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Ellen Ochoa, (born May 10, 1958, Los Angeles, California, U.S.), American astronaut and administrator who was the first Hispanic woman to travel into space (1993). She later served as director of NASA's Johnson Space Center (2013-18).

Ochoa studied electrical engineering at Stanford University, earning a master's degree (1981) and a doctorate (1985). A specialist in the development of optical systems, she worked as a research engineer at Sandia National Laboratories and at the Ames Research Center of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). She helped create several systems and methods that were awarded patents, including optical systems for the detection of imperfections in a repeating pattern and for the recognition of objects.

Ochoa was selected by NASA in 1990 to participate in its astronaut program, and she became the first Hispanic female astronaut when she completed her training in 1991. In April 1993 she served as mission specialist aboard the STS-56 mission of the space shuttle Discovery, becoming the first Latina to be launched into space. During this mission, she and the other mission specialists performed various experiments collectively called ATLAS-2 (Atmospheric Laboratory for Applications and Science-2) that studied the Sun and its interaction with Earth's atmosphere. The crew also released the SPARTAN satellite, which studied the solar wind for two days before it was retrieved. She was part of the STS-66 Atlantis mission in November 1994. STS-66 carried the ATLAS-3, which reflew experiments Ochoa had worked with on her previous flight. Another small satellite, CRISTA-SPAS, was released, which studied Earth's atmosphere for eight days before being retrieved.

In May 1999 she was a member of the Discovery STS-96 crew that executed the first docking to the International Space Station (ISS). The ISS then consisted of only two modules, the Russian Zarya and the American Unity. Discovery carried supplies to the ISS to get it ready for astronauts to stay there. It also carried two cranes to attach to the station exterior that would be used in building the rest of the station. Two astronauts, Tamara Jernigan and Daniel Barry, performed a nearly eight-hour space walk to install the cranes while Ochoa assisted them with Discovery's robotic arm. Ochoa returned to the ISS in April 2002 on the STS-110 mission of the shuttle Atlantis. The first truss, which formed the ISS's frame, was added; Ochoa and astronaut Daniel Bursch used the station's robotic arm to lift the truss out of Atlantis 's payload bay and attach it to the station. On her four spaceflights, Ochoa spent more than 40 days in space.

In 2007 Ochoa became deputy director of the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, and six years later she was promoted to director. She was the second woman to hold the post and the first Hispanic. During her tenure she notably oversaw work on the Orion, which was scheduled to travel farther than other crewed spacecraft, allowing for human exploration of such destinations as Mars. Ochoa retired from the Johnson Space Center in 2018to become vice chair of the National Science Board (NSB), which runs the National Science Foundation. She became NSB chair in 2020.

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Ellen Ochoa, American astronaut and administrator who was the first Hispanic woman to travel into space (1993), working as a mission specialist aboard the space shuttle Discovery. She later served as director of the Johnson Space Center (2013-18). Learn more about Ochoa's life and career.

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The Boy Who Harnessed The Wind | Offical Trailer [HD] | Netflix

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A fifth-grade project-based learning unit harnesses excitement about Mars to develop science, math, engineering, and literacy skills.

©Shutterstock/Jurik Peter

Media stories about colonizing Mars are everywhere. Elon Musk, NASA, the Mars One project-seems like everyone wants to visit the most habitable planet beyond Earth.

Elementary and middle school students love learning about Mars too, so can we use their interest to get them thinking critically about the complex science, math, and engineering needed to survive on another planet? The answer is yes: My fifth-grade students address these issues with research, technology, teamwork, and creativity as part of a roughly two-week Martian Colony project-based learning unit.

Mission to Mars

Our driving question is: How can humans survive on Mars? The answers begin on Earth, as students think about what makes our planet habitable, and by comparison what unique challenges Martian colonists will face. There are many challenges to consider: no oxygen, food, or readily available water; extreme cold and solar radiation; meteorites-sometimes I'm glad I'm too old for such an expedition.

Students working in groups of four or five research all things Mars using books, websites, and videos, some of which I post on my teacher portal and some of which they find. We focus on the human perspective-they don't need to know the diameter of the planet, but they do need to know the surface temperature and how that will affect their survival.

We also try to incorporate some fun into the unit. Before every mission, NASA crew members design a mission patch for the astronauts' flight suits. My students do something similar: Some design paper mission patches, complete with spacecraft and images of Earth and Mars. Others create computer-based drawings or even 3D models representing their group, which they often give silly names like the Goat Grandmas or the Flying Banana Peels. One year we used the website Patches4Less to make real cloth patches that cost each student about $2.50.

Applying What They Learn

On a more serious note, students must think about supplies they would need for their voyage. The students consider how much storage space their launch vehicles would hold and what items are mission critical. Is it realistic to bring a herd of cattle to feed Martian colonists? Probably not.

It's important to give them some parameters for this. I ask students to imagine an empty school bus (with no seats) and to think of items that could fit inside. And I require them to list supplies by category (food, clothing, medical) to help them organize their thinking.

Teams pick a landing location on Mars using Google Earth Pro's Mars option (look for the image of Saturn on the toolbar). There are no right answers, but they must justify their choices. If they plan to mine Martian ice for water, a location near the polar ice caps might work. Protection from meteors and solar radiation might suggest building in a crater or in one of the Martian canyons.

Our final product is a digital 3D model of the colony, an involved step that takes three or four days to complete. Students must first submit a working blueprint of their colony on grid paper. I set a square footage limit for the colonies, which forces students to make choices about essential elements and encourages them to apply math skills like multiplication, area, and perimeter.

As the Supreme Chancellor of Martian Colonization, I use the blueprint to verify the placement of buildings in the final model. If the blueprint shows a 12 foot by 10 foot science lab in the southwest corner of the colony, I ask students to show me this same building on their model. This encourages them to match their blueprint to their final product and spurs further collaboration between team members. More advanced groups calculate total colony volume by finding the lengths, widths, and heights of their various structures.

In previous years, early versions of the final product used recycled materials like cardboard and aluminum cans and then computer models built with Google Sketchup.

For the past three years, we have designed colonies on Minecraft.edu, an education version of the popular video game that omits the creepers and online communication with other gamers. Our school tech coach helped get things up and running and created a Minecraft server to save all of our work. Many students already know Minecraft, so the learning curve is not steep. I've been continually amazed by the solar panels, greenhouses, science labs, and Martian exercise equipment designed using only Minecraft blocks and group ingenuity.

Writing about their colonies accesses another set of skills. Can you persuade me that your colony is the safest and best designed of all the choices out there? Can you produce a travel log detailing daily life on Mars? Or a travel brochure advertising the colony to potential colonists? Students choose the writing form they think best represents their colony.

Presenting What They Learn

I save a day at the end for presentations. In addition to classmates, audiences have included students from other grade levels and sometimes parents. One day I'd like to invite an astronaut or NASA engineer to our presentations as well. The following questions guide feedback from the audience:

Would you feel safe in this colony?

What elements of the colony did you think the most creative?

What suggestions can you give to make this colony better?

Mars is an amazing place, and I hope to inspire students to dream big about the possibilities for human colonization of the Red Planet in their lifetimes.

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A fifth-grade project-based learning unit harnesses excitement about Mars to develop science, math, engineering, and literacy skills. ©Shutterstock/Jurik Peter Media stories about colonizing Mars are everywhere. Elon Musk, NASA, the Mars One project-seems like everyone wants to visit the most habitable planet beyond Earth.

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NSTA Science Store :: Picture-Perfect Science Lessons, Expanded 2nd Edition: Using Children's Books to Guide Inquiry, 3-6 :: NSTA Press Book

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How do you improve upon perfection? For years, new and experienced elementary school teachers alike have extolled the virtues of Picture-Perfect Science Lessons -the expertly combined appeal of children's picture books with standards-based science content. The award-winning, bestselling book presents ready-to-teach lessons, complete with student pages and assessments, that use high-quality fiction and nonfiction picture books to guide hands-on science inquiry.

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NSTA Science Store :: Picture-Perfect Science Lessons, Expanded 2nd Edition: Using Children's Books to Guide Inquiry, 3-6 :: NSTA Press Book

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How do you improve upon perfection? For years, new and experienced elementary school teachers alike have extolled the virtues of Picture-Perfect Science Lessons -the expertly combined appeal of children's picture books with standards-based science content. The award-winning, bestselling book presents ready-to-teach lessons, complete with student pages and assessments, that use high-quality fiction and nonfiction picture books to guide hands-on science inquiry.

