Adler After Dark

Location: Adler Planetarium

Date: Thursday, June 18, 2015; 5:30-10:30 pm

Tonight’s theme was “Is there anybody there” i.e. extra-terrestrial life and thus some of the activities that Michael had sent us were directly related to that, like building your own UFO.  I thought I was running late and so took a cab, but upon arrival realized that it was summer hours, meaning we started 30 minutes later.  I checked in and picked up my supplies for “Smelly Space” - which is of course my favorite activity to do - and then went to the classroom for pizza. I sat down with our usual volunteers and we had a “Scavenger Hunt Bingo” on the agenda this evening as well.  A few of the squares were quotes from famous movies like “ET Phone Home” or “KHAAAAN” etc. and if the guests gave us that, we were to respond with a code word that they could put on their Bingo Board.  I said that I would make the guests do the quotes like the actual dialogues in movies; not just say it.

We went on the tour, and first stop was ‘PXP class room’ where UFO building activity would take place.  The guests were encouraged to use items such as disposables, plates, glasses etc., along with LEDs, and make circuits to light them up using Aluminum tape - because as we all know, the best UFO’s have bright flashing lights!  Next up was a stop at the “Community Classroom”, where guests were encouraged to build a telescope mount for their smart phones, again using whatever materials were available.  The idea was to be able to take a picture through the telescope, and there were bonus points for being hands-free.  In the room across the classroom, there was a demo on how light sensors work, where small planet-like objects could be moved around to block a light source; which would then cause the sensor reading to spike.  The idea was to educate people on how “exoplanets” are discovered.  Final stop was to see the ‘Spectroscopy’ display, where there were tubes filled with different gases, and the guests would be asked to identify the constituents based on spectral pattern.

The various "layers" of Jupiter have different smells!

As per the schedule, I was doing “Smelly Space” from 6:30-7:30 and “UV Cart” from 7:30-8:30 – both with a new volunteer Phoebe, then a solo session of “Smelly Space” from 8:30-9:30, and finally “UFO Building” from 9:30-10.  Phoebe and I set off for our session just as guests started to come in.  Tonight’s special drink was green and with dry ice inside.  I saw a couple of ladies walking with those and indicated to Phoebe that we had a way to engage them.  I went over and asked them about the “smoke” from drinks and if they were absolutely sure that the drinks were safe.  One of them said that she had studied chemistry and I knew that we had our “hook”.  We went to a nearby table and I took all of my props out of the bag. We had moved away from squeeze bottles to small glass bottles with corks.  Our choices were "The Moon", "upper layers of Jupiter", "lower layers of Jupiter", "Titan" and "Io".  After the smell test, I asked why we had 2 samples from Jupiter and they had no idea why.  I said that it is a giant gas planet and the core is much denser than surface gases, meaning different constituents and different smells.  The next question was why it is important for us to know.  I said that this was consistent with the evening’s theme and it is an important step towards finding habitable worlds.  They seemed to be impressed for sure and we were off to a good start.

We ran the routine with some other people, and Phoebe did a good job by herself.  I saw that one guy in a group we engaged was wearing sunglasses and I told him to come downstairs in a bit so that we could test their effectiveness using the UV experiment.  At 7:30 we went there and while Phoebe took over the “IR Camera”, I sent up the cart with beads and fluorescent rocks and… bugs.  There were also Sunglasses and different grades of Sunscreen lotion in transparent plastic bags.  As people walked by, I would ask if they were from Chicago and if they missed the winter.  Then I would ask the people about their favorite summer activity, which invariable were going to the beach.  I would follow-up by asking them about the 2 things that they would carry to the beach - hinting they were on the cart - and people would say sunscreen and sunglasses.  Then I would say that today we would test the hypothesis whether those items were critical or if it was a marketing scam.

I would start by asking them to shine the UV light on the rocks and bugs and then follow-up with normal light.  The items – including the bugs – would fluoresce under UV and not under ordinary light, following which I would get into the discussion of "Fluorescence".  I would then ask them to shine the UV light on the beads for 10 seconds, after which they invariable changed color, followed by asking them to imagine that happening to their skin.  Having got their attention, I would ask them to test the hypothesis of the sunscreen and sunglasses and they would do so by either placing the pouch of sunscreen in front of the UV light or holding the sunglasses over the beads as they tested.  Some even tried with different grades of sunscreen.  When “protected”, the beads would not change color or were lightly faded and that proved the hypothesis that sunscreen and sunglasses provide protection from UV light, at which point I would ask them to be careful this summer.  Many people stopped by and were fascinated by the experiment.  Some wanted to test their own sunglasses - including the guy I had met earlier. 

At 8:30 pm, I left for my 2^nd round of “Smelly Space”.  One couple was very interested, and the woman asked how telescopes could see through all of the dust and stray objects in space.  It was a great question and since we were on the lower level, I took them to the wall of “Milky Way” and explained how different filters and telescopes can see through the gasses by using different lenses.  I got a few more guests, many of whom were walking about with the “UFO saucers” that they had made.  One of our prescribed activities was for them to take pictures with them and post on social media and so I made a few take pictures as if they were being chased by the UFO in question. 

I was headed to my last stop, which was making these UFO’s, and the classroom was more crowded than ever before.  People were highly engaged in this activity, meaning that there was general chaos.  My main task was to stand next to the supplies and provide LEDs, batteries, fishing line to tie the UFO, and in some cases little aliens to go inside.  Everyone wanted these tiny aliens and when we ran out, I encouraged people to make their own.  The designs were cool and we took several pictures.  It was by far the most popular activity and we had to literally ask people to leave at 10:15.  When there was reluctance, I said that whoever was still here in 10 seconds would help clean and started counting down.  The next day there was to be a kids summer camp here and there was litter on floor and tables.  In fact, we had spent a lot of energy “protecting” some of the camp supplies from being used.  Once all had left, we spent the next several minutes cleaning the tables and sweeping.  We did the best we could and then I went back down to return “Smelly Space” supplies before leaving.  It had been a fun night.