Connected on 2008-02-04 16:00:00
from Milwaukee, WI, US
- 2:56 pm
- Bugscope Teamhello I'm just setting up the session a little early
- Bugscope Teamim working on presets righ tnow
- Bugscope Teamright*
- GuestDon't mind me, I am just a teacher who stumbled onto the website and wanted to take a look at a live session
- Bugscope Teamthe actual live session starts at 4pm CST
- GuestWill I be able to stay on as a guest once the actual session starts?
- Bugscope Teamyes, I just thought I would let you know, in case you wanted to make sure you were here for that
- Guestsounds good...thanks for the heads up
- Bugscope Teamyeah no problem
- 3:01 pm
- Bugscope Teamhello gaye-lynn, I'm just setting up some presets early, did you have any problems?
- TeacherJust checking things out since Bernie will not be here today and I have not done this before.
- Bugscope Teamall right, if you want, I can unlock the session for a little while and show you how to use the controlls
- TeacherThank you...
- Bugscope Teamso you should see an area in the lower right where you can pick a preset that we make ahead of the session that lets you jump to that area
- Bugscope Teamyou can also manually move the 'scope by using either of the navigation buttons
- 3:06 pm
- Bugscope Teamclick to drive requires you to click in one direction to move in that direction and click again to stop
- Bugscope Teamclick to center you can click on an area of the screen and you will have that area centered, which is a little more controlled than click to drive can be
- Bugscope Teamso when we make presets we like to close in on a feature on an insect, and then if you wanted, you can lower the mag so everyone can see what we are actually looking at
- Bugscope Teamyou are doing a great job so far
- TeacherHow do I lower the mag?
Bugscope Teamin the upper right you should see the magnify box, you can just click on the - and +
- Bugscope Teamso you can see we were looking at a small part of the compound eye of a fruit fly
- TeacherVery cool... Now during the session students can ask questions, but do you also ask them questions?
- Bugscope Teamwe dont usually ask the students questions, usually the students are too busy asking us questions and we are hurrying to answer them all
- 3:12 pm
- TeacherAlright.. What are the thorny things in the picture?
Bugscope Teamthose are called setae (seta sing.), which are basically insect hairs
- Bugscope Teamsetae
- TeacherNeat...
- Bugscope Teamthe setae in the image are used by the fruit fly to assess windspeed
- Bugscope Teaminsects have hairs all over their body as a way for them to sense their surroundings
- TeacherThank you so much for allowing me to get up to speed on your program. I will see you at 4:00 pm with our after school girls team.
- Bugscope Teamthey are mechanoreceptors and presumably bend a bit in the wind
- Bugscope Teamscott is moving the scope
- TeacherBye!
- 3:22 pm
- 3:27 pm
- 3:56 pm
- Bugscope Teamhello fred, the session should start soon
- GuestThanks
- Guest... just kibbutzing
- Bugscope Teamsounds cool to me
- Bugscope Teamhey there again miss gaye-lynn
- Bugscope Teamjust let us know when you have any questions, and we will do our best to answer them all
- TeacherThe girls just arrived and they will be right up
- Bugscope TeamCool. Hi Sue!
- Bugscope TeamI am just getting off of the TEM, not quite done...
- 4:02 pm
- Bugscope TeamThis is a scary looking critter.
- Bugscope TeamWe are ready to roll.
- GuestHi, Scott and Team. So glad to be an observer today. Thanks for the invite. I was born in Milwaukee, does that count as a connection to this class?
- TeacherWe will be ready in one minute
- Bugscope TeamSure, Sue!
- Bugscope Teamheh i guess that will be good enough for today -.^
- Bugscope TeamHi Jon!
- Bugscope Teamhi
- Bugscope TeamI am going to try to draft Erica into helping us this afternoon as well.
- TeacherHi Scott our girls are ready to go now..
- Bugscope Teamall right, well if you want, you can start by clicking on a preset
- 4:07 pm
- Bugscope Teamthose are its grabber claws
- Bugscope Teamthis is a true bug
- Bugscope TeamHemiptera
- Bugscope Teamthis looks so much like a turkey
- Bugscope Teamlei lei says it looks like a lobster
- Bugscope Teamyou can see that it haas piercing mouthparts
- Bugscope Teamit is probably pretty fierce in its world
- Bugscope Teamit's a turkey-lobster!