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Mr. Whiskers, the teacher, has that wild look in his eyes again. That's the look that means, Get ready for hands-on science! This time the subject matter is . . . matter. Using seven science stations, Mr. Whiskers encourages his kids to use all their senses to make observations and draw conclusions.

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Get to know American Girl’s 2018 Girl of the Year, Luciana, in this first book in her series! Luciana is over the moon — she’s going to Space Camp! But when she’s picked to lead her team in a robot challenge, instead of rocketing her crew to success she steers them straight into trouble. After that, her teammates don’t trust her. In fact, Luci’s pretty sure they don’t even like her. It’s great to be good at science — but Luci learns that it’s not enough. If she’s ever going to make it to Mars, she’s got to be someone her crew can depend on, no matter what.

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Luciana is thrilled - she's going to Space Camp! But when she's picked to lead her team in a robot challenge, instead of rocketing her team to success, she stee

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Scholastic teamed American Girl to provide ideas for STEM and ELA lessons.

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Guide your students to work together as they shoot for the stars! Inspired by Luciana Vega ™, American Girl's 2018 Girl of the Year ™, these STEM and ELA lessons and activities will get your students excited about space exploration and encourage teamwork.

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With over 30 years in the Hilton Head Real Estate market Dunes Marketing Group is ready, willing and able to assist. Our licensed and professional Hilton Head Realtors are ready right now to help you buy or Sell. Visit DunesRealEstateGroup.com today.

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Looking for more diverse science books for older students?

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Looking for more diverse science books for older students?

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https://padlet.com/hallbeth/v36dvqdxbhoo

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told by Wangari Maathai
with Spanish subtitles.

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I WILL BE A HUMMINGBIRD - Wangari Maathai - SPANISH SUBTITLES

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California.

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Redwood National and State Parks (U.S. National Park Service)

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Most people know Redwood as home to the tallest trees on Earth. But the Parks also protect vast prairies, oak woodlands, wild rivers, and 40 miles of rugged coastline. People have lived in this verdant landscape since time immemorial. Together, the National Park Service and California State Parks ar…

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by Jacques Cousteau
20 book encyclopedia set from 1975 and still in good shape.

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In June 1979, 38-year-old explorer and filmmaker Philippe Cousteau died at the controls of a Cousteau Society seaplane in an accident in Lisbon, Portugal. For television viewers around the world, it seemed to be a personal loss. Since 1968, millions had watched handsome young Phillippe grow into his prime aboard the Research Vessel Calypso on his father's popular documentary series, The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau.

Six months after Philippe's death, his widow Jan gave birth to a son and named him Philippe Jr. As an infant, he was heir to an environmental brand and media dynasty that spanned the globe, yet was already falling into decline. The Calypso sank in 1996, family squabbles began even before Jacques Cousteau's death in 1997, and the legal fights over the Cousteau legacy continued for years. "People think we grew up rich, but the only thing (Jacques Cousteau) left us was a lawsuit," Philippe Jr. says.

Talk about a tough act to follow.

Today, 32-year-old Philippe Jr. bills himself as an "explorer, social entrepreneur, and environmental advocate," and his list of involvements is too long to fit on a business card. He's best known for his television work for Animal Planet (he was with Steve Irwin when the Crocodile Hunter star died on an Animal Planet documentary expedition), Discovery Channel, and, most recently, CNN International, but he's more deeply entwined in a series of environmental nonprofits.

Cousteau sat down with the City Paper at the College of Charleston's Stern Center on July 25. He was in town for an ongoing workshop for teachers sponsored by EarthEcho International, the youth-oriented non-profit organization Philippe Jr. and his sister Alexandra founded in 2007. He's one month removed from the launch of the environmentally focused Global Echo ETF mutual fund and actively promoting his nonprofit's plan to build and train a national network of student environmental journalists.

CP: What do you remember about your grandfather (Jacques Cousteau died when Philippe Jr. was 17)?

PC: He knew how to communicate. He knew how to be a storyteller. Go to where your audience is, don't expect them to come to you. And that was an important lesson to me.

We probably didn't have the childhood people expect. When my father died, my mother moved home to L.A. So I went to school in L.A., my sister and I. Grew up with a single mom. Nice little house in Pacific Palisades, middle-class community. We saw my grandfather once or twice a year, but people think we ... grew up on expedition, and that was my fantasy, too, but that just wasn't the case.

My mother spent 13 years on expedition. She kept [the Cousteau legacy] alive for us, watched all the films with us. So she was really the conduit, daily, to keeping that legacy alive. It's all from my mother. My grandfather was great and a huge influence, but if there was a foundational awareness and understanding of what Cousteau was, it was from my mom.

CP: Did you always think you'd grow up to continue the family enterprise, or did you consider anything else?

PC: I certainly for a time thought that we'd grow older and life would be very much like it was for my father and grandfather, that we'd be away on expedition for months all over the world. But the media market and the media world are very different today than they were then. There were three to five channels on television. Now there are 100,000 on TV these days.

So we always fantasized about being on expedition, doing what my father and my mother did. It's a different world today. It's a very different media world, a very different funding world, and without the funding, you just can't do it the way they did it.

[Jacques Cousteau] was a storyteller, and he innovated ways to tell the story, and at the time, he did television, he did books, he did radio, he did school programs, he did comic books, everything that was available. He blanketed the media that was available at the time. As I've gotten older, I've realized he would not be doing that today. I like to think that if he were doing it today, he'd be doing a lot of the same things as us.

CP: Such as?

PC: We launched a socially responsible investment fund a month ago on the New York Stock Exchange. I think he'd be looking at financial markets. I believe that he'd be really fascinated with technology in the same way that we're looking at how can we leverage games and phones and the internet to have more of a ground-up approach to getting young people engaged in a way that interests them.

CP: You're interested in networked media, social media, new media, but you work in traditional media too. How do you see the balance between big media and small media?

PC: Certainly the television media market is important - that's why we're still there. But it's very much saturated in a way it wasn't then. Although the international market is very interesting.

I think [the new media landscape] is fascinating. There's an opportunity now for anyone to have a voice. It's good and bad. But the power is not in the hands of the Sumner Redstones and the Rupert Murdochs. Or it is, but it's shifting. It's all changing, and in many cases for the worse. You're seeing budgets slashed and good investigative reporters and beat reporters being fired and laid off, and you're seeing the quality of journalism in many cases decline because there just aren't the resources.

But I do think that the internet is powerful, and it's fascinating because, for example, I think the ad-sales network and the public promotional system has yet to catch up to it, but there are people online that have YouTube programs and millions of people watch them every day. A program like Keeping Up with the Kardashians ... much of the time, it's getting far fewer people than some of these online internet programs. And yet the ad dollars and the public attention and the magazines are all still following this kind of traditional media platform. The strategic people I talk to ... they're all saying it's going to change. Because if it was pure ad-sale-volume driven, they would not be advertising on a lot of these crap programs on television that have half a million people watching but get all this media attention.

CP: But just because everyone can communicate doesn't mean anyone will pay attention. How do you address that with the people you're training as citizen journalists?

PC: I understand the importance and the power of the documentary series I do on CNN is not necessarily just the budget that they invest in making that documentary, but the inordinately larger budget that they spend promoting it. There's just not that mechanism yet online.

The growth model for STREAM (EarthEcho International's Students Reporting Environmental Action through Media) is how do you build the capacity within an organization, or several organizations, so we can essentially create bureaus, and curate content, and have a single umbrella brand through which it can be promoted? We've got a big network, we've known other groups that have huge networks as well, and our partners collectively can reach tens of millions of kids and teachers. It's a funding issue, but we have faith that it just takes curation and the management of that under an umbrella (brand).

So that's the long-term goal of STREAM is to have bureaus around the country that young people are part of and can share their content with and that we can place into newspapers, that we can help place onto television. We build the relationship, and we can have editor-in-chief kinds of people in communities.

CP: How did you get involved in networked media?

PC: Technically, I was writing blogs when I was doing Discovery shows in 2006, 2007, but ... it really started with the oil spill (the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010). The oil spill reminded people that maybe they ought to pay attention to the environment a little bit. I was just pissed off, basically. I felt like we weren't getting the story. So I got the idea to just go down there and start talking to people. We didn't have a budget or any money or anything. I think what's important in this new media world is authenticity and credibility. (On the Gulf Coast) I was able to see it and touch it and get my hands dirty and talk to people on the ground.

