Questions to Ask: How are auroras made? Scientists wanted to know if STEVE is made in a different way to auroras. How could you test whether STEVE is different from auroras?

Suggested Answer:  Auroras are made when charged particles trapped by the Earth’s magnetic field hit oxygen molecules in the atmosphere. This collision gives off energy in the form of green light. You could test whether STEVE is made in a different way to auroras. Evidence that they are the same would be if, like auroras, there is a large increase in charged particles in the atmosphere whenever STEVE happens. Scientists didn’t see this happen – therefore they agreed that STEVE is not the same as an aurora!

Sharing with kids: Did you know that other human-like species existed a long time ago but died out? The modern human species called Homo Sapiens is the only one left. Paleogeneticists (scientists that look at the genes of fossil remains) investigated the genome (the entire set of genes) of a bone found in Russia. They found that it belonged to a 13-year-old girl, whose mum was a Neanderthal (one type of extinct human-like species) and dad was a Denisovan (another type).

Questions to Ask: Do you know of any animals that are hybrids or mixes of species (a type of animal)? Why are species hybrids rare?

Suggested Answer:  Mule (female horse x male donkey), liger (female tiger x male lion), pizzly (polar bear x grizzly bear). All hybrids are from species that are closely related together (part of the same Genus – larger family). Each type of animal often has a unique number of chromosomes (the things that carry our genes). E.g. donkeys have 62, horses have 64. It is difficult to mix two animals with a different number of chromosomes. If they do happen to make children (hybrids), the children are often not able to have children of their own.

Sharing with kids: Instead of using swipe cards to get into buildings, credit cards to pay for things, or remembering passwords for computers, people working at a US company volunteered to have a microchip injected into their hands that do all these functions instead. The microchip stores information electronically and is only very small – the size of a rice grain. It also stores the person’s basic medical information e.g. if they have a heart condition. The microchip relies on radiofrequency waves from the microchip reader to give it the energy to send information.

Questions to Ask: What do you think is the advantage of using these microchips? What do you think might be some downsides to using them? Would you like one being put into your hand?

Suggested Answer:  These questions are designed to get kids to put their thinking caps on! Some answers might be: advantages – saves time, saves plastic card waste, one-day medical information can easily be read during a medical emergency. Disadvantages – privacy issues, don’t know if there are any long term side effects of having them inside your body, might accidentally move to another part of the body. There’s no right or wrong answer to the last question.

Sharing with kids: The number of bees worldwide that are dying is increasing and this fact is pretty scary. Scientists are doing studies to try and find out why that is.

Questions to Ask: What role do bees have and how does it impact us, humans?

Suggested Answer: Bees play a huge role in the pollination of plants. Pollination is the transfer of pollen from the male part of a plant, to the female part so that it can be fertilised and make seeds for new plants. Bees pollinate 70 of the 100 types of plant crops that feed most of the world’s population. If bees die, we wouldn’t be able to grow the plant crops that we eat and use e.g. certain vegies, fruits, and cotton. We also wouldn’t have a lot of the flowers that we know and love, like sunflowers!

Sharing with kids: The US government approved a new medicine or good ‘drug’ to treat an inherited disease. Genes, which we inherit from our parents, contain instructions to make proteins that carry out the body’s functions. Messenger RNA acts as a messenger between genes and our cells’ protein-making factories. The new drug works by stopping the messenger RNA that would usually allow mutated or damaged genes to make the wrong proteins. The technology behind the drug was discovered 20 years ago.

Questions to ask: Why is it important to do proper tests, in animals and humans, before the government allows a new drug to be sold to patients? 

Suggested Answer: To make sure that the drug will work properly i.e. do what it claims to do and that it doesn’t cause unwanted serious side effects. The first tests are usually done with a small number of participants. It takes time to conduct tests (‘clinical trials’) of several people over a long enough time to safely say the drug works properly.