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Getting a Grip on Geysers

with Mara Reed, Ph.D. candidate at UC Berkeley’s Department of Earth and Planetary Science

Wednesday, February 7th, 2024 * 7:30 – 8:30 pm at Terra Linda High School’s Innovation Hub

Description: Geysers are rare geological features—only ~1000 exist on our planet! Come learn about what geysers are, where they form, and how scientists study them. Then, get acquainted with one of Yellowstone National Park’s star performers: Steamboat Geyser, the tallest active geyser in the world. Using Steamboat as a case study, we’ll investigate why geysers might suddenly come to life after many years without erupting and whether earthquakes can influence geyser activity.

Mara Reed

Bio: Mara is a Minnesota-born PhD candidate in the Department of Earth and Planetary Science at UC Berkeley. She loves watching water boil and wants to understand the reasons why geysers start and stop erupting. If Mara isn’t in California, there is a 90% chance she’s in Yellowstone National Park for fieldwork or fun. When not thinking about geysers, Mara likes to explore and photograph caves. She also enjoys hiking and is trying to overcome her fear of climbing by bouldering at Pacific Pipe.

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Beware of the Aliens! Studies on Invasive Plant Pathogens at Dominican University

with Wolfgang Schweigkofler Ph.D. of Dominican University, San Rafael

Wednesday, March 20th, 2024 ~ 7:30 – 8:30 pm at Terra Linda High School’s Innovation Hub

Description:

Invasive organisms are animals, plants or microorganisms, which evolved in a different ecosystem and then were introduced into a new area by human activity. In the new environment, these invasive organisms can express some very negative effects on native biodiversity, e.g. by overgrowing native plants, killing native animals or spreading animal or plant diseases. Our research group at Dominican University studies the effects of tiny microorganisms on our forests in Coastal California. A ‘fungus-like’ pathogen, called Phytophthora ramorum, can infect many tree species (e.g. oaks) and causes a disease called ‘Sudden Oak Death’. We try to better understand the biology of the pathogen and develop methods to control its spread. We use a number of different methods, e.g. microscopic observations, immunotests and DNA-sequencing, to study the disease in our research lab, our research field site and in the natural environment.

Bio: Wolfgang Schweigkofler grew up on a small family winery in Bozano/Bozen (Italy). He holds a master degree in Microbiology from the University of Vienna, Austria, and a PhD in Applied Biology from the University of Natural Resources and Applied Life Sciences, Vienna. Wolfgang was a Postdoctoral fellow first at the Research Center Laimburg, Italy, working on bio-control of soil-dwelling insects, and then at UC Berkeley,US, working on forest pathogens. From 2004-2011 he  worked as a senior plant pathologist at the Research Center Laimburg. He then moved to the USA, working shortly at a biotech start-up before accepting a position at the Dominican University of California in San Rafael. Currently he is a Research Associate Professor and program manager at NORS-DUC, the National Ornamentals Research Site at Dominican University. His research interests include diseases of grapevine, apple and ornamentals, forest pathology, biological control, biodiversity and invasive biology. Wolfgang co-authored two book chapters on fungal biodiversity and published more than 30 scientific and technical papers.

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The Most Famous Equation: What is E=mc2

E = mc^2

with Tucker Hiatt of Wonderfest, Bay Area Beacon of Science

Wednesday, January 31st, 2024 7:30 – 8:30 pm at Terra Linda High School’s Innovation Hub

Around the world, people recognize that E=mc^2 oozes cosmic insight. But what does this “most famous equation” really say? What are energy and mass? And what makes the speed of light, c, so important? [Hint: mass, moving at speed c, doesn’t turn into energy!] Using little more than common experience and middle-school math, Einstein’s “special relativity” gem can come to life — with surprising insights into the nature of reality.

This event is co-produced by Wonderfest and Marin Science Seminar. Our speaker is long-time physics teacher Tucker Hiatt, founding director of Wonderfest. Tucker has been a Visiting Scholar in the Stanford Chemistry Department, and is a recipient of the Amgen Award for Science Teaching Excellence.

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Invention in Medicine: How Medical Devices get Invented and Go to Market

with Art Wallace MD PhD of VAMC SF and UCSF

Wednesday, November 8, 2023 – 7:30-8:30 pm, Terra Linda HS Innovation Hub

Dr. Wallace started out in experimental surgery and radiology studying imaging of the heart using CT scanners. He has worked on a number of devices that originally were built for experimental studies that evolved into clinically useful devices including a cardiac output monitor, the off pump CABG, off pump aneurysm surgery, electronic sedation, and a selective coronary vasodialtor. Dr. Wallace will explain his experiences with the inventive process using examples from both device design and drug development. There will be a brief discussion of the importance of intellectual property, patents, venture capital, FDA approval, and business development in completing the invention process. There will be a demonstration of his recent developmental project on a non-contact, remote patient monitor designed to prevent cardiac arrests.

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Archaeology and Ecological Crisis: Lessons in Sustainability from the Past

with Elic Weitzel, Ph.D. candidate, University of Connecticut

Wednesday, October 25, 2023, TLHS Innovation Hub, 7:30pm

Description: The world today is facing a variety of ecological crises and to combat these crises, policymakers are working hard to promote sustainability. While rarely included in policy discussions, archaeology has a part to play in contributing to a sustainable future. Archaeology uniquely provides us with thousands of years of information about how other societies interacted with their environments: how they used natural resources, managed their ecosystems, and either thrived or collapsed based on these interactions. Elic Weitzel – a human ecologist and archaeologist at the University of Connecticut – will describe some of the contributions archaeology can make to understanding sustainability, highlighting his own work on natural resource use and management in precolonial and early colonial North America. His research investigates how deliberately set fires can impact ecosystem health and resource abundance, how human demographic change impacts resource consumption, and how unsustainability often follows from commodification of natural resources in profit-driven economies. His talk will focus specifically on white-tailed deer, exploring why precolonial deer herds were hunted sustainably for millennia while colonial-era deer populations crashed soon after the arrival of European colonists. Elic will conclude his talk by discussing the environmental policy implications of these archaeological results, highlighting that the power of archaeology and the study of past societies is in reminding us that the way things are today is not necessarily the way that things must be.