We make a lot of mistakes in the environmental space. A big mistake is assuming that just because we're passionate about something, if we can just give people enough statistics or we can just talk to them, we can convert people to understand how important it is. Because of that, we end up becoming overly reliant on messaging that makes sense to us, statistics and information and science that we care about. And we don't do a good-enough job of asking, "What are the fundamentals of telling a good story?" And that is not statistics, it's usually not science, or at least complex science. It's people stories.

The fundamental of story is that people relate to people. They don't relate to information, statistics, science, animals - unless they're anthropomorphizing. We try to take pages from that book and say this first and foremost has to be a damned awesome story. It's got to have adventure, it's got to be funny, it's got to pull my heart strings, it's got to have conflict, setting, character. It's a story. And if it doesn't have those things, it can be the best-meaning story in the world, and nobody's going to buy it.

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A Conversation with Philippe Cousteau Jr.

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In June 1979, 38-year-old explorer and filmmaker Philippe Cousteau died at the controls of a Cousteau Society seaplane in an accident in Lisbon, Portugal. For television viewers around the world, it seemed to be a personal loss.

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About Me

I'm the most widespread sea turtle species in the world, and the most abundant of all sea turtle species in the U.S. You can recognize me by my reddish-brown carapace (upper shell) and yellow underbelly and my strong jaws that I use to crunch through the hard shells of crustaceans and mollusks. My mouth is actually where I get my name! Some people think my massive head is as big and sturdy as a log.

We are a long-lived species and don't reach sexual maturity until we're 35 years old. When we're old enough, we will mate in coastal regions about every two or three years, and then make a massive migration to lay our eggs. We make our way back to the exact beach where we were born, also known as our "natal" beach. We climb onto the beach at night to lay four clutches of over 100 eggs each, and then head back to the ocean. Our eggs are vulnerable to predators and environmental factors. For example, the sex of our offspring is actually dependent on temperature! Warmer conditions will result in mostly male hatchlings, and cooler conditions will lead to more females.

Did You Know?

I'm one of seven sea turtle species, including the leatherback, olive ridley, hawksbill, flatback, green and Kemp's ridley.

Likes

I'm a world traveler, and make long migrations during breeding season to return to the beach where I hatched as a baby to lay my own eggs. Unfortunately, I encounter a lot of trash and other dangers on my journey. I can get caught by fishermen, particularly shrimp trawlers, as bycatch or get entangled in abandoned fishing gear. This makes it hard or even impossible for me to swim and can be fatal. Plastics are a huge problem too, especially for young turtles. For baby sea turtles, just half a gram-one one-thousandth of a pound-of ingested plastic can kill them. We can easily confuse plastic bags for one of our favorite foods, jellyfish. So for our best chance at survival, humans need to work to keep plastics from our beaches and from entering the ocean.

Get To Know Me

References

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I'm the most widespread sea turtle species in the world, and the most abundant of all sea turtle species in the U.S. You can recognize me by my reddish-brown carapace (upper shell) and yellow underbelly and my strong jaws that I use to crunch through the hard shells of crustaceans and mollusks.

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Luna & Me, The True Story of a Girl Who Lived in a Tree to Save a Forest

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Luna & Me, The True Story of a Girl Who Lived in a Tree to Save a Forest

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by Jenny Sue Kostecki-Shaw
All ages picture book based on a simplification of the true story.

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by Philippe Cousteau and Deborah Hopkinson
illustrated by Meilso So
Elementary age fiction picture book.
An inspirational fictional story based on a true story of a group of 5th graders who lobbied to make the loggerhead turtle South Carolina's state reptile.

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How can one young girl save a tree or a sea turtle?  Determination!
What can you save?

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Women in Science - 50 Fearless Pioneers - Who Changed the World 

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Women in Science - 50 Fearless Pioneers - Who Changed the World 

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by Rachel Ignotofsky
Upper Elementary through middle school.
A page per scientist with very stylized drawings

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Solving the Puzzle under the Sea, Marie Tharp Maps the Ocean Floor

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Solving the Puzzle under the Sea, Marie Tharp Maps the Ocean Floor

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by Robert Burleigh
illustrated by Raul Colon
An all ages picture book with stylistic colorful pictures.

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Trailblazers, 33 Women in Science Who Changed the World 

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Trailblazers, 33 Women in Science Who Changed the World 

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by Rachel Swaby
Around four pages of details about each famous scientist.

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Many Wonderful maps and explanations.

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Marie Tharp was born in Ypsilanti, Michigan in 1920.  She worked hard to do what she loved making maps.  In her attention to detail Marie made a discovery that would be felt to the floor of the sea.

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Interested on more about Mars and exploration?

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Interested on more about Mars and exploration?

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https://padlet.com/hallbeth/j3ii4of1bvks

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The Mighty Mars Rovers, The Incredible Adventures of Spirit and Opportunity

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The Mighty Mars Rovers, The Incredible Adventures of Spirit and Opportunity

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by Elizabeth Rusch
Longer NF picture book, all ages.
A description of the Mars rovers and the scientists behind them.  Contains solid details, with real and sketched pictures, in a format that is not overwhelming.

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NASA Perseveres Through Pandemic, Looks Ahead in 2021

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With 2020 more than half way through, NASA is gearing up for a busy rest of the year and 2021.

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As seen in the movie Hidden Figures, NASA has a long-standing cultural commitment to excellence that is largely driven by data, including data about our people. Today, NASA strives to make sure their legacy of inclusion and excellence lives on.

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Hidden Figures | Official Trailer [HD] | 20th Century FOX

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by Thea Feldman
illustrated by Alyssa Petersen
Early chapter book about one of the scientists from Hidden Figures

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by Margot Lee Shetterly
Young Readers' edition.

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Track comets in the solar system and see stunning colorized photos.

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NASA.gov brings you the latest images, videos and news from America's space agency. Get the latest updates on NASA missions, watch NASA TV live, and learn about our quest to reveal the unknown and benefit all humankind.

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Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Who Helped Win the Space Race

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Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Who Helped Win the Space Race

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by Margot Lee Shetterly
Middle school and up.
The unknown story of the incredible journey of African American women scientists in an age or segregation.

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Sally Ride, The First American Woman in Space

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Sally Ride, The First American Woman in Space

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by Tom Riddolls
Upper elemntary to middle school non-fiction book.
The story of a pioneer.

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by Laurie Calkhoven
illustrated by Monique Dong
Early chapter book.
The inspirational story of the first African American woman in space. The back contains additional information including an experiment similar to what Mae did in space.

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Since the time of Caroline Herschel women have continued to play important roles in space exploration.

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Comets are icy bodies in space that release gas or dust. They are often compared to dirty snowballs, though recent research has led some scientists to call them snowy dirtballs. Comets contain dust, ice, carbon dioxide, ammonia, methane and more. Astronomers think comets are leftovers from the material that initially formed the solar system about 4.6 billion years ago.

Some researchers think comets might have originally brought some of the water and organic molecules to Earth that now make up life here. To research this hypothesis, the Rosetta mission, which landed a probe on a comet on Nov. 12, 2014, is studying its nucleus and environment, observing how it changes as it approaches the sun.

Comets orbit the sun, but most are believed to inhabit in an area known as the Oort Cloud, far beyond the orbit of Pluto. Occasionally a comet streaks through the inner solar system; some do so regularly, some only once every few centuries. Many people have never seen a comet, but those who have won't easily forget the celestial show.

Physical characteristics

The solid nucleus or core of a comet consists mostly of ice and dust coated with dark organic material, according to NASA, with the ice composed mainly of frozen water but perhaps other frozen substances as well, such as ammonia, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and methane. The nucleus may have a small rocky core.

As a comet gets closer to the sun, the ice on the surface of the nucleus begins turning into gas, forming a cloud known as the coma. Radiation from the sun pushes dust particles away from the coma, forming a dust tail, while charged particles from the sun convert some of the comet's gases into ions, forming an ion tail. Since comet tails are shaped by sunlight and the solar wind, they always point away from the sun. Comet tails may spray planets, as was the case in 2013 with Comet Siding Spring and Mars.

At first glance, comets and asteroids may appear very similar. The difference lies in the presence of the coma and tail. Sometimes, a comet may be misidentified as an asteroid before follow-up observations reveal the presence of either or both of these features.

