Ronan S.

3/20/25

Next year the W.I.L.D. lab is planned to be taking over the hydroponics lab, witch is a huge responsibly, especially since it is one of the oldest labs that is still in WISRD today. So today, I have been watching videos and researching hydroponic systems. I am planning on building a vertical set up.

Videos I have Watched:

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUKUuLcA83s

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rs-zQ1IjwZk

3/17/25

Today I fed the tanks as well as checked on the salt water tank seeing if there are any issues that I need to fix. We also have new brine shrimp eggs coming in soon so we can hopefully start hatching them soon.

3/10/25

Today I cleaned the interior glass on the salt water BioCube as well as researched new animals and organisms that can be added. I also worked on my “homemade” salt water witch has close to the same salinity as the large salt water tank.

3/3/25

Today I cleaned and organized the WILD table so it is easier for us to work and find samples or tools.

2/19/25

Today I restarted the brine shrimp hatchery and may have put in a bit to much eggs, but it will result in more food to feed all the tanks. The pros to using brine shrimp are its a live food, so the animals will use some of their more hunting instincts to receive their meal. It is also a more nutrient packed food that provides more health benefits to all the fish as well.

2/11/25

Today I used a endoscope to serch the small crevises of the salt water tank to see if we could get eyes on our goby fish and pistol shrimp. I was not able to locate them, they are so small and dig under ground so I didn’t expect to see them. I also set up a new dedicated brine shrimp hatchery to grow food for all the tanks, main purpose of making food for many new salt water fish that mainly eat meat product.

Note to Self: Started brine shrimp hatchery at 12:13pm

2/3/25

Today we got some new dyes for microscope slides. These dyes are able to highlight specific parts of cells and just add some color to a bright white viewing environment. I am starting to do lot of work on the salt water tank, in aquascaping and introducing new animals to the ecosystem. We have added 2 feather duster worms and 3 sea slugs so far. Tomorrow, our pistol shrimp and goby fish should be arriving, so we can put them in the tank.

1/16/25

We have been discussing plans for the Salt water tank, as it is reaching the end of its life span. Today alone we pulled out 5 dead urchin shells. We are planning on getting new fish and make this tank more lively and hopefully make it self sustaining one day.

Personal Reminder: Set up little tank to be a quarantine tank for any live creatures in salt water tank since we will be re doing the aquascape (taking everything out) and we want all living things to stay alive.

12/20/24

On Tuesday, we had our fall poster session. On our table we set up a special teaching micro scope that had a central master microscope, and 4 other lenses for people to look at the same thing at the same time. We had alot of kids fascinated and eyes glued while looking at little amebas swimming around in sub straight samples. This past week we have been prepping the tanks for the winter break, since it will be a period of 2 weeks while the tanks are not being maintained. (Water changes). Although I do believe someone will come in and feed them.

12/3/24

Urchin Project Inventory:

Urchin Count: 7

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What we have:

What we Need:

12/2/24

Today we had a lab meeting and discussed poster session. I am not sure what I want to do but I may want to do something with microscopy and the teaching scope we revived from the microscope event before break. We also got some owl pellets and I searched through them for some bones. I then found a ostracod under the microscope from the little tank with amphipods.

11/22/24

Next board meeting, I am planning on pithing the urchin project and hopefully become CI of that. Then a few days ago I attended a microscopy event where someone brought in a microscope that had one main scope and 4 other lenses that show what the master scope sees. This could be used to show people our small world and this leads to how I also want to pitch a Microscopy lab, hopefully having the two labs be “partners'“ especially since that the development stages of Urchins in fascinating.

11/12/24

Today we set up a new tank in WISRD. It is a freshwater tank, it looks to be around 20-25 gallons. A aqua clear filter and a heater I am not sure the name of. I am still designing the first version of the hyper loop.

11/6/24

Today I made a small prototype of the hyper loop and am using a small fan with three speed settings. these are the speeds of the wind through a short tube (12.5 Inches)(21.3 Diameter).

-13.6 MPH

-15.6 MPH

-17.4 MPH

Average speed of 15.5 MPH

11/5/24

Today I started to plan out my Shinkansen hyper loop project and I think it is going to be very cool. Unlike other projects with one question or things wanting to test. I want to test multiple things with this system and plan on using both mechanical and electrical engineering skills learned over the past couple years.