- Teachertell me about the claws
- Bugscope TeamMiss Gaye-Lynn are we going to have students logging on today to ask questions?
- Bugscope TeamThere now we can see the claws you were asking about.
- TeacherThe girls are the ones asking and driving right now...
- Bugscope TeamYou can see that they are designed to pierce and to hold tight once they grab something.
- Bugscope TeamThis is a great image.
- Teacherwhy is its mouth in that way
- Bugscope Teamthis is one of the claws...
- Teacherare we looking at the mouth now
- Bugscope Teamsome true bugs use their mouth parts to suck blood as well
- Bugscope Teammaybe you can take the mag up to see the end of the proboscis.
- 4:12 pm
- Bugscope Teamin the middle area, it comes down from the head to the bottom of the screen
- Bugscope Teamit's right in the middle of the body and at the bottom of the screen now
- Bugscope TeamD'Oh..
- Teacherwhat are we looking at
- Bugscope Teamthe little spikey balls (and you can increase the mag if you want) are pollen, they are on the true bug
- Bugscope Teamthey have spikes so they stick better
- Bugscope Teamif you decrease the mag, just lower the contrast in the adjust box
- Bugscope Teamso this is still the lacebug. its cuticle looks like that of an ant to me
- Bugscope Teamclick to center would be good to use if you want to center the pollen
- Bugscope Teamthis guy must have been lounging around in a flower
- Bugscope Teamplease feel free to drive around and see where you are
- Bugscope Teamwhen you have hay fever it is because of those little spikey pollens
- Bugscope Teamlet us know if you have any trouble
- Bugscope Teamyeah Jon is right -- ragweed pollen looks very much like what we see now
- Teacherwhere is the bug is from
- 4:17 pm
- Bugscope TeamCate found all of these today in our collection.
- Bugscope Teamso they are all from Illinois, I think.
- Bugscope TeamI'm not sure where abouts in the world it is specifically found, sorry
- Teacherare there real spikes
- Bugscope Teamon the pollen?
- Bugscope TeamBTW, when it is bright like that, just click on click to adjust and lower the contrast
- Teacheryes
- Bugscope Teamyeah the spikes are so they will stick to insects and animald
- Bugscope Teamant head
- Bugscope Teamthis is nice
- Teacherplease explain this image
- Bugscope Teamso ants are usually blind or are close to it
- Bugscope Teamthey will have small compound eyes then fruit flies, because they dont rely on them so much
- Bugscope Teamthe compound eye is the round circle by the antenna
- Teacherhow do they find their way around?
- Bugscope Teamsome ants dont have any eyes at all
- 4:23 pm
- Bugscope Teamnow you can see the compound eye to the right
- Bugscope Teamants usually utilize their antennae quite a bit more than their eyes
- Teacherhow does the eye let them see?
Bugscope Teameach facet will turn on and off as an object passes by
- Bugscope Teamand you could guess from the position and the prominence of the antennae compared to the eye
- Bugscope Teamthese are facets, called ommatidia
- Bugscope Teamwhen we find them broken, sometimes, we see that they are actually crystals, like lenses.
- Teacherwhat are the little bumps on the eye?
Bugscope Teamthose are called ommatidia (ommatidium for singular) they are the individual parts of the compound eye
- Bugscope Teamsome ants have much more primitive eyes, as Cate had alluded to.
- Bugscope Teamthis one is fairly complex
- Bugscope Teameach of the parts will relay back to the brain what the insect is seeing,
- Bugscope TeamI don't know what an ant's brain looks like, but if you were to see a fruit fly brain you would see that much of it is devoted to visual processing
- Teacherwhat are the little hairs for
Bugscope Teamsince insects have that hard shell, the exoskeleton, they need to have a way to sense their surroundings, so they have setae (which are insect hairs) that are connected to nerves that will tell the insect what is going on
- 4:28 pm
- Bugscope Teamthe hairs, which we are supposed to call 'setae,' are probably sensory here
- Bugscope Teamthey are used sort of like cat or rat whiskers in the dark
- Bugscope Teamthis is a water beetle claw
- Bugscope TeamI just read online that an ant's brain has 250,00 brain cells--it says that a human has 10,000 million brain cells
- Bugscope Teamthe way to think about it is that insects don't have skin like we do -- they have an exoskeleton.
