How would you like to wear a pair of spectacles to ensure that you don’t feel the effects of jet lag on long distance flights? Does it sound like science fiction? Strangely enough it is actually a real gadget that has been developed by some sleep researchers. That is people who do research on sleep patterns.

Professor Leon Lack, the inventor of the spectacles explains how they work. The high tech glasses which he calls “Re-Timer” emit a soft green glow that affects the human body clock. The light green glow helps to alter the sleep pattern of the wearer so that the person can get off a long distance flight feeling well rested.

The light affects a gland at the base brain which is known to control the body clock. This excretes hormones to regulate the circadian rhythms or daily cycles of the human body clock. Now that’s a science project that will literally change the way you rest.

The researchers at the Flinders University in Adelaide, South Australia hope that the light device will eliminate the sudden change that people experience from flying long distances into different time zones. Frequent fliers will probably be the most benefited when the device actually  hits the markets.

The bomb squad has often made use of the exceptional sniffing skills of dogs to sniff out explosives that were hidden and now that sense of smell is being mimicked by nanotechnology scientists. A new device based on the acute olfactory sense of canines is being developed by them.

At the University of California a new nano tech chip has been designed by researchers. This chip emulates a dog’s nose’s ability to sniff out certain molecules contained in an explosive device. The easily portable device is highly sensitive and so far very accurate as per professor Carl Meinhart.

The device detects vapor molecules of a specific substance and can distinguish them from similar molecules so that it does not give a false alarm. Being automated the device would be an improvement on dogs, who can be ill, get tired or just have a bad day. Although the prototype is far from ready to replace dogs on the bomb squad today.

Martin Moskovits one of the scientists who has worked on the project is hopeful that the devices will one day become as common as smoke detectors are at present. Given the current world climate it may well be a good idea to install such explosive sniffing devices in public places as a safety project.

Ever used a comb to pick up a piece of paper? Its easy to do if you rub the plastic comb on a piece of silk cloth. This little science project deals with making static electricity The charge of most materials is neutral till you rub them up against another material which may cause them to gain or lose a couple of electrons affecting the charge on the material.

So what are the different materials with which you can make static electricity? Any number of them to be certain, but here are a few that are easily found around the house. So you can collect them and get set making static electricity.

These materials include – your hand, glass, your hair, nylon, wool, fur, silk, paper, cotton, hard rubber, polyester, polyvinylchloride and plastic. This list of materials also makes up what is called the triboelectric series. If two materials on this list are rubber together the one listed first is likely to give up an electron and get positively charged.

So if you want to get started on a set of science projects dealing with static electricity just collect stuff made out of these materials listed above and you can be on your way. Most of it can be found easily at home and your parents will be happy to let you use it.

A thunderstorm is a common enough event around the world which sees lightening light up the sky and roars of thunder roll by. The sight may be a familiar one, but scientists are now considering an unfamiliar concept – capturing the power of lightening and harnessing it for their own use. Can something as random as a bolt of lightening actually be harnessed?

A single bolt of lightening can produce a great deal of energy. That is an undeniable fact. The random nature of its occurrence is what has made it an unpredictable and rather unreliable source of possible power. So what has changed now?

Scientists have now tried to use lasers  to direct the lightening away from striking the ground and instead striking target points from which their power could be used to generate electricity. Andre Mysyrowicz has actually managed to deflect lightening using laser lanes onto a specific target in Paris.

The science project at the optical lab of the Ecole Nationale Superieure de Techniques Avancees has even made lightening travel a curved path between electrodes. Their ground breaking work makes it possible for us to believe that in the not so distant future it may be possible to generate electricity by capturing the power of lightening.

Smartphones have taken over a number of tasks in our lives. From the time we get up using the alarm on the smartphone, to each meeting and appointment that they remind us of, to the fun we have on social media sites using the hone, there is little that smartphone apps will not allow you to do. So can they help with telemedication?

What exactly does one mean by this term? Telemedication involves evaluating the condition of patients at a remote location and then prescribing the right care and medication for them. Using the smartphone application it would be possible for medical care professionals to get a better idea about the condition of a particular patient and allow them to prescribe better care.

A specialist who works from a desktop or laptop computer would be able to consult with emergency room physicians at the rural hospital site and be able to evaluate the patient’s needs. Naturally this would improve the treatment that the patient received.

This is where using a simple smartphone would help improve the standard of treatment that a patient received. Not everyone can have expensive equipment in each rural out of the way hospital but just about everyone can get access to a smartphone. A great illustration of how one science innovation can make a huge difference to medicare.

Automation of long assembly lines is a standard practice in most manufacturing industries today. Robotic arms have taken up tedious and repetitive assembly jobs in many industries, so will a robot be taking up the running of a mine as well? Rio Tinto, the world’s largest mining conglomerate sure seems to think so.

