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Top Revision Tips: Get some sleep!

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With exam season upon us, we thought we would help you guys out a little bit with a useful piece of procrastination – revision tips backed up with scientific research!

1. Get a good night’s sleep

We spend on average one third of our lives asleep so it must be important. There have been millions of studies looking into sleep and how it effects our minds and bodies.

Sleep is divided into five stages. The final stage is called REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep, named after the quick eye movements made during it. If you look at someone who is in this stage of sleep you will be able to see their eyes moving behind their eyelids (it’s not creepy if it’s for science). During this stage your brain is super active, brain scans during this phase look similar to someone who is awake but your body is paralysed. This stage is considered to be the point at which you consolidate memories into long-term memories.

Scientists in Italy looked at a range of studies focusing on the effects of sleep on the academic performance of students. The results showed students whose sleep was restricted did worse than usual in exams whereas those who were allowed extra sleep performed better. Further to this, a study by Trockel (2010) looked at lots of variables in 200 students and found those that woke up later performed worse in exams. So you might want to avoid the lie-ins during the exam period!

 

2. Don’t pull an all-nighter

Although it can be tempting to stay up all night to get some last minute revision in when you’re particularly worried about an exam, I wouldn’t recommend it. Research from Pilcher and Huffcutt (1996) looked at 19 different studies and found sleep deprivation (going a long time without sleeping) can impair your thinking and this is not going to help you in any exam.

The world record for the longest time kept awake without drugs is 11 days and 24 minutes (please don’t attempt to break this record). The record was set by Randy Gardner is 1964 and the severe lack of sleep not only effected his concentration and memory but also led to paranoia and even hallucinations. Of course this is an extreme example but studies looking at just 24 hours without sleep have found worse performance on memory tasks and slower responses after sleep deprivation. Not ideal for an exam.

3. Don’t rely on coffee

Coffee may seem harmless enough but it does contain a drug – caffeine. Although it does have its perks, as with any drug there are side effects that you won’t want around exam time. Firstly, I’ll explain the science behind what caffeine actually does once it’s inside your body. Within your body you have a molecule called adenosine which suppresses arousal and promotes sleep when it binds to its receptors. Caffeine is able to bind to adenosine receptors but does not trigger them, instead it simply sits there and blocks adenosine getting to the receptors so causes the reverse effects. This is clearly beneficial when you want to stay awake but can cause insomnia – not good as you now are well aware how important sleep is. Caffeine also stimulates the release of adrenaline – this already happens when you’re stressed so can worsen the effects and cause anxiety.

So what does the research say? Harrison and Horne (2010) conducted a study in which they deprived participants of sleep and subjected them to memory tests, some with coffee, and some without. They found those who drank coffee felt less sleepy but performed no better in their tests. Even in control conditions where participants weren’t sleep deprived, coffee made no significant improvement in their results.

If you are starting to lag with your revision and feel a little sleepy, try having a nap instead of reaching for the coffee. One study found that having a 60-90 minute nap can improve your memory recall and learning ability much better that a cup of coffee.

 

4. Manage your time well

Good time management is key to making sure you cover all the topics you need to before an exam and still leave yourself enough time for a good snooze. It can help you keep calm as well if you know you have given yourself enough time. A study of 249 students found that time management behaviours such as planning, organising, setting goals and prioritising helped reduce stress levels better than leisure activities – although leisure activities also helped reduce stress, so make time for fun when creating your revision timetable.

But it’s not enough to just make your revision timetable – you obviously have to stick to it. Another study found that self-discipline is a major predictor of academic performance.

So make a plan, stick to it and get some sleep!

Top Revision Tips: Memory Techniques

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With exam season upon us, we thought we would help you guys out a little bit with a useful piece of procrastination – revision tips backed up with scientific research!

1. Don’t keep re-reading – test yourself!

Most scientific models of how memory works agree that we have a short term and long term memory. Short term memory can hold 5-9 items whereas long term memory has a much greater capacity but not everything we see, hear or read ends up there. To help embed things in our long term memory it helps to rehearse them and practice retrieval too. This means that whilst re-reading the same notes over and over again will help rehearse them, it is also important to test yourself to see how much of it you can remember to be sure you can retrieve these memories when you need them.

2. Use Mnemonics

Mnemonics are a technique used to help remember things by association. For example you might have learnt the order of the colours of the rainbow with the phrase “Richard Of York Gave Battle In Vain” with the first letter of each letter corresponding to the first letter of the colour it represents. So it translates to red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. Or maybe you learnt the compass points with “Never Eat Shredded Wheat”.

