Students in Y11 and Y13 have recently enjoyed a presentation by John Donaldson, one of the top two thermal imaging specialists in New Zealand and the south Pacific. John spoke to the students about his career in which he had started off as a builder! He can now charge over $2000 dollars a day for his expertise. John generously brought with him some of his equipment worth $200,000 and enabled the students to see the processes in action and better understand the science behind the theory. The learning focus was the topic of heat and energy with a focus on radiation (everything emits light, we just can't see it with our eyes).
The students were taught beforehand to calculate the amount of energy they emit sitting in the classroom (about 100 Watt). A number of experiments were performed to demonstrate the radiation of objects depending on their temperature as well as the properties of the object.
Over the weekend of the 8-10 April MBAS Y13 biologists are going to be at the forefront of genome research. For three days they will have the unique opportunity to work closely with 18 scientists from Massey University including, Dr Paul Rainey, the internationally distinguished research scientist renowned for his work in experimental evolutionary biology. The collaborative project was devised by Dr Justin O'Sullivan, 2010 young molecular biologist, building on an idea from MBAS science teacher, Paul Scott. Paul had been awarded a scholarship to attend last year's Queenstown Molecular Biology conference and while there he heard about a competition initiated by Roche which challenged conference members to propose a project which could utilise their DNA sequencing machine. Paul's proposal to research the genomes of micro-organisms found in the thermal springs of Hot Water Beach captured both Justin and Roche's attention and the project was born.
