The Daily Mining Gazette - Published: Wednesday, April 18, 2007 Print Article | Close Window Houghton students learn mysteries of physics MTU stages family event CAPTION: Garrett Neese/Daily Mining Gazette Michigan Tech University physics student Mike Gussert demonstrates the relationship between volume and pressure at Family Physics Night Tuesday. By GARRETT NEESE, DMG Writer HOUGHTON — Blow air into a tube, and the ping-pong balls inside fly out. Squeeze a bottle, and the weighted pen cap floating inside sinks. Houghton Elementary School students learned the secrets behind those mysteries and others at Family Physics Night on Tuesday. The event was put on by the Michigan Tech Society of Physics Students and the Western Upper Peninsula Center for Science, Mathematics and Environmental Education. The 11 exhibits included magnetics, making music with glasses of water and measuring the rolling speed of different objects. Kindergartner Grace Zhang’s favorite part was “using the air and pushing the ball up” in the “Amazing Air Tricks” station. That was a display of the Bernoulli Principle, which states that an increase in velocity will result in a decrease in pressure. An air hose, sprayed into a tube of ping-pong balls at a certain angle, sent the balls flying out. At another, it sent the ball spinning furiously. Tech physics student Mike Gussert said the night went well. “A lot of the kids seemed to really enjoy it,” he said. “It’s a great experience for them, I think. A lot of parents really seemed to like it, too. I had some that were amazed at the Cartesian Diver.” In that exhibit, students packed clay on either end of a pen cap, then put it in a pop bottle filled with water. By squeezing the bottle, they decreased the volume of the air in the pen cap. As a result, the weight outpaces the buoyancy of the pen, causing it to sink.Casey Rudkin has two daughters in the fourth-grade. The night was “fantastic” for getting them into science. “This put the fun back in it, so this is great,” she said. Tech students also put on a Chemistry Night last year at C-L-K Elementary School. What’s next? Possibly an Engineering Night, said Western U.P. Center co-director Joan Chadde. “We’re getting a really positive response, and so we’re going to keep working on it,” she said. Garrett Neese can be reached at gneese@mininggazette.com