If you have to remember things in a certain order for your exam, making up a mnemonic like this can be a great way to help you. Mnemonics work by creating more meaningful associations and giving you cues to help you retrieve the information from your long term memory. Researchers Shetty and Srinivasan looked into the study skills of 137 Dental students and found that the use of mnemonics were associated with higher exam scores.

Here’s a mnemonic to help you remember the geological time periods:

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If you use mnemonics to aid your revision, comment and let us know what they are – you might be able to help someone else out too!

3. Don’t rely on cramming

It’s a classic scene – just before you’re about to enter an exam, everyone is sat around stressing over their textbooks and flicking through sheets of scruffy notes trying to get in some very last minute revision. Is this really helpful? Studies have shown that you can generally hold, on average, 7 things in your short term memory and this fades after 30 seconds if not rehearsed and committed to long term memory. Therefore it’s unlikely you’ll remember much of what you read waiting outside the hall after you have taken your seat and read the question.

It’s much better to manage your time to allow yourself to cover everything you need properly and get it into your long term memory before the day of your exam!

4. Use Chunking

Despite the fact I have just said you can only remember around 7 things in short term memory, you can probably remember a phone number or a couple of post codes for 30 seconds right? This is because, whether you notice it or not – that information is chunked, making it much easier to remember. This is why phone numbers are usually displayed with a gap after three or four numbers and why post codes are in two parts.

Chunking, or separating your revision into relevant sections can help you digest everything and remember it more easily. If you can create links between different bits of information and put them in meaningful categories it can help you to recall the relevant information in your exams.memory

 

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Engineering Education Scheme

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This week we’ve been helping out with the Engineering Education Scheme. Lots of year 12 students from the local area have been working with industry to come up with a project based on real scientific, engineering and technological problems. The students have come in and had a chance to work in the engineering laboratories and workshops that university students and researchers would use. After lots of problem solving and hard work, they presented what they had done so far. These are just a selection of some of the projects.

Mechanical Engineering – Lifting

This group was working on creating a lifting mechanism for a heavy item/box. The current method of lifting isn’t very good as its centre of gravity is in the middle so it wobbles when they lift it. They created a design with a cradle for the box which spreads out the centre of gravity. It is more stable and quicker to lift, saving the company time. The use of shackles mean the box can attached by hand, no tools are needed, again saving time.

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Mechanical Engineering – Shield

A mechanical engineering group created an extendable shield. This is important for keeping people safe in war. In general all shields appeared to be really big or small, but there were none that could adapt to the situation. Use of cogs allowed the shield to be extended or retracted, solving the problem.

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Electrical and Civil Engineering – Solar Power

The brief from WSP Global was to provide renewable energy through use of solar panels to the 350 people who work in the office. The students made a to scale model of the office based on blueprints and used a fixed angle light (as the sun) to look at the shading on the roof of the building. They also ran computer simulations to look at which areas would capture the most sun.

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Civil Engineering – Leisure Centre

The brief was to design a leisure centre on land near to St James Football Park. There were lots of problems to be overcome in the design. The centre was to be built on top of an old mine shaft, which might mean the building would fall into the ground. They calculated that it was too expensive to fill the land underneath with concrete, so calculations had to be made for how heavy each part of the leisure centre would be.

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Marine Engineering – Underwater vehicles

This marine engineering group was helped by engineers from BAE systems. They looked at making an underwater unmanned vehicle. They had to do some problem solving with getting the submarine to sink, working out the exact amount of weight required to make it neutrally buoyant. They used electromagnets to power the vehicle.

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Marine Engineering – Underwater pipes

This group worked with GE oil and gas looking at using flexible pipes underneath the seabed. They compared two different materials; thermoplastic and thermoset.  They did lots of tests, looking at things such as compression (squashing) and torsion (twisting) to find out its properties. They also looked at factors such as the price. Testing found that it was really important that there were no faults in the thermoplastic as it broke a lot easier. Underwater pipes are really important for transporting things like oil and gas.

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Dippy the Diplodocus

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Dippy is a famous diplodocus skeleton cast that has been on display in the London Natural History Museum since 1905. Today it was disassembled as Dippy is going on tour throughout the UK! Dippy is visiting eight places across the UK between February 2018 and October 2020. We are very excited as Dippy is coming to the Great North Museum between May and October 2019.

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History of Dippy

Dippy’s history begins when a skeleton was discovered in Wyoming, USA in 1898. It was a new type of diplodocus and at the time it was described as ‘the most colossal animal on earth”. Andrew Carnegie acquired the bones for the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburg, USA, hence the new species was named Diplodocus carnegii  after him. King Edward VII saw a sketch of the diplodocus and mentioned how he would like a similar specimen for the Natural History Museum in London. Andrew Carnegie then made a cast of his specimen and Dippy was created.

