Dr. Dawn's STEM Story: Dawn Wendell at K12Live! (MIT Museum Second Fridays, 1-10-14) - Free Educational videos for Students in K-12

Dr. Dawn's STEM Story: Dawn Wendell at K12Live! (MIT Museum Second Fridays, 1-10-14) - By MITK12Videos

Transcript


00:06	All right . Can everyone hear me get off the
00:10	bike ? Just allowed . I think my students today
00:14	. All right , so hi everyone , as Elizabeth
00:18	said I'm dr don dr john Mandel and I'm currently
00:22	a senior lecturer of mechanical engineering . And today I'm
00:25	going to tell you about my story which is really
00:29	dirty . And you're over lucky because you know what
00:32	the endpoint is . But when I started off I
00:34	definitely didn't know that this was where I was going
00:37	to end up . So that's why the subtitle here
00:40	is how a nice quiet girl from suburbia ended up
00:44	with a PhD in mechanical engineering from M . I
00:46	. T . So why my step story ? Well
00:50	the reason I want to tell you my story today
00:53	, you're learning about a lot of really cool science
00:55	and engineering topics . And especially for some of our
00:58	younger audience members you might think this stuff sounds beauty
01:00	cool but you don't really know what to do with
01:04	the other than , wow , that's really cool .
01:05	So I'm going to tell you how I found the
01:09	things that were really cool when I was younger and
01:11	how I followed those my passion . So I followed
01:14	the things that interested me in a way that wasn't
01:17	making the most linear but was a lot of fun
01:20	. So I hope that my story can help you
01:22	get some ideas of how you call your passions as
01:24	well . So as I said , we know the
01:27	ending . I'm dr Don . You may have seen
01:30	my videos online , you may have heard about the
01:32	new maker portfolios that are in the M . I
01:35	. T . Office of admissions that are used as
01:37	part of our application process . Now that was an
01:39	initiative that I did when I was in the admissions
01:41	office as their technical expert and assistant director of admissions
01:44	there . So I'm out there , we've talked about
01:47	stem , we'll talk about engineering and talk about dying
01:50	really great . But that was not always the way
01:53	it looked like it was their turn out . So
01:56	here I am now you're holding . So this is
02:01	me when I was small , that's my aunt there
02:04	. And at this age my life goal was the
02:08	rainbow , right ? You know why she had really
02:12	cool outfits , really colorful , really pretty . I
02:17	was doing a great job . Right ? If you
02:18	ask me what I want to be when I grew
02:19	up , that's what I said . And so here
02:22	I am actually one of my favorite toys . My
02:25	parents are this wooden blocks , They were really playing
02:28	. They were just a bunch of squares and rectangles
02:30	are old and half circles . I looked in with
02:32	most things ever and I spent unreasonable amounts of time
02:36	building towers and I have much younger brother who probably
02:39	would have been about one year old in this photo
02:41	. We spent a lot of time doc in a
02:44	day . That was , I think his motivations were
02:46	to walk was so you could come over and topple
02:48	all my towers . Mhm . But you know ,
02:51	I just have this great sense of curiosity , I
02:53	wanted to see how colleagues to build this tower when
02:55	my mom came to visit from Hawaii , which was
02:58	very far away as I grew up in central Connecticut
03:01	, the first thing I did was show her in
03:02	the tower and I really love exploring , I actually
03:07	watched him outside a pile of rocks that has all
03:10	sorts of great , so me as a kid wondering
03:14	, right , I just like kind of playing around
03:17	with my environment . So I went to school ,
03:20	I took normal school classes in college school and the
03:24	next really kind of interesting thing in hindsight didn't happen
03:26	. So it makes now , it turned out I
03:28	was pretty good at this whole like kind of science
03:31	and engineering classes , but we didn't have engineering aspect
03:34	of the science . I was good at science .
03:35	It's good that it was also kind of writing in
03:37	english social studies . So my parents didn't really know
03:41	what to do with that because that's all she's good
03:42	at things , but they , they shouldn't sign me
03:44	up for all sorts of different activities . So for
03:47	example , here's me and 9th grade you tell who
03:49	I am now the red here should give it away
03:53	for most of these photos , but there is going
03:55	to do with the intention . So for example ,
03:59	here is a day long activities that I did .
