PopSci U: Seven of the Country's Coolest SciTech Courses

As students everywhere return to school, the luckiest are heading for caves and rocket firing ranges instead of lecture halls

By Rena Marie Pacella Posted 09.09.2009 at 11:08 am 5 Comments

Caving 101 Northern Kentucky University students collect fungi in Cudjo’s Cave in Tennessee’s Appalachian Mountains. John B. Carnett

So you want to explore the deepest caves? Design the cars of the future? Fire rockets? Don’t wait until you graduate. Here are 10 college programs that offer the most fun per credit—and can help you land your ideal job.

So You Want to...Hunt for Martian Microbes?

Where: Barton Lab, Northern Kentucky University
What You’ll Learn: How microbes thrive in harsh environments
Job Prospects: Geologist
Typical Assignment: Explore a 10-mile-long cave and capture the exotic creatures that live deep inside

If you want to be one of the six lucky undergrads to get off the waiting list and into Hazel Barton’s course, you’d better like tight spaces, heights, the dark, bats and getting dirty—and that’s just to get to the bacteria. Unlike microbiology majors at other schools, the ones laboring over microscopes and petri dishes all day, Barton’s students study extremophile microbes where they thrive: caves.

This fall, with NASA assistance, Barton and a select few students will explore the longest quartzite cave on the planet, a rare 10-mile-long labyrinth of pink and amber sandstone on Venezuela’s Roraima plateau. It teems with microbes that researchers think could provide clues to what life might look like on Mars.

Most caves are formed by limestone, a carbonate rock. The rock of Roraima, however, is mostly silicate, which is also found on Mars. The team will collect the nitrogen-eating, ammonia-spewing
microbes and other strange organisms that live in the walls. Back at the lab, students will observe the bacteria’s behavior under varying conditions, gathering information that could help NASA hone its search for extraterrestrial life.

Other students, like sophomore and newbie spelunker Katarina Schneider, cave closer to home, measuring groundwater pollution and studying links between microbes and cave formations. “Exploring that far below the earth surrounded by bats, beautiful rock formations and billions of organisms that you can’t see but you know are there,” she says—“that’s awesome.”

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5 Comments

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omarkoran

09/10/09 at 2:22 pm

I love your desisn.
ALIEN NATION

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abier

09/10/09 at 10:29 pm

Re: So You Want to...Fire Big Rockets?

Regulation of hobby rockets is NOT dependent on the altitude they fly to.

A model rocket weighs 1.5kg or less and is made of light weight material like balsa wood, paper, and plastic.

A model rocket motor contains 62.5g of propellant or less and a total impulse of 160 newton/seconds or less.

There is no maximum altitude or maximum speed except those imposed by the laws of physics. Super-sonic flights are possible and altitude records for F and G class rockets exceed 2 kilometers.

For the straigt scoop on model rocketry see the National Associatio of Rocketry web site at http://www.nar.org

Rick

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janjean

09/11/09 at 1:12 am

At my school you get to go caving in grade 7. the only thing different are the caves are really tight and you practically have to crawl through.

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janjean

09/11/09 at 1:12 am

At my school you get to go caving in grade 7. the only thing different are the caves are really tight and you practically have to crawl through.

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J-Hatfield_MAE

10/11/10 at 7:37 pm

abier: It is clearly stated that the rockets produced by UAH are NOT hobby rockets, making most of your points mute regardless.

Whenever an object of the scale of these rockets is launched, a permit is required. Otherwise we wouldn't pay for one. A model rocket has a MASS (not weight) of 1.5kg or less, perhaps this is why no permit is required for you.

Total impulse is measured by newton*seconds and is the integration of force over a given time. Units of newton/second correspond to a dimension of power*(1/distance) which has no name assigned to it that I can recall. Not saying it doesn't have a name, I just can't recall one.

And btw if you want your rockets to go supersonic without dissintegrating then you will have to get rid of those goofy wings featured in the rocket in your photo, unless your rocket is made of some VERY nice material. Check out this years USLI competition, as they plan to go supersonic for a short duration.

Please refrain on attempting to take away from our success. Or at least get your units right during your attempts.

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