The nuclei of most comets are thought to measure 10 miles (16 kilometers) or less. Some comets have comas that can reach nearly 1 million miles (1.6 million km) wide, and some have tails reaching 100 million miles (160 million km) long.

We can see a number of comets with the naked eye when they pass close to the sun because their comas and tails reflect sunlight or even glow because of energy they absorb from the sun. However, most comets are too small or too faint to be seen without a telescope.

Comets leave a trail of debris behind them that can lead to meteor showers on Earth. For instance, the Perseid meteor shower occurs every year between August 9 and 13 when Earth passes through the orbit of the Swift-Tuttle comet.

Orbital characteristics

Astronomers classify comets based on the durations of their orbits around the sun. Short-period comets need roughly 200 years or less to complete one orbit, long-period comets take more than 200 years, and single-apparition comets are not bound to the sun, on orbits that take them out of the solar system, according to NASA. Recently, scientists have also discovered comets in the main asteroid belt - these main-belt comets might be a key source of water for the inner terrestrial planets.

Scientists think short-period comets, also known as periodic comets, originate from a disk-shaped band of icy objects known as the Kuiper Belt beyond Neptune's orbit, with gravitational interactions with the outer planets dragging these bodies inward, where they become active comets. Long-period comets are thought to come from the nearly spherical Oort Cloud even further out, which get slung inward by the gravitational pull of passing stars. In 2017, scientists found there may be seven times more big long-period comets than previously thought.

Some comets, called sun-grazers, smash right into the sun or get so close that they break up and evaporate. Some researchers are also concerned that comets may pose a threat to Earth as well.

(Image credit: Michael Jäger)

Naming

In general, comets are named after their discoverer. For example, comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 got its name because it was the ninth short-periodic comet discovered by Eugene and Carolyn Shoemaker and David Levy. Spacecraft have proven very effective at spotting comets as well, so the names of many comets incorporate the names of missions such as SOHO or WISE.

History

In antiquity, comets inspired both awe and alarm, "hairy stars" resembling fiery swords that appeared unpredictably in the sky. Often, comets seemed to be omens of doom - the most ancient known mythology, the Babylonian " Epic of Gilgamesh," described fire, brimstone, and flood with the arrival of a comet, and the Roman emperor Nero saved himself from the "curse of the comet" by having all possible successors to his throne executed. This fear was not just limited to the distant past - in 1910, people in Chicago sealed their windows to protect themselves from what they thought was the comet's poisonous tail.

For centuries, scientists thought comets traveled in the Earth's atmosphere, but in 1577, observations made by Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe revealed they actually traveled far beyond the moon. Isaac Newton later discovered that comets move in elliptical, oval-shaped orbits around the sun, and correctly predicted that they could return again and again.

Chinese astronomers kept extensive records on comets for centuries, including observations of Halley's Comet going back to at least 240 B.C., historic annals that have proven valuable resources for later astronomers.

A number of recent missions have ventured to comets. NASA's Deep Impact collided an impactor into Comet Tempel 1 in 2005 and recorded the dramatic explosion that revealed the interior composition and structure of the nucleus. In 2009, NASA announced samples the Stardust mission returned from Comet Wild 2 revealed a building block of life.

In 2014, the European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft entered orbit around Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The Philae lander touched down on Nov 12, 2014. Among the Rosetta mission's many discoveries was the first detection of organic molecules on the surface of a comet; a strange song from Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko; the possibilities that the comet's odd shape may be due to it spinning apart, or resulting from two comets fusing together; and the fact that comets may possess hard, crispy outsides and cold but soft insides, just like fried ice cream. On Sept. 30, 2016, Rosetta intentionally crash-landed on the comet, ending its mission.

Famous comets

Halley's Comet is likely the most famous comet in the world, even depicted in the Bayeux Tapestry that chronicled the Battle of Hastings of 1066. It becomes visible to the naked eye every 76 years when it nears the sun. When Halley's Comet zoomed near Earth in 1986, five spacecraft flew past it and gathered unprecedented details, coming close enough to study its nucleus, which is normally concealed by the comet's coma. The roughly potato-shaped, 9-mile-long (15 km) comet contains equal parts ice and dust, with some 80 percent of the ice made of water and about 15 percent of it consisting of frozen carbon monoxide. Researchers believe other comets are chemically similar to Halley's Comet. The nucleus of Halley's Comet was unexpectedly extremely dark black - its surface, and perhaps those of most others, is apparently covered with a black crust of dust over most of the ice, and it only releases gas when holes in this crust expose ice to the sun.

(Image credit: NASA, ESA, H. Weaver (The Johns Hopkins University/Applied Physics Lab))

The comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 collided spectacularly with Jupiter in 1994, with the giant planet's gravitational pull ripping the comet apart for at least 21 visible impacts. The largest collision created a fireball that rose about 1,800 miles (3,000 km) above the Jovian cloud tops as well as a giant dark spot more than 7,460 miles (12,000 km) across- about the size of the Earth - and was estimated to have exploded with the force of 6,000 gigatons of TNT.

A recent, highly visible comet was Hale-Bopp, which came within 122 million miles (197 million km) of Earth in 1997. Its unusually large nucleus gave off a great deal of dust and gas - estimated at roughly 18 to 25 miles (30 to 40 km) across - appeared bright to the naked eye.

Comet ISON was expected to give a spectacular show in 2013. However, the sun-grazer did not survive its close encounter with the sun and was destroyed in December.
Additional reporting by Nola Taylor Redd, Space.com contributor Explore the solar system Additional resources

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Comets: Facts About The 'Dirty Snowballs' of Space

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Comets are icy bodies in space that release gas or dust. They are often compared to dirty snowballs, though recent research has led some scientists to call them snowy dirtballs. Comets contain dust, ice, carbon dioxide, ammonia, methane and more. Astronomers think comets are leftovers from the material that initially formed the solar system about 4.6 billion years ago.

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Look at current images from the Hubble space telescope right now.

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by Emily Arnold McCully
All ages picture book with classical illustrations, a timeline, glossary and additional references in the back

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A woman born in 1750 who ends up stunted and scared in childhood has little hope for happy life. Woman are expected to marry and raise a family, which would be impossible for Caroline Herschel. Yet with help of her older brother Caroline becomes the first woman to receive a salary for scientific research from King George the 3rd along with discovering 8 comets.

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Autism Speaks is dedicated to promoting solutions, across the spectrum and throughout the lifespan, for the needs of individuals with autism and their families. Your tax deductible donation will support advocacy efforts, increase acceptance and understanding of the condition and advance research into better treatments.

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Temple Grandin, an animal scientist who teaches at Colorado State University, works to improve animal welfare in farming. She is autistic, and, as she told Terry Gross, she thinks that may give her a special ability to do her work:

It was easy for me to figure out how animals think and how animals would react because I think visually. Animals don't think in language. They think in pictures. It's very easy for me to imagine what would it be like to go through a system if you really were a cow, not a person in a cow costume but really were a cow, and autistic senses and emotions are more like the senses of an animal.

My nervous system was hyper-vigilant. Any little thing out of place, like a water stain on the ceiling, would set off a panic reaction, and cattle are scared of the same thing. They're scared of things like high-pitched noise, sudden clanging and banging, sudden movement, maybe even a little chain that hangs down in the chute and jiggles because it looks out of place, and things that are out of place can mean danger out in the wild.

I talked to Grandin for my recent piece on the morality of meat-eating, and the interview was so interesting I decided to publish the whole thing (edited and condensed for clarity). For those looking for something with citations, Grandin also writes about most of the things we discussed in this paper, and in her book, Improving Animal Welfare: A Practical Approach.

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Q. Do you think that meat eating is OK, and ethical, within our existing system?

A. We've gotta give animals a life worth living. That's what the Farm Animal Welfare Council in England said. Before I heard that, I said "a decent life," but I like "a life worth living."

Q. What about confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs); are they as [harmful to animals] ...

A. That's really a big blanket statement.

Q. Absolutely, let's dig into it.

A. You can't just say CAFO is this, everything else is this - that's just painting with too broad a brush. Things aren't that simple when you actually get out in the field and look at stuff. Compared to the bad old days, it's drastically improved, and I mean drastically. And the handling at slaughter plants has drastically improved.

Q. So what are the qualities of a cattle finishing operation that give the animals a good life?

A. Keeping the pens dry and keeping cattle clean - that's really important. When I first started out in cattle, we had lots of feedlots in Arizona, where it's very dry. So the feedyards did not get muddy, and it provided a good environment.

