Science Circle

Classical Concert
2024-12-01 07:00 - 08:00, 2024-12-08 07:00 - 08:00, 2024-12-15 07:00 - 08:00, 2025-01-05 07:00 - 08:00, 2025-01-12 07:00 - 08:00, 2025-01-19 07:00 - 08:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | The Lighthouse Café

Moon Base Meeting
2024-12-02 10:00 - 11:00, 2024-12-09 10:00 - 11:00, 2024-12-16 10:00 - 11:00, 2024-12-23 10:00 - 11:00, 2024-12-30 10:00 - 11:00, 2025-01-06 10:00 - 11:00, 2025-01-13 10:00 - 11:00, 2025-01-20 10:00 - 11:00 | Moon base

Mathematics Club
2024-12-05 16:00 - 17:00, 2024-12-19 16:00 - 17:00, 2025-01-02 16:00 - 17:00, 2025-01-09 16:00 - 17:00, 2025-01-16 16:00 - 17:00, 2025-01-23 16:00 - 17:00 | Maths Club

SC Field Trip: Whole Brain Health
2024-12-07 10:00 - 11:00 | Whole Brain Health
Whole Brain Health presents the most recent multimedia self-guided tour! Simply Impossible by Thuja Hynes exploits the SL physics engine to create marvelous unscripted and perpetual machines, including the Lemniscate, rocking blocks, ceiling fan, carousel, and more! With Gifts and Instructions to build your own!
Destination is http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Inspiration%20Island/116/36/22
But we will gather at Science Circle before going over en mass.

NO Mathematics Club
2024-12-12 16:00 - 17:00
Cancelled

SC Field Trip: Virtual Worlds Education Consortium
2024-12-14 10:00 - 11:00
VW Education Consortium (VWEC) was founded in January 2021 as a way bring educators together both to share successes and to tackle obstacles across virtual platforms and communities.

When Linden Labs wanted to establish an educational region in Second Life, the VWEC became a central hub for this effort. The Science Circle and tens of other organizations are now part of this greater educational community. You will find a link to us and a partial list of other members at https://www.vweconsortium.org/communities/

Join us for this field trip to the hub of education in Second Life. We will gather at the Science Circle auditorium at 10am SLT on Saturday before proceeding to VWEC island at http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/VWEC%20Eduverse/219/105/45

SC Field Trip: Scientia
2024-12-21 10:00 - 11:00
Our field trip this week is to Scientia, our nearest neighbor in Second Life.
Scientia is the new name for Virtech, the virtual presence of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
We will arrive at the Scientia Central Plaza to begin our field trip: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Scientia/128/128/31
From the region’s website at https://virtual.caltech.edu/virtech
Scientia “is an experimental platform for online education, operated by the Virtual Reality Lab, which is a part of the Center for Data-Driven Discovery at Caltech. It was designed to furnish the Caltech community with an alternative to in-person interactions during the pandemic. Through the use of avatars, participants can visit a rich virtual space furnished to enable engaging experience as well as seamless social interaction. It is open to all members of the Caltech community and their approved guests, as well as the members of other academic communities by a special arrangement.”
From https://virtual.caltech.edu/virtech/virtech-and-second-life
“Caltech uses Scientia to experiment with various combined technologies for online learning, and virtual teaching labs in particular. A general consensus is that using virtual worlds for education can lead to better learning outcomes, as the students find the lectures and demonstrations more engaging and more memorable than those delivered through a standard video (e.g., YouTube) or conferencing (e.g., Zoom) platforms. VWs also provide a channel for the human interaction component of the learning process (both student to student and student to instructor) that is clearly superior to other online mechanisms such as the discussion threads, social media posts, or video conferencing, and that is their major strength. While such interactions are obviously not as good as those in the physical reality, they can be pretty close, once the participants get used to the platform and identify with their avatars.”

NO Classical Concert
2024-12-22 07:00 - 08:00, 2024-12-29 07:00 - 08:00 | The Lighthouse Café
cancelled for the holiday

NO Mathematics Club
2024-12-26 16:00 - 17:00
Cancelled for holidays

SC Field Trip: Chemistry World
2024-12-28 10:00 - 23:00 | Chemistry World
Explore the region south of Science Circle with Mike Shaw. Chemistry World is contiguous with Science Circle at its southern border. It is a working educational region, serving about 160 engineering college students in freshman Chemistry labs annually. Originally designed by faculty at Texas A&M and Florida Tech, the region now boasts a total of 4 Chemistry Lab activities, conference areas suitable for peer-led Team Learning, an environmental recreation of the Tantramar Marsh, and many fun Chemistry Easter eggs.
https://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Chemistry%20World/183/48/26

2024 Genome Editing Year in Review
2025-01-04 10:00 - 11:00 | Auditorium
2024 Genome Editing Year in Review
Every year there are new advances in genome engineering enabled by CRISPR/Cas and other editing systems. In this talk, the most important and interesting news in gene editing from 2024 will be presented. Come learn about Technology Advances, New Tools, Intellectual Property, and Target Genes and Modified Organisms from a practitioner in the field. This year’s emphasis will be on some of the developments most adjacent to the public.
Stephen Gasior, Ph.D.
Stephen’s previous talks

Playing God: How Selenium Nanoparticles Change Plants, Heal People and Protect Nature
2025-01-18 10:00 - 11:00 | Auditorium
Presented by Anton Shiriaev Ph.D.
Around one billion people on Earth lack Selenium (Se) in their diet. In severe cases, Se deficiency causes diseases and disorders in humans. Se is not essential for plants, however, they metabolize toxic Se forms from the soil into bioavailable organic molecules. Consuming fruit and vegetables enriched with Se is one of the ways to overcome or prevent dietary deficit.
We engineered three strategies allowing enriching tomato fruit with Se: plant foliar spraying, vacuum infiltration and passive immersion. Additionally to traditional methods, we introduced the application of Se nanoparticles, produced chemically or created by tiny microbes (Stenotrophomonas maltophilia). We discovered that Se, besides elevating the nutritional value of tomatoes, triggers molecular machinery resulting in better fruit quality, and potentially prolonged shelf-life.
Come to explore with us
Why Selenium used to be called an “essential poison”?
What does Selenium have in common with cuckoo birds?
Why to design better tomatoes, our research group have dared to play God three times?
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