04:02	This other high schoolers about bridge building . Now I
04:08	think lesson from this as crews are boring . I
04:11	don't think that's what my parents hoped for me to
04:13	just go , but I realized that I just wasn't
04:15	really bridges . I mean , I felt really tall
04:17	towers , but I was like four . So bridges
04:20	just weren't that cool to me . But the thing
04:23	is that my parents didn't just let me say ,
04:25	oh , I'm not into virgins . My parents encouraged
04:28	me to keep looking for things that I was excited
04:30	about . They kept signing up for all these different
04:32	activities and making sure that I was going to different
04:35	things after school and seeing what else is out there
04:39	. So one of these things that I just ran
04:41	to the window in my school was this new o'clock
04:43	, I got formed my freshman year called the first
04:46	robotics club . Now this is a club that competes
04:49	in the first revised competition , which is an international
04:52	competition of robots . Mhm . Now robots are not
04:57	like bridges or towers . So , I was like
04:59	, huh , this is new . So can you
05:02	tell who I am ? Yes . They only go
05:05	the only girl there's other girls to when they're they're
05:08	actually finding out of the photo . So yeah ,
05:10	so here I am and here we are brainstorming as
05:13	a team . Different ways that we're going to play
05:16	this game . This challenge was given to us this
05:18	year and the first robotics , It was basically picking
05:21	up big inner tubes and stacking them more than six
05:24	ft hot . Mhm . Really , I had no
05:27	concept of building a tower . I could do building
05:29	rich , I could do making a robot Lift up
05:33	this inner tube from the ground up to six ft
05:34	high . I had no idea . Here I am
05:37	. I can barely reach it with this little model
05:39	we have made out of cardboard . So I decided
05:42	that robots were cooler than And so I stuck with
05:47	this club and I thought this one seemed like I
05:49	had a lot more promise . I was learning a
05:51	lot more . A lot more fun . I was
05:53	doing things . I didn't know how did you .
05:55	So we learned all sorts of different little things .
05:57	We learned about batteries . We learned about motors .
06:01	Who am I got it . Got it good ,
06:06	good . All right . So there's more girls there
06:08	. They were just panic . So then it turned
06:12	out we were actually able to build a robot as
06:14	a teeth . And can you find me in this
06:16	car ? Where am I ? I got my head
06:20	. The toolkit come back in the toolbox . I
06:23	was like this is awesome . So here I am
06:26	digging around probably finding a hammer or screwdriver something a
06:30	hand with the robot back together . And my dad
06:33	turns out like really already photos . So to remind
06:36	this one because yeah , yeah , good . So
06:42	this was a really great experience for me and I
06:44	worked on my high school's first robotics team for all
06:47	of high school . Each time . Each year ,
06:50	each new year I learned a whole bunch of new
06:52	context . I worked on chemical engineering sub teams .
06:56	I worked on drive train . I worked on the
06:58	different lifters . I worked on the electronics because I
07:01	didn't know anything about the product and then you turn
07:03	on a switch lights off . So I thought I
07:05	would just try out everything . So when my parents
07:08	were still , for me , when I was a
07:09	kid , I'm just trying things out and see what
07:11	you love . I just kept doing that . Once
07:14	I found an area , I'd like to just try
07:15	to everything inside of that area . And so in
07:18	the end I decided my lesson was I love robots
07:23	, lot of things . There were lots of often
07:27	so that wasn't coming out of high school . I
07:29	love robots . How is that gonna be a worrying
07:32	now ? Well what I was told was that if
07:37	you love robots you should eat engineer . I didn't
07:39	know what it was before I got some high school
07:41	, before I started doing all these different activities .
07:44	So now I discovered engineering and then people told me
07:46	you want to be an engineer . So I went
07:49	to college for engineering actually came right here to mitt
07:53	and I decided to become a mechanical engineer and I
07:57	got involved in all sorts of other things again because
07:59	once again I've been a whole new place off tons
08:01	of fun Cambridge is tons of fun and my cheese
08:04	, tons of fun . And there's all sorts of
08:06	different activities there that I haven't got to experience yet
08:09	. So things like competitive robotics , has anybody ever
08:14	heard of the T . V . Show battle box
08:16	? The city's preference is getting old . I know
08:18	it was like back when I was in college .
08:21	Yes , so I do that . I unfortunately have
08:25	no pictures of me driving my robot because those people
08:27	were too busy watching . But so here's , here's
08:30	actually one of my robots . I had three different
08:32	robots that I built and drove . At one point
08:35	I was the 20th range £20 or in the nation
08:39	. So that was pretty awesome . I was really
08:41	proud of that . This is awesome . Then I
08:44	was like okay , this is cool , this is
08:45	good . But now let's leave the ground . I
08:49	didn't know how my RC planes , I was like
08:51	this is gonna be great . It turns out I
08:53	am not super good at flying are some length .
