Australia's Science Forum

Here are some Youtube clips we show our senior biology classes, plus a couple of diagrams of blood vessels that might be useful. http://youtu.be/H04d3rJCLCE http://youtu.be/LA2DuxCcO4g http://youtu.be/HiT621PrrO0 Artery vein & capillary cross section.pdf Artery vein & capillary diagram.pdf K...

All the info you need as a starting point is in this earlier post by Sheryl. On 1st Jan 2012 all states in Australia will have in force new national harmonised OHSW legislation called “Work Health & Safety” (WHS). As part of these changes Australia will finally embrace the “Glo...

Just the standard breathing into bromothymol blue before & after running around, & adding ammonia dropwise to bring the colour back. Heart rate is taking pulse before & after running around, & we also do breath holding timed before & after running around. They cover the bases top...

What sort of pracs do you guys do with your biology classes to examine the effect of exercise on the respiratory & circulatory systems?

Anything different to the usual heart rate/CO2 production stuff?

A couple of classic less than perfect translations.... In an Austrian ski lodge "Please not to perambulate the corridors in the hours of repose in the boots of ascension." & In a car rental brochure, Tokyo "When passenger of foot heave in sight, tootle the horn. Trumpet him melodi...

I think you can stop your DG updating........ :w00t: .....have you heard about the changes that are coming into effect next year? A new system of chemical labelling is going to hit us, & we'll have to relabel everything, so I wouldn't bother updating labels, MSDSs or anything to do with chemical...

Yep, tried the peas, which worked for a while but don't seem to have any effect any more. Apparently the peas are to relieve constipation, if that's the problem (fish laxatives :yuck: ......who discovered that accidentally one day :cheesy: ) If the problem is genetic or physiological I've read there...

Coxy.....thanks for posting on Chemtalk, & also please pass on a big thankyou to Marilyn

I shared the freezer bag idea with a bunch of Adelaide labbies at a meeting last night & they al loved it!

We've got tall chairs with backs that double as prac 'stools'. For the reasons listed above kids stand for all pracs except when they're using microscopes. When we designed our senior labs about 10 years ago, we went for with the same height for our classroom tables & prac benches around the edg...

Hiya, I'm sure a few of you have been in the same situation.....our front office girls called me this morning because one of the goldfish they have is looking very poorly, upside down & can't swim properly, so they wanted to know how to kill it humanely. I did a quick google to get details etc, ...

When we moved into our labs a few years ago I set up a stack of drawers in the prep area corridor with all kinds of stuff like scissors, glue sticks, pencil, pens, whiteboard markers, staplers, sticky tape etc for them to raid when needed. The drawers are great because they can pull them out & t...

Hi Lizzie, we got a colorimeter & some cuvettes from a South Aussie company called Adelab a couple of years ago, but you can get the cuvette tubes from a bunch of companies, including Serrata, Scientrific & Wiltronics, or do a google search for "colorimeter cuvettes". You can get a...

Good luck Robb, with a planet-sized brain like yours I'm sure you'll ace it!

Here's another alternative to liver etc if you want to do an enzyme prac. We haven't done this version for years, but one of our teachers resurrected it & it's worked nicely with our IBs this week. I think the original prac idea came from Southern Biological & we just reworked it a bit. You ...

What powder do you guys use in your dishwashers? I was lucky enough to get a Miele a few years ago, & Miele recommended I use Neodisher powder, & sold me a 10kg bucket of the stuff. Lately I've noticed that it's not been as effective as usual & when I checked the tub, it's waaaaay past i...

HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY :clap3: Just checked my peppercorn plates, & overnight a lovely thick culture of Bacillus has grown! Bacillus plates.jpg A HUGE THANK YOU to Ian for the suggestion......I'm gratefully converted to the peppercorn plates now, bugger spending money on Staph & E.coli broths w...

Thanks for the peppercorn idea Ian :clap3: How long does the bacillus usually take to grow a nice fuzzy lawn? I'm guessing a couple of days? I usually inoculate our plates with staph albus, & we used to get a lawn & distinct clear zones, but for some reason the staph just hasn't been reliabl...

We tried a different version this year that avoids the problems with getting a consistent colour..........just make up plain agar & add a bit of starch powder. Pour into unitrays with dividers & set (thanks to Ian for that genius idea :clap3: ) Drop your cubes into dilute Iodine-pot iodide s...

I get the brains frozen, put them in an icecream container full of 70% meths, & leave them in the fridge overnight.
The smell of the meths is a bit over-powering , so I take them out & rinse them 2 or 3 times in water, then drain on paper towel.

Hiya, what do you use as your 'organisms' in the Lincoln Index capture-recapture prac? I usually buy cannelini beans because they're cheap & white, so easy to mark with textas, but after a few classes have used them & marked with different coloured textas I throw them out, & I'm wonderin...