Q. Why is it so important to keep them dry? From my uninformed perspective that seems like a relatively minor point.

A. It's the single most important thing in feed yard design. You've got to do your dirt work. You've got to go in there with big equipment and spend the money to slope the land correctly for drainage. You just can't do it right if you have puddles of water standing around. If cattle are standing in mud, they are more likely to go lame, and that's a huge welfare issue.

And then, of course, how you handle cattle, that's the bright spot - that's something that has really improved. People have seen the value in using low-stress methods of handling. Stunning and handling at the slaughter plant is greatly improved. I worked with McDonald's in 1999 and 2000, and back then it was terrible - broken stunning equipment, yelling and screaming and hitting cattle, poking them repeatedly with electric prods. Now, things are not perfect; but they are much, much better than they were in the bad old days.

Q. Are there elements that I might see if I go to a good finishing operation that I might find repellent that are not repellent for a steer?

A. Well, of course, if there are a lot of cattle in one place, they are going to smell. That's one of the things that really bothers a lot of people. And I've had a lot of people tell me that.

Q. Does that bother the animals?

A. I don't think so. You've got to control dust. You've got to control mud.

Q. What about feed? I hear people saying that feeding cattle grain isn't good for them.

A. Well, feeding cattle grain is sorta like a diet of cake and cookies. And cattle love to eat sweet yummy cake and cookies. Obviously a mama cow out on a ranch can't eat that - because you aren't going to be healthy eating cake and cookies all your life. But then, for a steer in a feedlot, the whole thing is that you slaughter them before it hurts them. They love to eat it. They come running when the feed truck comes. Of course, beef is the least confined compared to egg-layers or pigs.

Q. Right, so maybe we should talk about that. Take chickens first.

A. Remember there are two types of chickens that live in very different conditions. There's the meat chicken, or broiler, and they live in sheds just walking around on the ground, and then you have egg-layers. And that's where the real housing controversy is. There are things the egg-layers need to get changed - the standard battery cages where the ceiling is so low the bird can't stand at normal walking height.

There's a new kind of cage design - furnished cage, enriched housing, colony housing - they're all the same thing. The birds can walk at full height. They have a very strong urge to lay their eggs in a secluded spot, so the cage has a little nest box, a perch, and a place for them to scratch. For a large-scale commercial operation that's probably a good alternative. Now if you raise them in loose housing without cages, you do have problems with dust - it's hard to keep the atmosphere good. There are tradeoffs on the different systems. I think the colony house is the way to go.

Q. So are big operations with enriched cages good?

A. Well, I have a new thing: Big is fragile. The recent avian flu killed 80 percent of the hens that lay for the liquid egg market. Half of all eggs go into baked and processed foods - it's called liquid eggs. Big is very efficient; it's not bad! It's fragile. When you look at the consumer survey data, local is something people really want. And you know, I think deep down inside, that's a primitive instinct about food security. What happens if the Walmart truck stops coming? You look at the port strikes on the West Coast: You had refrigerated containers rotting on the docks. Meat supply chains are very fragile.

Q. I think of cars as an analogy - we have cars now that are much faster and much more efficient than the Model T, but when they crash it's a much bigger deal.

A. Big is definitely efficient. When it works it's great! But it's also bad, because it's a much bigger mess when it crashes.

Q. Getting back to egg-layers - I look at this with my human values and say I'd like the hens to be exposed to sunlight, and grass ...

A. Well, then it's much more expensive. And we've got 25 percent of people in this country working minimum wage jobs and they gotta buy the cheapest eggs they can lay their hands on. I think eggs are a necessity - beef you could say is a luxury, but not eggs.

Q. From the hen's point of view - of course we can't totally know - but how important do you think it is to be outside?

A. Well I think there are certain behavioral needs we should satisfy, and you can actually, scientifically, look at what things a hen wants the most. There are objective ways to measure her motivation to get something she wants - like a private nest box. How long is she willing to not eat to get it, or how heavy a door will she push to get it? How many times will she push a switch to get it?

A private nest box is something she wants, because in the wild she has an instinct to hide in the bushes so that a fox doesn't get [her eggs]. Give her some pieces of plastic to hang down that she can hide behind. Give her a little piece of astroturf to lay [her eggs] on. Give her a perch, and a piece of plastic to scratch on, and at least enough cage height so she can walk normally. I'm gonna call that apartment living for chickens. Do they need natural elements? Being outside? Science can't answer that. I mean, there are people in New York that hardly go outside.

Q. But can't you use those same objective measurement techniques to see how badly the hens want to go outside and scratch for bugs?

A. Well you can, and the motivation is pretty weak compared to something like the nest box, which is hard wired. Take dust bathing - for a hen dust bathing is nice to do, but it's kind of like, 'Yes, it's nice to have a fancy hotel room, but the EconoLodge will do too.' Motivation isn't as great.

Q. If we move over to pigs, now the controversy is about gestation crates.

A. Well, on gestation crates, the science shows that they do just fine. That's what the science shows. But that's a degree of confinement that two-thirds of the public find unacceptable. People say things like, 'I wouldn't put my dog in that.' That's something that probably needs to get changed. Does that mean the pig needs to go outside? Probably not.

Another thing is that all the research that's been done on gestation crates was done on young gilts [female pigs that haven't had babies yet] on their first litter, and they actually can sit in the stalls [because they are small]. Now you've got a lot of farms out there where the stalls are so tight that the sow can't even lay on her side, and no research supports that.

Q. Another thing people get upset about is the separating of dairy calves from their mothers.

A. That's been going on for as long as I've been around on every little family dairy that ever was. That's not new. They did that on our 12-cow dairy when I was a student in high school.

Q. Obviously it's nothing new, but is it OK?

A. I'm not going to say she doesn't get upset, but a Holstein gets less upset than a beef cow does. An Angus cow will get a lot more upset. There are a lot of individual differences, but on average that's true. What I'm more concerned about is that we've bred that Holstein so much for milk production. I have a term that I call biological system overload. When you push that animal too hard - either genetically or whatever - you start to have problems with its biology.

When you breed an animal just to be productive, productive, productive, there's always a price. Nothing is free in this world. They were breeding some of the hardiness out. It takes energy to fight off disease, and it takes energy to make meat. I think we need to be looking at what optimizes production. There are places they are putting HEPA filters - you know, the things that bubble-boy would have - on the windows of pig barns. Well, I don't know if that's the way. Maybe we need to breed a more hardy pig.

Q. And there are issues with genetics and structural problems, right?

A. Oh yeah. Broiler chickens 10 years ago had really bad structural issues with their legs. They've actually corrected some of those problems, and now they have tree-trunks for legs. Pigs still have bad structural issues that started back in the late '80s. If you're just breeding for production traits, you don't bother to look at the leg structure to make sure it won't get lame.

Q. There was something I wanted to get at with you, because I'd seen animal activists talking about you on the internet, playing on the stereotype that autistic people are cold and unfeeling. But it's clear when you write about animals that you have tremendous empathy and deep feeling for them. I was really struck by the passage in which you described working on an animal holding mechanism for a slaughterhouse, then crying all the way back to the airport.
[That passage: "To design a good restrainer system, you have to really care about the animals it will hold. You have to imagine what it would be like if you were the animal entering the restrainer. It is a sobering experience to be a caring person, yet to design a device to kill large numbers of animals. When I complete a project I am left with a feeling of great satisfaction, but I usually cry all the way to the airport."]
A. I did cry all the way back to the airport, yes I did. Then I think of another project. I was up on a catwalk over a whole sea of cattle - this was in the summer of 1990 - and getting kind of upset about it. And then I thought, you know, none of those cattle would have been born if we hadn't bred them - they would never have existed at all. But we've got to give them a decent life.

Also, with my kind of metabolism, being a vegan is just not going to work. I think there are genetic differences in the ability to tolerate a vegan diet, and I [don't have them]. My mother is the same way - she's got to have her sausage in the morning.

Q. And so when you look at just sort of the average of what we have for animal agriculture in the U.S., do these animals have a decent life as far as you are concerned?

A. It varies a lot. Some people do a better job than others. I think cattle, done right, have a decent life. There are some muddy feed yards that need to be worked on. I think another issue we've got to look at is shade. We are growing cattle bigger, we've got more black cattle, we've got to start shading these feed yards. Keeping cattle clean is really important. But cattle I've seen in dry feed yards, I think they have a decent life, yes.