08:58	This plane went up and down a lot down .
09:01	I spent a lot of time on the ground repaired
09:03	by me and I discovered this actually wasn't my favorite
09:05	thing ever . And I'm not particularly good at it
09:08	even though I practiced a lot . But I tried
09:11	it out . I learned a lot of new things
09:14	and also I got really involved in some class projects
09:18	such as this is one of my favorites called the
09:20	battery mate Abalone . This is a three pasta printer
09:27	. You know sometimes you go to the store and
09:28	you get those cute little shaped pasta like get a
09:33	mac and cheese box . Spongebob Squarepants . Yeah .
09:37	So we thought it would be cool to be able
09:38	to design your own macaroni shapes . You know ,
09:41	I don't just want the ones that come from the
09:43	store . I want to take up my own .
09:45	I love star trek shapes , I want something else
09:47	. So as a team of students and I build
09:51	our own three printer that did pasta them . It
09:55	was super fun . It was great . I loved
09:58	working with everyone . I love working change up and
10:01	having something that actually works at the end was really
10:03	cool . Although we never eat any of the pasta
10:06	, it was more through the concept . So that
10:09	was really fun . Some of the other things I
10:11	discovered when I got to college . So it turns
10:13	out , I think like a few other hobbies that
10:16	you maybe don't consider engineering say . But then I
10:18	really loved . So it turns out I love baking
10:22	and I love knitting . Yeah , so I actually
10:25	can be found all over boston getting , especially in
10:28	the weather forward . You don't have to wear gloves
10:30	. I've always have all the fuss and sitting at
10:32	the T . And I did it . And so
10:35	what are all these things have in common ? Well
10:38	, I decided that actually what I really love is
10:41	creating things and I only would have discovered that by
10:45	going out and trying all sorts of different things .
10:47	One of the things I didn't love about RC planes
10:50	is that I actually didn't really build the one I
10:52	had bought . It , can't put it together ,
10:54	try to fly it . I got much more satisfaction
10:58	out of designing my own fighting robots even though they
11:00	often got destroyed because I learned so much more through
11:03	the process . The same thing with kidding . I
11:07	love the process and the process of cooking . I
11:09	can give away most things I cook . I love
11:12	the problem . So I love the process of creating
11:15	. That's what I learned by going to school for
11:17	engineering . It's not weird . Okay , so now
11:22	PhD in engineering obviously stuck around and the question you
11:27	might be asking is one of my parents asked me
11:29	all the time , wow , why why a PhD
11:34	in engineering ? Because when I started my PhD ,
11:38	it turned out that I didn't really have this vision
11:40	of teaching and have this vision of still being here
11:44	. And I think after all these years , but
11:47	I realized that there are still so many things that
11:49	wanted to learn and try . So I found ultrasound
11:53	fun adventures earlier on and I thought there were so
11:55	many more opportunities . The other thing that I realized
11:59	is a long time is here . I saw that
12:00	scientists and engineers were the ones who make the new
12:03	discoveries . They're really the ones who are creating all
12:07	sorts of different materials . So I wanted to be
12:10	involved in that . Yeah , I'm going to tell
12:13	you the story that actually was the story that inspired
12:16	me to get a PhD that story about side .
12:21	So , how many of you have ever been to
12:22	a lake and seeing water stride ? If your river
12:27	, there's these little box ? All right . So
12:29	you're mostly familiar , pretty small , sit on the
12:32	water and they don't really swim . They glide ,
12:36	right ? So they're gliding water straps . This one
12:42	now , 10 years ago , we didn't know how
12:47	they walked out on him . Or should think about
12:50	that for a second . The year 2000 came and
12:53	went and we did not have physics that described how
12:58	water striders could stride on the top surface of the
13:01	water . We had physics that student did . That
13:03	could describe why they loaded . We understood that part
13:07	when we actually didn't understand a real subtlety of how
13:11	they were able to propel themselves across the surface .