- Bugscope Teamlike a suit of armor
- Teacherwhat are the lines for
- Bugscope Teamthe exoskeleton is made of chitin, and we also call it cuticle -- it is much like fingernail material
- Bugscope Teamthe lines are little plates in the cuticle
- Bugscope Teamso if you wore a suit of armor all of the time, you would be like an insect everyday, and to be able to feel even the breeze it would be helpful to have things sticking through the armor that would allow you to sense the outer world
- TeacherWhat are thies
Bugscope Teami think these are setae for swimming, but that is just a guess, maybe scott knows better then me, scott?
- 4:33 pm
- Bugscope Teamif you take the mag down a little you can see where are on the water beetle's body
- Bugscope Teami think its on one of its limbs
- Bugscope TeamI think Cate is correct -- they are used to swim
- Bugscope Teamso they are like flippers, in a way
- Teacherwhat are the little circles
- Bugscope Teamthis is the carbon tape surface
- Bugscope Teamto make samples, i put a piece of double stick carbon tape on a circular aluminum stub
- Bugscope Teamwe use the tape to stick the bugs down
- Teachertell us more about this
- Bugscope Teamwe also use silver paint to help ground the bugs, because we are shooting electrons at them.
- Bugscope Teamthe bumps are uneven areas that help increase surface area for extra stickyness
- Bugscope Teamand in order to make the insects conductive (so they dont charge up) we coat them in a thin layer of gold-palladium
- Bugscope Teamthese are lots and lots of bacteria
- Bugscope Teamso around each 'bug' you will see a pool of silver paint that Cate used to get the sample to stick even better.
- Bugscope Teamthis is such high mag that the image is distorted
- Teacherwhat type of bacteria are these
- Bugscope Teamthe energy of the electron beam is so strong that it can distort the sample, as we saw.
- 4:38 pm
- Bugscope Teamwell they are bacilli -- the rod-shaped bacteria
- Teacheris this bacteria good or bad
- Bugscope Teamso they could be one of hundreds of species
- Bugscope Teamthey are good; they help things decay
- Teacherdoes this type of bacteria turn into a virus
Bugscope Teamno but some times bacteria get infected with virus and burst open
- Bugscope Teamecoli looks like this, but i doubt it is ecoli
- Bugscope Teame.coli
- Bugscope Teamanthrax looks like these, as (as Cate says) does E.coli
- Bugscope TeamEscherichia coli
- Bugscope Teamwe had someone using the tranmission electron microscope here to image anthrax spores
- Bugscope TeamThey are called Bacillus anthracis.
- Teacherexplain the image thet we are looking at now
- Bugscope Teamcan you lower the mag a bit
- Bugscope Teamso we can see where it starts
- Bugscope Teamother way please
- Bugscope TeamCate says this is one of the palps -- one of the mouthparts that an insect uses to taste and sometimes manipulate its food.
- Bugscope Teamoh its an antenna
- Bugscope TeamOops it is an antenna.
- Bugscope Teamsometimes it is hard to tell.
- Bugscope Teamthe palps are a little further in
- Teacherare they eyes
Bugscope Teamyes the eyes face down toward the water
- Bugscope Teambeetles have those bulbous-tipped antennae
- 4:43 pm
- Bugscope Teamthe eyes are to the left and right, above the little setae next to the antennae
- Teacherwhere are the eyes
- Bugscope Teamthe eyes are a little hard to see but they are at the lower parts of the head
- Bugscope Teamthey have compound eyes
- Bugscope Teamto the right and left of the antena
- Bugscope Teamthough from here, the eyes look like another part of the head
- Bugscope Teamthis is a whirligig beetle
- Bugscope Teamthis is the mouth
- Bugscope Teamyou can see the rounded thing to the right -- that is one of the palps, one of the mouthparts
- Bugscope Teamthere are mandibular and maxillary palps
- Bugscope Teamthese have little openings in the ends that hold setae that function like tastebuds.