Q. What are the biggest issues that need to be addressed?

A. Well, pigs and laying hens are the most controversial. If you look online, the worst activist video - where people are hitting cows and stuff - is dairy. Pitchforks in the milking parlor, beating cows, just bad stuff.

Q. And that may have something to do with labor, and the conditions those workers are living in.

A. There are some very good dairymen. One of the problems that the dairy industry got into was breeding these gigantic big cows that would last just two years milking. Some of the really progressive dairies now are starting to go to smaller cows that last three or four years milking, a much better cow. I visited a couple this spring. There are about a third of the dairies here in Colorado that are really, really progressive and really, really good. And there's another percentage that are not, that will milk cows until they are half dead and then market them. There's a certain segment of the dairy industry that's just horrible. About 25 percent of all dairy cattle are lame, and lame cattle are in pain - that's just not acceptable.

Q. Is that a genetic issue?

A. Partially, but also standing on concrete, foot diseases - there are a lot of different causes. Having these humongous cows tends to make it worse.

Q. So are there specific things that you'd like to see changed? Forget about what the activists want, forget about public opinion for a second, just from the perspective of what science suggests would be good for the animals ...

A. People get into, "big is bad, small is good." It's not that simple. The key is management. Whether you are big or small, you've got to have good management. Another thing you cannot do is understaff and overwork. If you overwork people they are going to get so tired there's no way they can do things right.

We've got to figure out sensible things to do. The thing that worries me on a lot of these issues is that we've got more and more people getting involved who have never done anything practical, because schools have taken out all the cooking, sewing, woodworking, and art. And in the real world of practical things, nothing can be perfect. You can work to make it better, but it won't be perfect.

You have to pick out some specific thing to work on. I worked on improving slaughter plants - that's a specific thing. You gotta pick out something specific if you want to make constructive change on the ground, not destructive change. We have this abstractification, with activists attacking things they don't even know anything about. And ag has responded poorly. Ag gag laws: dumbest thing they could have ever done. That just makes you look guilty. Why are they passing laws to make it a crime to videotape something?

Q. This has been really fascinating. Any last words?

A. We have got to find reasonable, practical things to do. I'm worried about pushing animal biology too hard - either with genetics or with drugs or whatever - and I like to look at welfare on outcome-based measures. First of all, you gotta make sure your air quality is good, they aren't lame, they don't have sores on them, they are clean, and they get to act out their behavioral needs.

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Temple Grandin digs in on the practical side of what animals want

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Temple Grandin, an animal scientist who teaches at Colorado State University, works to improve animal welfare in farming. She is autistic, and, as she told Terry Gross, she thinks that may give her a special ability to do her work: It was easy for me to figure out how animals think and how animals would react because I think visually.

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Ted talk

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Temple Grandin: The world needs all kinds of minds

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Temple Grandin, diagnosed with autism as a child, talks about how her mind works -- sharing her ability to "think in pictures," which helps her solve problems that neurotypical brains might miss. She makes the case that the world needs people on the autism spectrum: visual thinkers, pattern thinkers, verbal thinkers, and all kinds of smart geeky kids.

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Animals in Translation
by Temple Grandin and Catherine Johnston

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Understanding animal behavior.

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If you live with animals, the real question isn't whether they can think or not. It's "What do they think of humans?" I often find myself mulling that over when I go out to gather eggs or feed the pigs. It isn't a personal question-Have I earned the horses' respect?-it's a philosophical one. Living with animals means coming to terms with who they are and what makes them tick. That's what you want to know when you train a dog or ride a horse or try to catch a barnyard goose. At least that's what I want to know. I live and write on a small farm in New York State, and since my work, most days, means asking questions about the world around me, I find myself wondering about the animals I live with. I take it for granted that they also wonder about me. I can see the questions in their eyes, in the tilt of their ears: Who are these humans? Why do they behave the way they do?

There's no point asking these questions of the cattle staring at me on this warm November Sunday. They won't answer, not in so many words. But if I ask the woman standing beside me-the cattle are staring at her too-I'm likely to find some answers. That's because the woman is Temple Grandin.

The cattle were dozing, perhaps a hundred of them in several long pens a few minutes north of Fort Collins, Colorado. Then we showed up. The steers roused and strode toward us, following their curiosity. They would have walked right up to us, as near as their caution allowed, if they could have. They stand at the fence, head-on, impassive, like the Charolais they are-patient, buff-colored animals.

Say the words cattle, autistic, and woman, and a surprising number of Americans will come up with the name of Temple Grandin. Thanks to her writings, and those of Oliver Sacks, she is perhaps the best-known autistic person in America.

And if you eat at fast-food restaurants-McDonald's, Wendy's, Kentucky Fried Chicken-you're eating meat that's been slaughtered in plants audited to Grandin's standards, meat from cattle and pigs that walked calmly to their fate through handling systems she designed. In the human scheme of things, those animals are economic units whose death is inevitable. By designing chutes and alleys that respect a cow's sensibilities-reducing its fear and uncertainty-Grandin has done more to improve animal welfare than almost any human alive. Increasing a cow's comfort as it nears death may seem like a futile subtlety to many humans. But fear is one of the critical differences between humane and inhumane slaughter. It also happens to be one of the differences between good meat and bad.

Grandin defines what works when it comes to handling cattle in feedlots and slaughterhouses because she defines it from the cow's point of view. Because of her autism, she's able to see what cattle see and humans don't. She understands, for instance, that even a tiny thing, like a harsh lighting contrast, will startle cattle, stopping them in their tracks. She knows that fear is a landmark emotion for a cow, just as it is for an autistic person. "You can't get anything past a cow," she writes. She knows this partly because you can't get anything past an autistic person either.

In her new book, Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior, Grandin examines the surprising similarities between an animal's mind and an autistic mind-her own. "Autistic people," she writes, "are closer to animals than normal people are." This may sound like a cruel judgment, the sort of thing a cold-hearted clinician would say, but it isn't. It's an acute observation, all the more important because it comes from an autistic person. Her autism, Grandin suggests, puts her somewhere between normal human mentality and animal mentality, not as a matter of IQ but as a matter of perception and emotion. Being closer to animals isn't necessarily a bad thing. After all, that's what makes Grandin such an uncanny translator of animal behavior.

Scientists and animal trainers (and plenty of ordinary people) have devoted their lives to trying to understand what the world looks like to animals. After all, the planet teems with perceptive creatures-of whom we are a small minority-and it's more than a matter of idle curiosity to consider how life appears to them. Humans can't help approaching this problem from a human perspective. We posit our own intelligence, our behavior, emotions, and language skills, as the norm. A horse-trainer friend of mine is often asked if horses are intelligent. "It depends who's writing the test," he likes to say. I've often wondered how it would turn out if humans weren't the ones writing the tests, defining the norm.

What if we accepted the sensitivity, the acute worldliness of a dog or a horse or a cougar as the norm? What would humans look like if we were measured from a crow's perspective? What kind of theory of human consciousness would a good-natured pig or an inquisitive dolphin arrive at?

A curious thing happens in Animals in Translation. Grandin sets out to portray the mental and emotional character of animals and its resemblance to that of autistic people-all of it set against the familiar backdrop of normal human intelligence and behavior. But what emerges, almost incidentally, is a fascinating portrait of "normal people" from her perspective and, by analogy, from the perspective of animals too. Reading Animals in Translation is like looking at a photographic negative of ordinary human behavior and consciousness. This is perhaps as close as most of us will come to seeing humans through animal eyes. Humans may be "regular" and "normal," but it's clear that, by animal and autistic standards, we're also very strange.

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If you live with animals, the real question isn't whether they can think or not. It's "What do they think of humans?" I often find myself mulling that over when I go out to gather eggs or feed the pigs. It isn't a personal question-Have I earned the horses' respect?-it's a philosophical one.

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https://www.hbo.com/movies/temple-grandin

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Has a "ask Temple" section.
Or http://www.grandin.com/

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Dr. Grandin did not talk until she was three and a half years old. She was fortunate to get early speech therapy. Her teachers also taught her how to wait and take turns when playing board games. She was mainstreamed into a normal kindergarten at age five. Oliver Sacks wrote in the forward of Thinking in Pictures that her first book Emergence: Labeled Autistic was "unprecedented because there had never before been an inside narrative of autism." Dr. Sacks profiled Dr. Grandin in his best selling book Anthropologist on Mars.