13:14	There were two competing theories . We actually didn't have
13:17	any answers now . Pretty much everyone raised their hands
13:21	when I said , have you seen a water strider
13:24	? That means it's something that you have seen in
13:25	your life that you probably just thought was like ,
13:27	oh this bug . We didn't understand the physics of
13:30	it . I went to a seminar after the professor
13:33	who actually figured this out . What he told me
13:35	, that my mind was blown and I decided that
13:37	this was my challenge . I knew how to build
13:40	things , but I wanted to understand the size of
13:43	a different way . And so I'm going to answer
13:47	the question is so now we actually know . So
13:49	about 10 years ago now , this professor and a
13:52	couple of students had an idea of how to settle
13:55	the debate between these competing theories . So they had
13:58	an idea , they made some experiments , And actually
14:01	these are the images that were the cover of nature
14:04	that showed these fortresses here , both in this image
14:09	and this image show that that is how the water
14:12	strider is able to propel itself across the surface of
14:14	the water . It's participate . So I thought this
14:19	was amazing . And not only did we understand the
14:22	physics of this . So this was done in a
14:25	project jointly between the math department at MIT and mechanical
14:28	engineering department at MIT . We were then able to
14:31	use the physics game from that to build a mechanical
14:34	water strider . So this is what they did .
14:36	They had an idea , they did experiments . They
14:38	figured out the answer . And then they were like
14:40	and now we're going to build a robot . I
14:42	love robots . You know that I thought this was
14:46	amazing . This was incredible . And I thought if
14:49	there are still problems like this out there , things
14:51	that you can see every day aren't fully understood .
14:54	I am not done in school yet . And it
14:58	turns out the person who built this little water strider
15:00	robot do these experiments is a super cool person .
15:03	And I ended up getting my species from the same
15:05	lab that he did . That was so inspired by
15:07	the mechanics . He's too so we have the same
15:09	adviser still one of my heroes and it's ingenious for
15:12	what you do . We both engineering . Mhm .
15:16	So anyways which one of the photo again ? You
15:19	gotta figure if you're good at this you gotta figure
15:21	out . Yeah . So that's why I wouldn't want
15:24	to get a PCI . So for me my journey
15:29	and engineering because engineering is really an outlet for my
15:34	creativity and curiosity about the world . I like designing
15:38	things like abilities like creating things , I like understanding
15:41	things . And the really other cool thing that I
15:44	discovered , the further I went along and the more
15:46	I learned is that I can travel around the world
15:50	and meet other people in engineering and science . We're
15:53	just as excited about the things that I am .
15:56	They want to talk about this and they want to
15:58	share ideas and they want to collaborate . I got
16:02	to go to new Zealand china . I got to
16:06	live in France when I graduated my PhD , my
16:09	mom's an orchestra . She never got to go to
16:12	France and I got a job in paris because I
16:16	was a engineer and they use them with my specific
16:19	expertise to go over their usually mechanics research in paris
16:23	awesome . So hopefully through this , you see that
16:28	you can really have a nominee your journey . So
16:30	all these things that you're seeing tonight , all these
16:32	different ideas , these different explanations , All the signs
16:35	of engineering is awesome is out there , you should
16:39	get out there , figure out where your passion lies
16:43	. Get involved . Follow those passions , ask questions
16:48	, keep exploring because maybe the 1st , 2nd ,
16:51	3rd 12th thing fine , it's not going to be
16:54	the thing that's most exciting for you and it's also
16:56	okay , we don't have all the answers right now
16:59	. Maybe you don't know where your life story is
17:00	gonna take you yet , I didn't know where mine
17:02	is gonna take me . But as I said so
17:05	I got the doctrine , I finished my PhD in
17:08	mechanical engineering , I got a job in physics research
17:12	in fluid mechanics in paris . I lived in paris
17:16	for a year and then my journey took another term
17:19	. I came back to M . I . T
17:21	. And the technical expert in the admissions office where
17:23	I got to work with fantastic people all over the
17:26	world and tell them about optimistic my teeth . And
17:29	now I transitioned again to lecturing because just as you've
17:34	seen here tonight I love to talk to people .
17:36	And so it absolutely incredible for me to get to
17:39	talk about engineering students and share with them my passion
17:42	and my discoveries and help them discover engineering themselves .
17:47	So thank you very much . I'm gonna stick around
17:49	for a couple seconds to answer a few questions either
17:51	about the technical or not technical side of my life
17:54	. And then I ended up in exponential where you
17:56	can hear about more awesome step activities President uh intimidation
18:11	uh Start lecturing next month . I don't know what's
18:14	gonna happen . Your questions on robots . You all
18:21	know how to build robots . How exactly do water
18:27	striders stand ? Don't want . All right . So
18:29	the question is how do you watch and understand on
18:31	water ? So they're standing and there's moving , It
18:34	turns out those are very different things . So we're
18:36	standing on water . They have these long legs that
18:41	are hydrophobic , that needs that are repelling water .