10/28/24

We just rapped up our Dark Matter Day event where we have different booths revolving around science for younger kids to get involved. Now we are going back to regular WISRD days. We are still keeping the tanks at stable levels and I am wanting to do something with tardigrades but I don’t know what yet.

10/2/24

Today I did some research on how to make the mazes for the pea puffers. I was considering clear PVC pipe or clear aquarium line. If we were to use PVC pipe, we will be able to make a durable and structure, it will also make the escape hatch doors easier to design and develop. Although for turns and corners, we would have to use slightly thicker corner pieces. If we were to use the aquarium line, we would be able to get a smaller profile design, and we would be able to bend it and make sharp turns possible. The only down sides with this is we would have to develop a system to keep it stable since aquarium line is very flexible. Also we would have to design and develop little modules that allow for escape hatches to be possible. It all comes down to what we want to do and how much room we have.

9/24/24

Today I found 2 shrimp molts in the circular tank containing a few shrimp, 2 pea puffers, and a random fish from the big freshwater tank. I look at them under a disectiscope and saw little worms and bacteria eating away at the molt. I also scrapped away at the cyanobacteria in the salt water tank (purple coat).

9/23/34

Today I started to think more about how the mazes for the pea puffers will be made and how to make it stress free for the fish. We also found a dead shrimp in the circular tank that holds the pea puffers. We took it out and looked at it under a dissecting scope and saw parasitic worms eating away at the body.

9/16/24

Today I found out what I am going to write for the inquiry, attempted to see if I can retrieve snail eggs from freshwater tank, and finished the code for the automatic mister that will be going into the terrariums. For the inquiry, I will be writing about how people look at beaches and tide pools as a fun vacation activity, but there are some dangerous species that can be living in the tide pools. These include the blue ring octopus and the stone fish. Pretty much writing about how these animals can illustrate threats towards civilians. For the snail eggs, I thought it would be interesting to look at them under the microscope, to only realize it is easier to climb mount Everest than capture runaway snails eggs the size of a cookie crumb. Then with the auto-mister, a bottle with bottle will have a small device on it controlled by a servo to pull a string wrapped around the trigger, therefore spraying the water.

9/10/24

Today I started to reserch and develop PPCVT (pea puffer color vision test) so we can start the pea puffer lab again. Currently I am working on the circuit that will be able to control the color of it witch you will hopefully be able to change using a remote. If that doesn't work it will be a bright white light with different color filters that will be able to be swapped out to change the colors.

9/9/24

Today was a lab meeting were we discussed the base standards of WISRd and how important it is to journal and document your work so either your gorp member's or others can observe the research you are doing. We also discussed dark matter day and the agenda on how that is going to work this year. My goal for this week is to see the state of the puffers and if they are healthy enough to be able to do a possible maze run later this year. Although the first step in that is to get the breeding tank water, witch they are in, goto a clear state so you can look into the tank. Also another goal is to have a finished prototype of the color tester so we can start the proses of figuring out what colors the species can see.

We need this filter ordered for the breeding tank so we can improve the water quality in order to observe the life forms within (fish, snails, shrimp, pea puffers).

After meeting, I removed duckweed from the main freshwater tank, now I am researching if something will be able to use the duckweed as a food source, currently it is a gold fish but they can get big fast.

9/4/24

Today I switched out the 9v battery on the terrarium lights to a power supply since the batteries would die quickly. Although once I plugged the power supply in, it made some weird noise. Not sure if that is normal but I will find an alternative.

8/22/24

Today I made a physical prototype of the electronic system for the color indicators for the puffers. Even though everything was done correctly, the light wouldn't turn on. I will fix it another day.

8/21/24

Today we did a lab meeting discussing all major events and protocols happening this year. I also checked in with the peapuffers and have only spotted 1 pea puffer. Over the summer on of them passed and it looks like another one has passed since the last time I have checked. I am currently prototyping something to test what colors the species can see. This information will help the W.I.L.D. team develop different tests to test the puffers intelligence.