Dr. Grandin became a prominent author and speaker on both autism and animal behavior. Today she is a professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University. She also has a successful career consulting on both livestock handling equipment design and animal welfare. She has been featured on NPR (National Public Radio) and a BBC Special - "The Woman Who Thinks Like a Cow". She has also appeared on National TV shows such as Larry King Live, 20/20, Sixty Minutes, Fox and Friends, and she has a 2010 TED talk. Articles about Dr. Grandin have appeared in Time Magazine, New York Times, Discover Magazine, Forbes and USA Today. HBO made an Emmy Award winning movie about her life and she was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2016.

When she was young, she was considered weird and teased and bullied in high school. The only place she had friends was activities where there was a shared interest such as horses, electronics, or model rockets. Mr. Carlock, her science teacher, was an important mentor who encouraged her interest in science. When she had a new goal of becoming a scientist, she had a reason for studying. Today half the cattle in the United States are handled in facilities she has designed.

In 2013, the American Psychiatric Association revised the diagnostic criteria for autism. This greatly broadened the spectrum. It now ranges from brilliant scientists, artists, and musicians to an individual who cannot dress himself or herself. Over the years, the diagnostic criteria have kept changing. It is not precise like a lab test for strep throat. Labels such as autism, ADHD, sensory processing disorder or learning disability are often applied to the same child. In older children with no speech delay, the diagnosis sometimes switches back and forth between autism and ADHD.

"One of the problems today is for a kid to get any special services in school, they have to have a label. The problem with autism is you've got a spectrum that ranges from Einstein to someone with no language and intellectual disability," said Grandin. "Steve Jobs was probably mildly on the autistic spectrum. Basically, you've probably known people who were geeky and socially awkward but very smart. When does geeks and nerds became autism? That's a gray area. Half the people in Silicon Valley probably have autism."

As the number of children diagnosed with autism continues to rise nationally, Grandin is sharing her message about the disorder and "differently-abled brains" with packed houses. At the heart of that message is this: Rigid academic and social expectations could wind up stifling a mind that, while it might struggle to conjugate a verb, could one day take us to distant stars.

"Parents get so worried about the deficits that they don't build up the strengths, but those skills could turn into a job," said Grandin, who addresses scientific advances in understanding autism in her newest book, "The Autistic Brain: Thinking Across the Spectrum." These kids often have uneven skills. We need to be a lot more flexible about things. Don't hold these math geniuses back. You're going to have to give them special ed in reading because that tends to be the pattern, but let them go ahead in math."

Early diagnosis can lead to early intervention and access to special education programs, and, while crucial for children with speech delay, also means a permanent label that ultimately could impede progress, and the healthy development of a child's identity. There are other situations where an autism diagnosis is helpful for an older person who is having problems with relationships. It can give them great insight, and enable them to improve relationships.

Have High, But Reasonable Expectations

A label can also impact parental expectations, a major source of therapeutic momentum for children. A parent with a diagnosed autistic child might be reluctant to teach practical social skills that are outside the child's comfort zone, such as ordering food at a lunch counter. You have to stretch these kids just outside their comfort zone to help them develop. Give them choices of "stretching" activities such as you can do Boy Scouts or robotics.

"It hurts because they don't have enough expectations for the kids. I see too many kids who are smart and did well in school, but they're not getting a job because when they were young, they didn't learn any work skills," Grandin said. "They've got no life skills. The parents thinks, 'Oh, poor Tommy. He has autism so he doesn't have to learn things like shopping." Grandin was raised by her mother in the 1950's, a time when social skills were "pounded into every single child," she said. "Children in my generation, when they were teenagers, they had jobs and learned how to work. I cleaned horse stalls. When I was 8 years old, my mother made me be a party hostess - shake hands, take coats, etc. In the 1950's, social skills were taught in a much more rigid way so kids who were mildly autistic were forced to learn them. It hurts the autistic much more than it does the normal kids to not have these skills formally taught."

"In my generation, paper routes taught important working skills. Today, parents should set up jobs a child can do in the neighborhood such as walking dogs for the neighbors. Younger children can do volunteer jobs outside the home such as being an usher at a house of worship or community center. This will teach both discipline and responsibility. It improved my self esteem to be recognized for doing a job well."

"The skills that people with autism bring to the table should be nurtured for their benefit and society's." Grandin said. "And, if a cure for autism were found, she would choose to stay just the way she is.

"I like the really logical way that I think. I'm totally logical. In fact, it kind of blows my mind how irrational human beings are," She said. "If you totally get rid of autism, you'd have nobody to fix your computer in the future."

Educating Students with Different Kinds of Minds

If algebra had been required course for college graduation in 1967, there would be no Temple Grandin. At least, no Temple Grandin as the world knows her today - professor, inventor, best-selling author, and rock star in the seemingly divergent fields of animal science and autism education. "I probably would have been a handyman, fixing toilets at some apartment building somewhere," said Grandin. "I can't do algebra. It makes no sense. Why does algebra have to be the gateway to all other mathematics?"

The abstract concepts in algebra present a common stumbling block for many with an autism spectrum disorder, dyslexia, or other learning problems. Many of the kids would do well if geometry was substituted for algebra. For autistic and photo-realistic visual thinkers, such as Grandin, understanding comes from being able to see and work through a concept in images, creating what is in effect, a virtual reality program that plays out in the brain. In this manner, Grandin, who didn't speak until she was almost 4, conceptualized down to minute details her design for a humane livestock restraint system now used on nearly half to the cattle in the U.S.

Fortunately, the academic trend in the late 1960's was finite math, a course Grandin passed with the help of tutors and devoted study, satisfying her college math requirement. She went on to earn a bachelor's degree in psychology and both masters and doctoral degrees in animal science. For the past two decades, she's been a professor at Colorado State University.

In her book, The Autistic Brain, she presents research findings that definitely show three types of specialized thinking. They are the photo realistic visual thinkers who think the way I do, math/pattern thinkers and word thinkers. Children who think differently will often thrive if they have more hands-on activities. Parents need to work with the schools to make sure that elementary school children have art, music, theater, sewing, woodworking, computer programs, and cooking . These classes teach important career skills and provide opportunities for students to have social interactions with their peers. Older students need to have access to career related classes such as welding, auto mechanics, and computer science.

There is a huge shortage of skilled mechanics. When I worked in construction installing my systems, I worked with many talented mechanics and metal fabricators. Some of them may have been on the milder end of the autism spectrum. These people were brilliant and they built very complicated things. Skilled trades are not for everybody on the spectrum. I estimate that a skilled trade would be a good choice for 25% of fully verbal people with ASD. When I look back on a long career, some of the best days of my life were out at a construction site. It was so much fun to talk about building things.

- 1 in 68 U.S. children has been identified with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
- ASD in 4.5 times more common in boys (1 in 42) and in girls (1 in 189).
- About 1 in 6 children in the U.S. had a developmental disability 2006-2008.

This covers a wide range of developmental problems ranging from mild to severe.

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Welcome to Temple Grandin's Official Autism Website

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Dr. Grandin did not talk until she was three and a half years old. She was fortunate to get early speech therapy. Her teachers also taught her how to wait and take turns when playing board games. She was mainstreamed into a normal kindergarten at age five.

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A Guide to Trees in Kenya Useful for Agroforestry

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Each year, the global community comes together to discuss the ongoing climate crisis, aiming to devise strategies to address this pressing issue. This year's conference, hosted by the United Arab Emirates, which currently holds the COP28 presidency, provides an opportunity for nations to commit to concrete actions in response to the escalating climate crisis.

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Each year, the global community comes together to discuss the ongoing climate crisis, aiming to devise strategies to address this pressing issue. This year's conference, hosted by the United Arab Emirates, which currently holds the COP28 presidency, provides an opportunity for nations to commit to concrete actions in response to the escalating climate crisis.

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Unbowed: My Autobiography
by Wangari Maathai

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The First African Woman to receive the Noble Peace Prize.

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Nobelprize.org, The Official Web Site of the Nobel Prize

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Wangari Maathai was born in a time when Kenya was under British rule; women were under men's rule and didn't attend school; and trees were under progress's rule with value only as fire wood.
Mama Mati ("Mother of Trees") worked and in time changed all those values. In the process she helped her country grow along with her trees and earned a Noble Peace Prize in 2004

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Wangari Maathai, The Woman Who Planted Millions of Trees

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Wangari Maathai, The Woman Who Planted Millions of Trees

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by Franck Prevot
illustrated by Aurelia Fronty
all ages
Colorful picture book with details and a timeline in the back.