18:44	And so the amount of area that they have in
18:47	each of their legs actually system afloat . So it's
18:50	as if you took four huge inner tubes and tie
18:54	them to use your hands . You wouldn't think either
18:58	. So they are taking advantage of geometry in that
19:00	case . Now , the thing is if you hide
19:03	these huge water to use your hands and deep and
19:06	you're loading there in the pond and you try to
19:10	move the water tubes , it's like they're slippery right
19:15	waters , It's the brief surface . And so you
19:18	might be moving the water tubes and not going really
19:22	anywhere . You can't just stop there because when you
19:25	swim , you actually paddle , right ? Doggy paddle
19:28	or like a real person swimming , that's not why
19:31	it's like , I think this is what happens when
19:32	you really swim and so people don't just float on
19:35	the surface , Water striders don't just blow . But
19:37	the question was , how are they able if they're
19:40	not putting their legs into the water to create that
19:43	propulsion ? So they're actually using some creative physics that
19:47	have to do with the surface tension of the water
19:49	. And that's why you were able to see these
19:50	vortices . Those vortices are able to interact with each
19:53	other and propel the box right over . That was
19:57	one of the theories that was out there . There's
19:58	another competing theories , but no one had actually really
20:00	figured it out because they were like , okay ,
20:02	the water fires on the water floating is good ,
20:05	but it wasn't clear how they were actually able to
20:08	go forward . I thought that was crazy , like
20:11	how do you not know that ? Yeah I know
20:16	. This time we look at a lot more about
20:18	kids like this layer . Mr smack war places .
20:26	Yeah , you can stand on that memory . Great
20:31	, great question . A great .2 . So water
20:34	has some really interesting poverty . The question is about
20:37	the top surface of the water . Now that's called
20:40	surface tension . And the water striders are able to
20:45	take advantage of surface tension in order to float .
20:48	And people debated what elements of certain tension we're helping
20:51	them propel themselves . So that was that was another
20:54	one of the challenges . There's a lot of really
20:55	great stuff out there about surface tension actually . And
20:59	that that I couldn't give a whole lecture about all
21:01	the awesomeness that is out there . Here's a good
21:03	take home experiment for you all about surface tension .
21:06	So if you take cheerios , cheerios and a bowl
21:09	of milk don't for a whole lot bowl of milk
21:12	. Put a couple cheerios and you'll find that if
21:15	they come close together , they'll actually stick , which
21:18	is weird . Right ? Like there's no blue .
21:21	Why are they sticking ? And they're sticking as a
21:23	result of surface tension . There's actually an energy minimization
21:27	that happens when the cheerios come close to each other
21:30	. And so that stickiness is actually a result of
21:33	surface tension . Okay . It's really cool . That's
21:37	like one of my favorite experiments . There's another thing
21:39	that , you know , when I was four years
21:40	old , I wanted on my cheerios based out in
21:42	the bowl , I couldn't figure out why they wouldn't
21:44	stay where I put them . Physics . Physics .
21:47	It's always physics calls . All right . One more
21:52	question and then we're going to turn it over the
21:53	next what's the biggest thing ? Well , the biggest
21:56	thing , I mean car , do you mean the
22:01	largest or the most complicated for ? That was complicated
22:06	. That's hard . I think about all the projects
22:10	I've worked on with lots of different people . There's
22:12	probably some of those that are watching more complex .
22:14	I think probably if you talk about complexity in the
22:17	shortest amount of time , it was the Pepperoni .
22:20	So we went from the idea for the 3D pasta
22:23	printer to a pasta printing device in less than two
22:27	weeks . So that had a huge amount of complexity
22:31	and we all worked really , really hard to finish
22:32	it up that quickly . But it was just something
22:35	that we want to do . It was really ,
22:38	really fun . So it doesn't have to be a
22:40	long term project either something faster than . Thank you
22:45	very much for joining me .

Summarizer

DESCRIPTION:

OVERVIEW:

Dr. Dawn's STEM Story: Dawn Wendell at K12Live! (MIT Museum Second Fridays, 1-10-14) is a free educational video by MITK12Videos.

This page not only allows students and teachers view Dr. Dawn's STEM Story: Dawn Wendell at K12Live! (MIT Museum Second Fridays, 1-10-14) videos but also find engaging Sample Questions, Apps, Pins, Worksheets, Books related to the following topics.