they are used for simple or more complex tasks.

3. No, all of the testers gave each sample a different rating. One reason this occurred is because each person has unique senses and everyone tastes slightly different. What is sweet for one person may not be sweet at all for another person. Another reason is because there was no given scale to inform everyone what a 200 sweetness tasted like and what a 100 sweetness tasted like. Therefore, everyone's analytical thinking to determine what measurement of sweetness each carbohydrate was different. A third reason that everyone gave the samples a different rating is because we did not cleanse our palette between tastings. Depending on the order in which each person tasted the sugars, the carbohydrates' sweetness was based on what carbohydrate they tasted before.

4. "Savory dishes that taste of broth evoke pleasant emotions in most people. They are a signal that the food is rich in protein...flavors that are appetizing increase the production of saliva and gastric juices, making them truly mouthwatering...The chemical substance responsible for the taste is freed in the mouth and comes into contact with a nerve cell. It activates the cell by changing specific proteins in the wall of the sensory cell. This change causes the sensory cell to transmit messenger substances, which in turn activate further nerve cells. These nerve cells then pass information for a particular perception of flavor on to the brain." Humans taste sweetness because of taste buds on the tongue that send sensory information to the brain. Tasters rank sweetness differently because everyone's cells transmit information differently and at different speeds, causing information people think to vary.


"How Does Our Sense of Tast Work?" How Does Our Sense of Taste Work? U.S. National Library of Medicine, 28 Oct. 2009. Web. 15 Sept. 2015. <http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0072592/>.

 

Biology Collage