The Australian part of the company has been making plans to automate mining processes to a considerable degree. The different forms of automation would include the actual digging, transferring of material, processing the stuff and then transporting the processed end product to the railway lines where they can be shipped out from.

The entire process of mining would be automated and the entire operation would be controlled by a man sitting in a location far away from the physical mine. The remotely controlled system would be able to save money on manpower and be more effective than the current manual system in place.

Of course its not going to happen overnight, but Rio Tinto hopes to make it happen within the next decade. At least on one of its current underground mines. If the process is successful they will naturally use it again on other mines that they own. Now that’s a science project that will need a lot of help.

Every time the wind picks up in a storm you are left hanging on to your umbrella with all your might to ensure that it doesn’t take off with the next gust of wind that assails you. A very common problem for which some scientists have come up with a rather unique solution – the storm proof umbrella.

Researchers have been working on an unflappable umbrella which would be able to withstand winds of 113 kph speed. The cycle helmet style umbrella has an aerodynamic design which makes it tough for the wind to blow it away. The flow of the wind is directed over and around the helmet making sure that it stays in place.

The helmet tapers in the back giving the asymmetric design a chance to hold on despite the strongest blowing gusts. The Senz design as it is called was tested in a Dutch study carried out in a wind tunnel. The researchers determined that the Senz design umbrella was much more likely to be effective than the traditional umbrella in a storm which had strong gusts of wind blowing.

The gale force winds did not affect the storm proof umbrella of the Senz design. So perhaps it would be a good idea to benefit from this scientific study and purchase these new storm proof umbrellas to ensure that you don’t get wet in the next storm that come along.

Think of bugs and ones thoughts end up with germs, bacteria, viruses and illness. However here is one bacterial bug that you may not want to keep at bay. It seems that researchers have found a metal tolerant bacteria that can withstand toxicity to produce gold.

At the Michigan State University researchers fed the bacteria known as “cupriavidus metallidurans” large amounts of gold chloride or liquid gold. In a week’s time the bacteria transformed this toxic material into a small gold nugget of 24 carat pure gold.

Kazem Kashefi who is an assistant professor of microbiology and molecular genetics said that what they were doing was microbial alchemy. It involved transforming a material that has no value into solid gold which has considerable value.

Does this mean that everyone can now get rich by growing their own gold at their home? Or can we look forward to making toxic waste heaps into the valuable precious metal gold?Unfortunately the answer is no. The process is too cost prohibitive for it to be managed on a large scale.

So biotechnology may throw up a few surprises every once in a while. It would be well worth conducting your own science project on just how useful some of these surprise results could be.

Sunita Williams, the Indian American astronaut made headlines last week for becoming the second woman in history to command the International Space Station. She also holds the current record for maximum hours in space walks. However it obviously wasn’t enough because she set her mind to creating yet another first record for space.

She completed a triathlon in space by running, biking and even “swimming”  with athletes during the Nautica Malibu Triathlon held in Southern California over the weekend. She used used exercise equipment that included a stationary bike, treadmill and strength-training machine specially formulated for weightlessness to simulate the triathlon experience in space.

Running and cycling one can imagine, even if its done in gravity less space, but how did she swim? To simulate the swimming portion of the race, Williams used the Advanced Resistive Exercise Device (ARED) to do weightlifting and resistance exercises that approximate swimming in micro-gravity.Talk about advanced science projects.

At the end of the triathlon Sunita Williams thanked the astronaut strength and conditioning folks back in California for all their help. She stressed the importance of health and fitness of astronauts who took on long-duration spaceflights. Williams finished the triatholon with a time of one hour, 48 minutes and 33 seconds.

Most astronauts tend to be male for the simple reason that the task is as physically demanding as it is mentally challenging. However from time to time we hear of a woman who has made her mark on the system. One such woman is the new commander of the International Space Station, Sunita Williams.

The Indian-American lady already holds the record for the longest space walk timings for women, and now is heading Expedition 33 on the International Space Station. She took over from Commander Gennady Padalka Expedition 32 which ended Sunday, 16 September.

A Russian-made Soyuz capsule took Commander Padalka, Flight engineer Joe Acaba of NASA, and flight engineer Sergei Revin of the Russian Federal Space Agency back to earth on Monday, 17 September.They orbited earth 2,000 times and traveled 52,906,428 miles before finally touching down successfully in central Kazakhstan steppe region. Padalka is now fourth in rank for the most days spent in space, which includes a total of 711 days during four flights.

Commander Sunita Williams will share space with veteran Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko and Japanese astronaut Akihiko Hoshide. They will be joined in the month of October by NASA astronaut Kevin Ford and three more astronauts to bring the crew up to its full operational number. The scientific expedition is to last three months.