4/19/24

I have gotten interested into aquatic life and have started to do mantnence and moniter the freshwater tank. I then wanted to do something with Pea Puffers, to better describe it, think of a puffer fish the size of a penny. They are so small! They are also so interesting to me for some reason. So I found a empty 5 gallon tank, filled it with some sand and water. I know I want to do something with their Intelligence and how they respond to different changes. Pea puffers love heavily planted tanks, so a few live plants where added to the tank. Also a light is need to help the plants grow and provide light for the tank. I got this little clip on light. Since pea puffers are so small, you have to treat them like guppies. So when it comes to filters, having a regular hangon back fliter may be an issue since their may be a chance they could be sucked into the intake pipe. This can hurt your puffer and it is possible for the filter to break. Thats why a sponge filter will be used instead.

2/21/24

After trying multiple systems, such as closed circuits and rassperry pie. I have decided to take on a lit project idea of mine. That is to make my own custom mother board relying on a arduino nano to control most components.

1/10/24

I found a DC and Stepper motor HAT for the rasperry pie, I put it together and hooked it up to the PI, while I was on the system I attempted to run some test code, I realized that this board didn’t work with the PI 5. I have had this Idea in the back o my mind for a while, and that was to make my own PCB mother board to control everything on board the cart. And more importantly, make it move, witch was a comment and question I was asked alot during the poster session. Although I dont know how to use the software to have the board professionally made, and I dont have the patience to learn so. I will be using a prototype board to make a PCB motherboard. and Yes, it is going to be tall!

11/14/23

I have reprinted the shopping car on the big FDM printer in multiple pieces so it an be a decent size. It went from a size of a credit card to the size of a laptop! On the new cart, on board is the new Raspberry Pie 5, a computer that is almost as powerful of a apple mac book air. This board will be able to control the cart wirelessly and be able to code the cart of specific actions. In the near future, I hope to have a small touch display boarded on the cart to be able to control it.

11/6/23

I have started printing the shopping cart as a bigger model on the FDM printers instead of resin. It is in multiple parts and will be assembled once I have all the parts. Today I got the Right side of the cart and hope to have the other peices next class or next week

9/21/23

Today I installed the circuit assembly into the “storage” area of the cart. Tonight I am going to 3d print some wheels that should hopefully fit on the DC Moters. I may add some rubber coat on the wheel surface so it has some grip to help it drive. I am also going to design a smaller front wheel that can spin. I also used the solder sucker/remover thing. I watched a youtube video where they used one of these and I wanted to try it out. I saw one today and used it to remove some solder that was left behind after the wire fell off. It worked first try. It is a sequence of heating up the left over with the solder gun then sucking it up as fast as possible before it drys. I want to do more with soldering in the future.

9/19/23

Today I have cured the new shopping cart print so it is ready for testing. I have also learned how to solder different wires to different components.

8/31/23

I have been trying to repair and fix the Resin printer for the past few days. I have taken it apart many many many times until today I found a button of some sort and pressed it. Once I powered back on the printer it was still having the same problem. I have even reached out to Elegoo (the company that made it) customer support team to get their help on it as well. Currently, I am printing a file that works and can be printed. I hope that this machine is fixable so others can use it and enjoy it!

8/25/23

I have something I want to make. The future is upon us, things are about to change in our world and this idea came to me when I was in a grocery store. What if the shopping cart was remote-controlled and went into the store for you and got everything you needed. So what I want to do is 3d or resin print a scaled-down shopping cart (this will be a prototype and not an actual shopping cart) with a few moters that can be controlled by a controller and you will be able to drive it around like a little RC car. There will also be a grabber/arm of some type to grab the items.

8/24/23

Today is my first day of WISRD. There are many things going on and many labs that people think I would be a good fit in. Im exited to dive in and get started.

Statement of interest, Spring 2023: I am interested in joining this specific institute because I want to become a mechanical engineer some day and what some practice learning certain skills. Such as how to use and run 3d printers, and CNC machines. I also want to learn how to code Arduino microcontrollers. What I am hoping to get out of this experience is to know how to code, design, and make things just like the back of my hand! Jokes out of the way I want to upgrade the skills I already have to create machines or anything else to make the world a better or more enjoyable place. Given infinite funds, I would build a machine that is pretty much your cell phones but with wheels, taking inspiration from Baymax in the movie Big Hero 6. Although these will mostly be in the house holds for the elderly. Instead of having a nurse or someone taking care of them, the robot is prepared for any situation. If something big happens, like a heart attack, the robot will immediately call 911 and as they are on the way, the robot can help make the proses quicker and safer.