Small Bodies of the Solar System

Saturday, May 5, 2001
1:30 - 4:30 p.m.
Rushmore Plaza Civic Center
Room 205

Instructor: Jami Stone, certified by NASA's Solar System Educator Program

This workshop will focus on the study of the small bodies of the solar system, comets, meteorites, and asteroids (particularly comets).  An overview of NASA's Stardust Space Mission and why scientists are interested in studying comets will be provided.

Participants will make dry ice comets (the activity is called "Cooking Up a Comet") and also learn how to scale down the activity so that their students can make mini-comets. We will do an activity on "Cometary Orbits".  We will do an activity on "Comet Cratering" and how velocity affects the size of an impact crater.  Participants will be introduced to aerogel, an amazing substance, which is used to collect the particles from the coma of comet Wild-2 (the comet Stardust is melting). We will do an activity called "Aerojello" which provides a model for students to understand how the cometary particles will be captured in the aerogel.  Participants will learn how data, such as pictures, are transmitted back from a spacecraft to mission control.

The Stardust workshop end with "The Incredible Edible Comet", where participants will make ice cream comets as final reinforcement that they can use with their students to help them remember what they learned about comets.

To register for this free workshop on Saturday, May 5, 2001, send your name, address, phone number and school affiliation to Tom Durkin, SD Space Grant Consortium (605-394-1975).

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