RE Log - Spring 2020

SPRING 2020 Ransom Everglades LOG 17 Frost Science and helped me set it up. They took the lead on the issue of how to handle the bay water samples. They were joined by Clara Villalba ’22, Isa Ciocca ’20 and Khushi Shah ’19 , who answered my call for lab assistants and showed up to join our team. The girls at first tried freezing the samples – with dry ice and at different temperatures. They tried different techniques to turn them into gels. The other problem we had: since no one had previously tested liquid samples with laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy, there were no available containers to hold the samples. There was literally nothing available anywhere. So I walked over to RE engineering and robotics teacher Bob DuBard and asked him if he had any students who could help us design what we needed. Max Vallone ’22 and Josh Buttrick ’22 were working on robotics in the summer at RE. I asked the two boys and they jumped at the opportunity. They were thrilled to join this project, and they barely knew what it was. They asked us all sorts of questions, and started designing containers in AutoCAD. We needed a container that wouldn’t interfere with the measurement. We needed a container that wouldn’t be contaminated with the samples, and was reusable. It had to be impenetrable, and it had to avoid spilling the samples. They worked on a bunch of designs, and we finally found one that worked. They used one of our 3D printers to print the container. It cost two cents to produce. Josh Buttrick ’22 and Max Vallone ’22 hold containers they created to hold liquid samples for laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy. Meanwhile, the girls settled on the best technique for working with the samples – adding three percent agarose to create a gel. In three-and-a-half weeks, the girls tested 60,000 samples. They were so determined. I would stay until 11 p.m. or later every day, and I would kick them out at 7 p.m. to go home to their families. They asked if they could come at 6 a.m. instead of 7 a.m. I was tired, sleeping about four hours a night, but I didn’t feel it. The rush was incredible. We worked so well in tandem. It was full collaboration. We were all colleagues, from 14 years old to whatever the oldest was. Thanks to the girls’ efforts, we had solidified the samples. Thanks to Max and Josh, we had a container that would hold them. But when we fired the laser at the samples, and studied the emission spectra produced, we had trouble identifying the heavy metals. With much effort working with databases from the National Institute of Standards, we eventually identifed zinc, mercury, copper, nickel and iron. STEMat RE Isa Ciocca ’20 prepares to gelatinize bay samples.