- Bugscope Teamnice
- Bugscope Teamthis is a dirty pollen grain on a spider
- Bugscope Teamthe really small balls on it are called brochosomes
- Bugscope Teamthe spider may have been eating leafhoppers
- Teacheris the same type of pollen we saw before
- Bugscope Teamit is so similar we cannot be sure
- Bugscope Teamnow you can see the spinnerets
- Bugscope Teamall spiders produce silk, but not all of them make webs
- 4:48 pm
- Bugscope Teammy fault, it slipped
- Teacherwhy doesn't all of themm make webs
- Bugscope Teambut you can se the fangs really well
- Teacherwhat are their enemies
Bugscope Teamthey have lots of enemies: other spiders wasps birds & nemotodes to name few
- Bugscope Teamthe fangs are under those two chelicerae in the middle
- Bugscope Teamthey eat bugs, and they suck all of the fluids out of them like a milkshake
- Bugscope Teampreying mantids like to eat them
- Teacherwhy does it have a lot of hairs
- Bugscope Teamthe web is used to bind, sometimes, and sometimes to shoot out and stun something
- Bugscope Teamthe greatest threat to spiders are other spiders. When times are hard and food is scarce, it becomes hard for the spider to overlook it's next of kin.
- Bugscope Teamactually they do often have a lot of hairs that are specially suited to sense vibration
- Bugscope Teamdaddy long legs are great spider killers, so be nice to them!
- Bugscope Teamsome spiders, like tarantulas, have hairs that they release when you disturb them
- Teacherwhat is this
- Bugscope Teamthey are called urticating hairs, and they make you itch and wish you had not picked on the spider
- Bugscope Teamthis is the eye, the compound eye, of a fruit fly
- Bugscope Teamif you take the mag down you can see where you are
- Teacherwhy is thee mold on it's eye
Bugscope Teamone reason might be that it was near some rotten fruit before cate got him
- Bugscope Teamthe antennae are on the right of the head here
- Bugscope Teamnow you can see the antennae -- the mouth would be to the right
- 4:53 pm
- Bugscope Teamthey are old flies
- Bugscope Teamoops Cate beat me to it
- Bugscope Teamwe need more insects for our collection, but its winter, so they are hard to find
- Bugscope Teamactually jon has a point
- Bugscope TeamDaniel, who used to work on bugscope all of the time, grew fruit flies in his kitchen. But then he got married...
- Bugscope TeamThis looks like a tiny rock.
- Teacherwhat are these hairs for
- Bugscope Teamyou can see that there is some oily substance on the fruit fly's thorax.
- Teacherwhy does it have oil
- Bugscope Teamthe hairs are mostly sensory, probably. But some of the microsetae -- the tiny hairs, also seem to add surface area and thus lift to the insect as it flies
- Teachername one of the most interesting adaptations of a fruit fly
- Bugscope Teamthe oily stuff is probably hemolymph that came out of the body after it died
- Bugscope Teamthe mouth is designed to help it suck up liquids, and it is really cool-looking before it dries out
- 4:58 pm
- Bugscope Teamyou can see the eyes are HUGE, they encompass most of the head
- Bugscope Teamthat gives them an almost 360 degree view
- Bugscope Teamthese are the guys that have such huge visual centers in the brain
- Bugscope Teamthe mouth, I am sorry, does not look so good here
- Bugscope Teamto the back of the body we should be able to see one of the halteres
- Bugscope Teamto the left
- Bugscope Teamthis is a owl fly larva
- Bugscope Teamnow this is wild -- we just got these
- Bugscope Teamor part of it anyway
- Bugscope TeamCate thinks these are spiracles
- Bugscope Teami think these little mouth guys are spiracles, which are breathing holes
- Bugscope Teamwhich let the insect respire (breathe)
- Teacherwhy are they shaped that way
- Bugscope Teamthey are protected from sucking up materials they do not want to do into the body cavity
- Bugscope Teamso they have these sort of filters on them
- Bugscope Teamit looks real cool at low mag
- Bugscope Teamthey can open and close in some bugs, like cockroaches, that allows them to live in places with little oxygen
- Bugscope Teamlarval insects can be bizarre -- they don't even have to have six legs
- Teacherwhat is that
- Bugscope Teamalthough this does have six legs
- Bugscope Teamif you keep lowering the mag you will see
- Bugscope Teamthe owl fly larvea
- Bugscope Teamyou can see when we get close that there is a lot of fungus on the body
- Bugscope Teamif you drive to the north now you can see its head.
