Sun & Earth Day, Magnetic Magic

Sun & Earth Day, Magnetic Magic:
Saturday, March 20th, was not only Vernal Equinox, but the annual Sun-Earth Day: a NASA effort promoted around the country to focus attention on the special connections between the Sun and the Earth. This year's theme: Magnetic Storms! That gave me a lot to work with-Sun-Earth Day usually does, but the opportunity to create more hands-on experiences for our visitors, the better, and when it comes to curious natural phenomena, magnetism is a fertile subject for all sorts or seemingly magical fun. So, I turned Chabot's Chemistry / Physics Magnetism laboratory classroom into a public, giving visitors a chance to learn, or relearn, some of the basics of magnets, as well as to connect the tabletop experiments to phenomena that take place on enormous scales on the Sun and the Earth. First was magnetic polarity: playing with a set of magnets, visitors got a feel for the behavior of magnetic poles N and S-and how opposite poles attract and like poles repel. (It's always fun to feel the pull of attraction between two magnets, but there's something extraordinary about the feeling of repulsion push-your mind just expects to see little bumpers on the magnets, but there's seemingly nothing there!) The Earth itself is a giant magnet, as most of us know, but what many of the adults found surprising and intriguing is the polarity of Earth's magnetic field. Using small magnetic compasses, we sought out the Earth's magnetic poles: north and south. By taking careful notice of which type of magnetic pole pointed to the compass needle ends, the fact that the magnetic pole of the Earth up near the geographic north pole is a south-or 'S'-magnetic pole was revealed! This is why in physics we are often careful to refer to magnetic poles as 'S' and 'N', not north and south, to avoid confusion. At another station, visitors made their own magnetic compasses by singing an iron nail stuck through a Styrofoam packing peanut and floating it in a bowl of water. Darned if that did not nail stubbornly turn to floating point in the same direction, no matter what direction we tried to turn it! Station 3 was about mapping the invisible magnetic force field surrounding various magnets. Human eyes can not see magnetic fields, but they are there and have an influence. I had constructed magnetic field mapping devices for this purpose: used CD jewel cases, labeling with paper removed, filled with a SPRINKLING or iron filings. When shaken gently back and forth, as if panning for gold, the iron filings align and connect in gritty little strings and according to the pattern of the magnetic field. The strong converging field at the two poles of a magnet were boldly evident, but also to be seen were the more tenuous curls of field lines arcing through the space around the magnet. The patterns formed by the filings were very similar to the patterns seen in images of Sunspots we compared them to. On the Sun, it is not iron filings that trace the invisible magnetic fields for us to see, but hot, electrically charged gas, or plasma (mostly hydrogen and helium, but also traces of calcium, iron, and other elements). Electric charges (electrons and ionized atomic nuclei) are strongly affected by magnetic fields when they move through them. Numerous ultraviolet images of the Sun were available on computer screens around the lab for visitors to compare the magnetic patterns and shapes to. We had more: building from an electro magnet wire, an iron nail, and a battery. This demonstrates how magnetic fields are created by moving electric charge in the electrically-conductive wire of the electro magnet in the circulation of electrical current inside the Earth's iron core, and in the motions of plasma on the Sun. It's all moving electricity, friend. We also conducted "Magnetic Yacht Races: Pushing through the repulsion of like poles, a floating, magnetized" yacht "across a pound or water. The challenge of propelling and steering the yacht yachts led to some interesting designs, certain configurations of packing peanuts and iron nails proved easier to accelerate and maneuver than others. Sun Happy Earth Day 2010! I wonder what we'll be doing next year.
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