Bio: Elic Weitzel is a human ecologist and anthropological archaeologist interested in how humans both adapt to and modify their environments. The bulk of his research concerns the ecology of sustainable and unsustainable natural resource use and management, spanning time periods from the Pleistocene to the present. He has published on topics such as Ice Age megafauna extinctions, the origins of farming, the historical ecology of white-tailed deer, and the ecological consequences of European capitalism and colonialism. Elic is a Ph.D. candidate in anthropology at the University of Connecticut and holds a M.S. from the University of Utah and a B.A. from Dickinson College.

Eric Weitzel
Elic Weitzel

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Renewable Power!

Powering electric cars and storing renewable energy with energy-dense batteries

with Jason Lipton (TLHS ’13) of HRL Laboratories in Malibu, CA

ZOOM seminar Wed. March 6, 2024 | 7:30 – 8:30pm – Use the Contact Form to request an invite. Please state in the comments of the contact form that you would like a Zoom link, and let us know how you heard about the event.

Description: How can we power electric cars and store renewable energy? Energy-dense batteries are one solution. Learn about this and about the field of chemical engineering in this live Zoom presentation with Terra Linda High School alum, Jason Lipton.

Jason Lipton, Ph.D.

Bio: Jason Lipton is a chemical engineer and research scientist at HRL Labs in Malibu, California. He is a graduate of Terra Linda High School (’13), UC Santa Barbara (BS Chemistry), Yale University (MS Chemical Engineering), and NYU (PhD Chemical Engineering).

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Through the Fantastic Eyes of Frogs and Toads: How Scientists Study what Frogs and Toads See

with Rayna Bell Ph.D., Assistant Curator of Herpetology, California Academy of Sciences

NEW DATE! Wednesday, November 15th, 2023 – TLHS Innovation Hub – 7:30 – 8:30pm

Green tree frog. Photo by Andrew Stanbridge
A Hyperolius molleri frog on São Tomé Island. Photo by Andrew Stanbridge

Dr. Rayna Bell grew up in Marin County and her love of science was nurtured by several wonderful teachers at Drake (now Archie Williams) High School. Rayna attended College of Marin and the University of California, Berkeley where she studied biology and interned at U.C. Berkeley’s Museum of Vertebrate Zoology where she started doing research on Australian frogs and lizards. She received her Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from Cornell University, during which she conducted research on African tree frogs, and joined the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History as Curator of Amphibians and Reptiles. In 2019, Rayna moved back home to the California Academy of Sciences where she is the Associate Curator of Herpetology. Rayna’s research focuses on the ecology, evolution, and conservation of amphibians and reptiles with an emphasis on island biogeography, hybrid zones, and coloration.

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Unveiling the Secrets of Volcanoes

in the Springerville Volcanic Field

with Marissa Mnich Ph.D. of Sonoma State University

Wednesday, September 20, 2023, Terra Linda HS Innovation Hub

Important update for those planning to attend tonight’s Marin Science Seminar! Due to construction at Terra Linda HS, the Innovation Hub can only be accessed from the courtyard inside the campus. You can park anywhere, but you need to enter via the student quad area between the new gym and the admin building. From there, access thru the doors to the 100 building. We will have signage and guides to help people find the Hub. Sorry for the inconvenience. Looking forward! 😃

Description: The Springerville Volcanic Field (SVF), located in east-central Arizona, erupted between 2.1 million and 300,000 years ago, and erupted over 500 distinct lavas. The volcanic products of the field have been mapped and sampled in great detail, which serves as the basis to unraveling the volcanic history to the field. Several similar volcanic fields pose a great risk to people and towns, but aren’t studied in real time (like monitoring at larger, active volcanoes), making the lessons learned in the SVF invaluable for understanding the nature and hazards associated with this type of volcanism.

Bio: Dr. Marissa Mnich is a professor in the geology department at Sonoma State University. Her work has focused on understanding volcanic systems in various locations on Earth, but largely focused on the Springerville Volcanic Field in Arizona.

Dr. Marissa Mnich

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What Can AI Teach us About the Human Mind… and vice versa?

with Irina Rabkina Ph.D. of Occidental College, Los Angeles

Wednesday, October 11, 2023 7:30-8:30pm, Terra Linda High School Innovation Hub

Scientists often use models to study complicated and interesting phenomena (think the model of the atom, mouse models to study cancer, etc.). In particular, computational models allow us to improve our understanding of phenomena that cannot be observed directly, whether due to time (such as predicting earthquakes) or access constraints (such as understanding the functions of the human mind). Depending on what they are modeling and why, computational models may use statistics, simulation, and/or artificial intelligence (AI). In this talk, Prof. Irina Rabkina (TLHS ’10) will discuss the use of AI models in Cognitive Science, what they can teach us about the human mind, and how that new understanding can, in turn, be used to improve AI as a tool.

Bio: Professor Rabkina is a Terra Linda High School graduate (2010) who is currently Assistant Professor of Computer Science Irina’s interest in neuroscience sprang from a talk she heard through Marin Science Seminar, so she is excited to return to the source and share her experience.

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