- Bugscope Teamthis is so cool.
- Bugscope Teamthe undersides look fine tho scott
- Teacherwhat is the purpose of the fungi
- 5:04 pm
- Teacheris this a boy or a girl
- Bugscope Teamthe fungi came along after the larva died
- Bugscope Teamand help to rot it
- Bugscope Teamthat is a good question
- Bugscope Teamthe eyes are covered up by its jaws
- Bugscope Teamyou cannot always tell a boy from a girl with insect
- Bugscope Teams
- Teacherwhat does it eat
- Bugscope Teamthe body parts that let you distinguish between the sexes may be on the inside with a lot of insects
- Teacherthank you very much
- Bugscope TeamI think they trap smaller insects
- Teacherwe have to go now but thank you very much
- Bugscope Teamit has a hair-trigger jaw that snaps shut like that of a trapjaw ant
- Bugscope TeamThank You!
- Bugscope TeamSee you tomorrow?
- Bugscope Teamok thanks for doing the session with us today
- GuestNice Session! Thanks
Bugscope Teamhi
- Teachergood bye
- Bugscope TeamPKSmart let us know if you would like to drive for a few minutes.
- Bugscope Teamdid you want to drive around
- Bugscope TeamYou now have control...
- Bugscope Teamyou can drive the scope now if you want
- Bugscope Teamor click on presets to the lower right
- 5:09 pm
- Guestthis is really interesting!
- Bugscope Teamyou can magnify to see more detail
- Guestit looks almost like scales on a snake
- Bugscope Teamyep
- Bugscope Teamthe eye here is a compound eye
- Bugscope Teamwhich has little components called ommatidia
- Guestso they dont see things like us, right?
Bugscope Teamwell we get one picture
- Bugscope Teameach ommatidia which get an image and send the pieces of the image to the brain
- Guestlike a puzzle?
Bugscope Teamyeah like a jigsaw puzzle
- Bugscope Teamthey don't use their eyes as much as their antennae -- so they have senses that we don't have
- Bugscope Teamkinda
- Guestthe detail is amazing!
Bugscope Teamwe are at 1696x mag right now
- Bugscope Teamif we were trying to get super good resolution we would be closer to the sample
- Bugscope Teaminsects dont have much interesting details at above 50,000x-ish, but we can take the scope way higher than that
- 5:14 pm
- Bugscope Teamfor bugscope we are far from the sample so the kids can get good low mag images as well as high mag
- Bugscope Teamoh yeah and btw you are controlling a 600,000 dollar microscope!
- GuestI better be careful
Bugscope Teamdont worry, the software for bugscope wont let you break anything
- GuestI didn't know ants had hairs
Bugscope Teamactually all insects have hairs, but in the insect world they are called setae
- Bugscope Teamthe antenna has a ball and socket type of joint
- Bugscope Teamsee insects have their exoskeleton which is like a suit of armor, and if you have a suit of armor on, you wont be able to feel anything through it
- Bugscope Teamso they have setae that go through the armor and are connected to nerves
- Bugscope Teamso they have setae that will allow them to feel, smell, taste, sense vibration (like on a spider), or detect wind movement (like on a fruit fly eye)
- GuestGregg says, "Nice Ant"
- Guestwhat kind of ant is it?
- Bugscope Teami am not that knowledgable about ants, it was just a little black ant we had in our collection
- 5:19 pm
- Bugscope Teamanyways, we have to start closing down the session, ok?
- Bugscope Teamdo you have anymore questions?
- GuestThanks for letting me drive - it was fun. I just stopped by to say Hi
- Bugscope Teamok well see ya around! bugscope is fun
- Guestbye
- Bugscope Teambye