TAKE YOUR CHILD TO WORK DAY
On April 27, 2006, Eltron Research hosted “Take Our Child to Work Day” and welcomed children of employees to experience their parent’s workplace first-hand. The activities for the day included visitor safety training, tours of the laboratory and machine shop, science experiments, and various hands-on demonstrations designed to encourage their interest in science.
The day officially started off with some basic visitor safety training presented by Morris Berton. Everyone was outfitted with a visitor’s badge and some PPE (personal protective equipment). This included lab coats, safety glasses, goggles, ear plugs, and respirators. He demonstrated the use of face shields, hard hats, and various gloves used within the laboratory. Discussions covered important issues such as “Why is safety important?”, PPE, and Emergency Procedures. They covered visitor procedures in the event of an emergency such as various alarms, evacuation procedures, and detection of a fire. They watched a video entitled “Emergency Response”, which covered some emergencies that might occur in a laboratory (fire, radioactive material spill, bio-hazard release, and chemical spills). After the video presentation, Dan Riffell came in to demonstrate a SCBA (Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus). After Dan’s demonstration, the children then put on their PPE and made their first trip into the laboratory where the function and use of a chemical fume hood was explained. After that they went back to the conference room to meet Jesse Taylor, who would lead the group on a tour of the whole laboratory.
Jesse Taylor escorted the children on a short tour of the laboratory. They discussed many of the projects that are currently underway at Eltron. He explained the science and purpose of each of the projects as they toured the laboratory. They visited the facility’s instrument room and reviewed the various instruments and why they are important to the research we do. The children were very interested in the projects that their parents are directly involved with.
In his tour of the machine shop, Dan Riffell went over the specific uses of each tool, and did some simple machining tasks. After that, they tried to find as many different ways to make a hole in a metal disc as possible. Each child chose a different machine to perform this simple task. They used the vertical knee mill, the tool-room lathe, the drill press, and a large hand punch. The discs were great souvenirs for each of them to take home. They also discussed the many different ways a finished part could be made from raw material. There was no shortage of interesting ideas, but some were more practical than others. At the end of the tour they had time for one of the kids to use the abrasive cut-off saw, which produces lots of sparks as it cut through a piece of metal.
Paul Grimmer was pleased to visit with the children. Their keen interest in their parent’s work indicates a possible future in science. He explained the importance of safety and discussed office business activities such as accounting, recordkeeping, purchasing, human resources, etc. They left with a better appreciation of how all of the parts need to work together to make the company function properly.
After their discussion with Paul Grimmer, Nathan Young introduced the kids to the microscopy lab and discussed how microscopes function. Using a binocular microscope, they looked at fingernails, a penny, a strand of hair, the point of a ballpoint pen. Each child helped capture a digital image of their selection and printed the image to take home. Next on the tour was the sputter coating machine. The kids were instructed on how a sputter coating procedure is used to coat objects with a thin film of metals. Eventually, they coated some objects with a thin layer of gold. When finished, Erick Schutte took the kids over to a demonstration on corrosion. He demonstrated the different corrosion resistant properties of zinc and copper in post-1982 pennies.
Sara Rolfe introduced the children to the scanning electron microscope (SEM) and energy dispersive spectrometer (EDX). The kids explained what they had learned about vacuum chambers and microscopes. The SEM can reach much higher magnifications (300,000x) than the optical microscopes (1000x). The EDX can determine the elemental composition of an object.
Jay Patel demonstrated how electricity could be generated by hydrogen and air (oxygen). The children learned that a fuel cell has the potential to be cleaner (less pollution) and much more efficient and than electricity produced by combustion of fossil fuels. Eltron Research’s fuel cell demonstration consisted of a proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell stack connected to an electric motor, multiple LED’s, a buzzer, and two electrical meters (current and voltage measurement). A small hydrogen tank was used as the fuel source. The children observed that as the hydrogen (fuel) flow increased, the voltage and current increased proportionally. Also, as the voltage increased due to a higher fuel flow, the electric motor ran faster and LED’s got brighter.
Sara and the kids had some fun with liquid nitrogen. Sara demonstrated the freezing power of liquid nitrogen, making flexible plastic become hard and brittle. By placing an inflated latex glove into liquid nitrogen, Nathan demonstrated how the cold temperature of the liquid nitrogen decreased the volume gas inside the gloves, shrinking the inflated glove into a small volume. Then, as the glove warmed back up to room temperature, the glove re-expanded to its original volume. The most enjoyable part of this demonstration was disposing of the liquid nitrogen. The excess liquid was poured on the floor and kids cheered and ran after the tiny liquid bubbles as they quickly evaporated into the air.
In Michael Pierce’s program, the children learned the process of building an analog prototype circuit. This hands-on learning exercise allowed the children to use different tools to build an example circuit. They learned how to use wire cutters to trim components and then place the components (resistors) onto the prototype circuit board. After placing the components they learned the proper way to use a soldering iron.
At the conclusion of the day, the children visited their parent’s work area before returning home.