DIY science is the perfect way to use your creative skills and learn something new. With the right supplies, some determination, and a curious mind, you can create amazing experiments that open up a whole world of possibilities. At home-made laboratories or tech workshops, makers from all backgrounds can explore new ideas by finding ways to study their environment in novel ways – allowing them to make breathtaking discoveries!
James Bridle built this version of Donald Michie’s Tic-Tac-Toe solving computer, MENACE (Matchbox Educable Noughts And Crosses Engine). Not what one would think of as a typical ‘computer’, the instruction to choose the next move is performed by the user.
There’s railroad-car homes, offices, hotels–even a railroad-car footbridge.
Starting on December 5, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency will award $40,000 to the first registered team to correctly report the location of ten eight-foot-diameter weather balloons distributed randomly across the continental United States. From the challenge website:
Peter Johansson is building a medium-format film camera. Like, from scratch. He’s about 80% done and has done a wonderful job documenting the build. [Thanks, Billy!]
Mark, MAKE’s Editor-in-Chief, was on NPR’s Science Friday yesterday, talking about how to “Geek Your Halloween.” You can hear the broadcast here. Photo and pumpkin carving by Patrick Murray.
Over at the Periodic Table of Videos, their chemists put pumpkins through the ringer to demonstrate properties of various chemicals, states, and processes. Nice to see Halloween getting the whole “Peeps in the microwave” treatment. [Thanks, Shawn!] Periodic Table of Videos More: See our own growing collection of chemistry experiments in the Make: Science Room
Still trying to get a grip on the relative size of say, an X chromosome and a ribosome? Then you might want to check out Cell Size and Scale, a neat visualizer of the scale of things from a coffee bean to a carbon atom made by the University of Utah.