Dippy was disassembled during World War II to protect it from bomb damage. It made the move to Hintze Hall (the main entrance hall of the museum) in 1979. Dippy was taken down today, as it is going on a two year tour of the UK.

The unveiling of Dippy in 1905
The unveiling of Dippy in 1905

Diplodocus Facts

  • They were up to 27m in length
  • They weighed about 10,800 kg (as much as a large truck).
  • Lived at the end of the Jurassic period (154-150 million years ago)
  • Its heavy tail was used to scare off predators.
  • They were vegetarian.
  • Diplodocuses lived in North America.
  • Its name means double beam, due to the unusual double row of bones on the underneath of the tail.
  • It was a slow moving dinosaur, moving at 5-9.3 mph.

Why Perfumes are not the Perfect Christmas Present…

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Many animals rely heavily on their sense of smell for finding food, getting a whiff of the competition and even sniffing potential mates. You might not often see humans checking the scent of their partners, but scientists have found it does play a subtle role in helping us chose mates – as do perfumes.

All animals are made up of a collection of genes that are inherited from parents, these code for all sorts of things like eye colour and taste buds. All mammals, including us, have a section of genes called the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) which affects how well your immune system fights diseases. It is also linked to your natural scent.

There have been experiments on mice, mandrills, meerkats and many other animals showing that females tend to mate with males that have a different MHC to their own. This ensures that their offspring have a more varied set of genes and so will likely have a better immune system and survive for longer – which is what every parent wants for their child.

When tested in humans, the usual method is to get a group of men to wear a t-shirt for several days to get it nice and sweaty and smelly. Women will then smell each of the t-shirts and rate the odours in order of which they find the most pleasant. These experiments have consistently found that women tend to prefer the scent of men with MHC genes different to their own.

So what happens when you wear perfume and cover up that lovely natural odour of yours? Two researchers, Wedekind and Milinski wanted to find out. They asked over 100 people to rate a selection of perfumes based on whether they would like to smell like that. They found a correlation between the type of MHC and the scents selected, suggesting that we choose perfumes for ourselves that will enhance our natural odour. However, when asked to rate perfumes based on whether they would like their partner to smell like that, they found no significant link.

It appears that we are great a picking out odours for ourselves, but not so much at selecting the perfect perfume for others. Maybe a gift card would be better this year…

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Marine Projects Society

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There are loads of societies that you can get involved in at Newcastle University. These are clubs based around your interests or what course you study. One of our newest STEM ones is a hands on engineering society: the Marine Projects Society.

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It all started when a group of Marine Technology students took part in the International Submarine Race in 2014 in Washington DC, USA. Students who were interested in working on it the following year took over and decided to form a society around it to enable students to partake in a variety of Marine related projects. The society remained focused on marine engineering so a a variety of engineering students across the university could collaborate on projects.

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Working on the submarine
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Last years submarine team

This academic year (2015/16) they are working on building an underwater ROV (Remotely Operated Vehicle), which are underwater robots important in studying deep water habitats that we otherwise couldn’t access . The society aim to take part in the MATE (Marine Advanced Technology Education) ROV competition in Long Beach, California, USA in June next year. The competition is based on acting as entrepreneurs selling the prospective client a product (in this case an ROV). To achieve this they must draft technical reports, marketing displays and engage in community outreach as well as build an ROV to demonstrate that it can perform certain set underwater tasks.

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Working on a prototype

This years team consists of about 30 members, some of whom are a part of the core team and others are ancillary members who have the opportunity to learn from more experienced members and contribute in their own capacity. The current members form 3 sub groups, namely- 1) Structures & Chassis  2) Mechanical Systems  3) Electrical & Computing.

  1. The Structures & Chassis team is responsible for designing the outer framework of the ROV and responsible for waterproofing and making certain design calculations (buoyancy, weights, center of gravity etc.).
  2. The mechanical systems team is responsible for designing & building a manipulator (mechanical arm) in order to enable a person from the surface to control it remotely to perform certain underwater tasks such as picking items up.
  3. The electrical & computing team is responsible for coding the control architecture or the ‘brain’ of the ROV. They are tasked with controlling the motor speeds, manipulator & underwater video-cam transmission.
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Essential calculations for the ROV

This society is a really good opportunity for anyone who is studying engineering to get some practical experience. The students across the different sub groups come from a variety of engineering backgrounds (Electrical, Marine, Mechanical, Computer science). We wish them the best of luck with the ROV competition!

 

Stu Brew – Our very own student run brewery

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Stu Brew is Europe’s first student-run microbrewery based at Newcastle University.  We are managed by students for students through Newcastle University Students’ Union. There are over 120 students involved in Stu Brew. The brewery is capable of producing around 800 pints in one day and the beer is sold at a variety of pubs and bottle shops throughout the North East.