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Malawi is beige.
Kenya is light brown.

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The Girl WhoThought in Pictures: The Story of Dr. Temple Grandin

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The Girl WhoThought in Pictures: The Story of Dr. Temple Grandin

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What can be expected from child with autism, who doesn't talk till she is three? Greater understanding of animal behavior and farm renovation to begin with.

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The Girl WhoThought in Pictures: The Story of Dr. Temple Grandin

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The Girl WhoThought in Pictures: The Story of Dr. Temple Grandin

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by Julia Finley Mosca
illustrated by Daniel Rieley
All ages picture book with simple pictures with additional detail in the back matter, a timeline, and a note from Dr. Grandin.

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 The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind: the true story of William Kamkwamba and his Windmill 

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 The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind: the true story of William Kamkwamba and his Windmill 

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The incredible story of a boy's drive to help his family by bringing electricity to an area where magic was trusted more than science. William Kamkwamba grew up in Mawali in Southeast Africa during a time that was ravaged by drought, and not everyone could afford to eat let alone attend school. William had a spark of drive and a curiosity that was fanned by an old physics book into a roaring desire to generate electricity from a windmill created out junkyard scrapes.

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Step by step instructions to make a windmill.

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Wind power is one of the fastest-growing energy sources in the world. With this quick project by Michael Arquin of the KidWind Project, young engineers can build a working turbine in just a couple of hours.

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1 Make Your Own Miniature Wind Turbine

Renewable energy is the wind beneath our turbine blades. Over the past few years, wind power has been among the fastest growing sources of energy in the world. Learn how to capture the airstream's gusting force with this rugged PVC turbine design by Michael Arquin, founder of the KidWind Project. This exploratory project teaches engineering and modeling and-to make it age- and skill-appropriate-can be scaled up or down in complexity to create more or less electricity, as well as to demonstrate concepts such as energy transformation and blade efficiencies. Get ready to be blown away.

* Five 1-inch-dia. PVC 90-degree fittings
* Three 1-inch-dia. PVC tee fittings
* One 1-inch-dia. PVC coupler
* Six 1-inch-dia. PVC 6-inch-long pipes
* One 1-inch-dia. PVC 24-inch-long pipe
* One 1-inch-dia. PVC 2-inch-long pipe

* Two alligator clips
* Poster board for blades
* 20-inch box fan or other wind source
* Duct tape
* Hot glue/glue gun
* Wire cutters
* Drill

Special Parts (Available at store.kidwind.org)

* KidWind Basic Turbine Building Parts kit
(includes DC motor with wires, 12-hole crimping hub, and 25 dowels)
* Multimeter
* 5-mm LED bulb
* Sound & Light Board

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1. Create the blades from material 6 inches to 10 inches in diameter. We used poster board, but you can use any stiff, light material, such as a sturdy paper plate or sheets of balsa. (Note: The voltage that your turbine produces depends on the torque and RPM of the blades. We found that a configuration of two or four blades generated plenty of energy, but feel free to experiment!)
2. Secure the blades to the dowels with tape or hot glue.
3. Insert the dowels into the crimping-hub holes. Tighten the hub after inserting.

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Wind power is one of the fastest-growing energy sources in the world. With this quick project by Michael Arquin of the KidWind Project, young engineers can build a working turbine in just a couple of hours. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below 1 Make Your Own Miniature Wind Turbine Renewable energy is the wind beneath our turbine blades.

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by William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer
Middle school and up.
Engrossing story with rich details and a positive message.

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(CNN) -- William Kamkwamba dreamed of powering his village with the only resource that was freely available to him.

His native Malawi had gone through one of its worst droughts seven years ago, killing thousands. His family and others were surviving on one meal a day. The red soil in his Masitala hometown was parched, leaving his father, a farmer, without any income.

But amid all the shortages, one thing was still abundant.

Wind.

"I wanted to do something to help and change things," he said. "Then I said to myself, 'If they can make electricity out of wind, I can try, too.'"

Kamkwamba was kicked out of school when he couldn't pay $80 in school fees, and he spent his days at the library, where a book with photographs of windmills caught his eye.

"I thought, this thing exists in this book, it means someone else managed to build this machine," he said.

Armed with the book, the then-14-year-old taught himself to build windmills. He scoured through junkyards for items, including bicycle parts, plastic pipes, tractor fans and car batteries. For the tower, he collected wood from blue-gum trees.

"Everyone laughed at me when I told them I was building a windmill. They thought I was crazy," he said. "Then I started telling them I was just playing with the parts. That sounded more normal."

That was 2002. Now, he has five windmills, the tallest at 37 feet. He built one at an area school that he used to teach classes on windmill-building.

The windmills generate electricity and pump water in his hometown, north of the capital, Lilongwe. Neighbors regularly trek across the dusty footpaths to his house to charge their cellphones. Others stop by to listen to Malawian reggae music blaring from a radio.

When he started building the first windmill in 2002, word that he was "crazy" spread all over his village. Some people said he was bewitched -- a common description for people with perplexing behavior in some African cultures.

"All of us, even my mother, thought that he had gone mad," said his sister Doris Kamkwamba.

Villagers would surround him to snicker and point, Kamkwamba said. Ignoring them, he would quietly bolt pieces using a screwdriver made of a heated nail attached to a corncob. The heat -- from both the crowd and the melted, flattened pipes he used as blades -- did not deter him.

Three months later, his first windmill churned to life as relief swept over him. As the blades whirled, a bulb attached to the windmill flickered on.

"I wanted to finish it just to prove them wrong," he said. "I knew people would then stop thinking I was crazy."

Kamkwamba, now 22, is a student at the African Leadership Academy, an elite South African school for young leaders. Donors pay for his education.

His story has turned him into a globetrotter. Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, an avid advocate of green living, has applauded his work. Kamkwamba is invited to events worldwide to share his experience with entrepreneurs. During a recent trip to Palm Springs, California, he saw a real windmill for the first time -- lofty and majestic -- a far cry from the wobbly, wooden structures that spin in his backyard.

Former Associated Press correspondent Bryan Mealer, who covered Africa, wrote a book, "The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind," after hearing Kamkwamba's story. The book was released in the United States last week.

Mealer, a native of San Antonio, Texas, said he lived with Kamkwamba in his village for months to write the book. The story was a refreshing change after years of covering bloody conflicts in the region, Mealer said.

Kamkwamba is part of a generation of Africans who are not waiting for their governments or aid groups to come to their rescue, according to the author.

"They are seizing opportunities and technology, and finding solutions to their own problems," Mealer said. "One of the keys of his success is ... he's never wanted to rest on his laurels."

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Malawian boy uses wind to power hope, electrify village

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(CNN) -- William Kamkwamba dreamed of powering his village with the only resource that was freely available to him. His native Malawi had gone through one of its worst droughts seven years ago, killing thousands. His family and others were surviving on one meal a day.

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by William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer
Young Readers edition.

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by William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer
pictures by Elizabeth Zunon
Picture book
All ages.
Wonderfully textured pictures in a collage style. Back matter contains additional details of his story.

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First Ted Talk

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William Kamkwamba: How I built a windmill

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When he was just 14 years old, Malawian inventor William Kamkwamba built his family an electricity-generating windmill from spare parts, working from rough plans he found in a library book.

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Full Ted talk with subtitles.

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William Kamkwamba: How I harnessed the wind

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At age 14, in poverty and famine, a Malawian boy built a windmill to power his family's home. Now at 22, William Kamkwamba, who speaks at TED, here, for the second time, shares in his own words the moving tale of invention that changed his life.

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 Beyond Marie Curie: Who contributed to our understanding of the world and how; a look into the rich diversity of scientists.

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 Beyond Marie Curie: Who contributed to our understanding of the world and how; a look into the rich diversity of scientists.

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No one knows who will contribute to the ever growing body of understanding of our world.  Can a sickly, disfigured woman discover a new celestial entity?  Can a woman who didn't talk till she was 3 find a way to understand cows?  Can a boy who couldn't afford school find a way to bring electricity to his home and village?  Can a young girl save the world or at least a piece of it?
The answer to all those questions can be found in the pages described below.