The Brewery

Our brewery is where all the magic happens. The brewery is made up of a number of stages. The brewery can be seen in the picture below which shows all the different vessels.

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  1. Hot Liquor tank: This is where all the water that is needed for the brewing process is heated up to around 77°C . Our brewery uses around 500 litres of water per brew!
  2. Mash Tun: This is where the hot water is mixed with grain to extract all the sugars that are used to make the beer. Different types of grain are used to create different styles of beer. We have made over 15 different styles of beer with many more to come.
  3. Whirlpool: The grain is separated from the sugar rich water which is known as wort in this stage
  4. Kettle: The wort is boiled for an hour killing off any bacteria that may infect the beer. Hops are added at various points in the boil to add different flavours to the beer. For example adding hops at the start of the boil gives the beer its bitterness whereas hops added towards the end of the boil yield more aromatic flavours.
  5. Heat Exchanger: This is used to cool the boiling wort down to 20°C.
  6. Fermentation: The yeast is added to the beer which reacts with the sugars within the wort and converts them into alcohol. After about 72 hours this reaction is complete and the beer is then put into casks and is ready to be sold and drunk!

 

Celebrating Marie Curie

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Marie Curie was born 149 years ago today. We think she is one of the most inspiring female scientists as one of the first women to make an outstanding contribution to science. Her work overturned established ideas in physics and chemistry and helped overcome societal barriers for women.

Marie Sklodowska was born in Poland in 1867. In 1891 she went on to study physics and maths at Sorbonne University in Paris. She met Pierre Curie, professor of the School of Physics, who she married in 1895, becoming Marie Curie.

The Curies worked together investigating radioactivity, the process where atoms decay by emitting radiation. With help from other physicists they discovered new elements, polonium (named after her home country, Poland) and radium in 1898. This work was extremely difficult as they were constantly exposed to radioactive elements, which made them feel ill, an effect known as radiation sickness. They received the Nobel Peace Prize in Physics for their work in 1903. Marie Curie was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize.

Unfortunately, Pierre died from being knocked down by a carriage in 1906. Marie Curie took over his professor post and became the first woman to teach at Sorbonne University. She received a second Nobel Peace Prize in 1911 for her work in chemistry where she determined a way to measure radioactivity.

Her research was crucial in development of X-rays. Marie developed small mobile X-rays that were used in World War One to diagnose injuries. She worked with her daughter at the front line to help diagnose injuries.

Marie Curie died due to exposure to radioactivity during her work in 1934. The Marie Curie Hospital was opened in 1930, specialising in radiological treatment of women suffering from cancer. The Marie Curie charity was established in 1948 which now offers care, support and guidance for people with a terminal illness.

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The Science of Fireworks

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We all know the history of Bonfire Night, but do you know the science?

The Explosion

All fireworks are essentially a combustion reaction, like fire, that produces light and heat.

Fireworks tend to have a long fuse that burns slowly so you have time to light the fuse and run away before the big bang! The fuse first reaches a compartment containing gunpowder, it ignites this causing the firework to launch into the night. There is a delayed fuse to ignite the next explosion, this heats the “stars”.

The stars in a firework are individual compartments containing a different composition of chemicals, depending on the desired colour and effect of the firework. The stars may even be arranged inside the shell of the firework so that they burst in a certain formation to form a shape.

The Colours

Firework displays always use a range of striking colours, the variety of colours comes from the use of different chemicals. Elements such as barium, copper and lithium burn with a coloured flame and are chosen for use in fireworks due to the bright colours they produce.

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The Sound

When the chemicals inside the firework’s shell are heated they convert from a solid to a gas. The gas takes up more space than there is available inside the shell so it bursts out creating a loud BANG.

Crackling noises come from fireworks which contain lead. When lead oxide is heated and vapourised, the vapour atoms produce crackling noises.

The whistling sound that you hear when the fireworks shoot up in the air, comes from the firework tube itself, not the chemicals. When the tube is partly empty, it will vibrate the air passing through it, causing a whistle.

How can you write your name with a sparkler?

I’m sure you’ve all held a lit sparkler at some point and twirled it around in the air to see a trail of light lingering in the air for a few seconds. The truth is the light isn’t really still there but your eyes play a trick on your brain to make you think that it is. Image resultOur eyes don’t react as quickly as you might think when our view changes, they usually keep the old view around for a fraction of a second. This is known as visual persistence and it’s what allows us to view a series of still images as movement. The effect is increased in the case of the sparklers due to the very bright light emitted form the sparks contrasting against the dark background. This makes the light appear to last longer.

 

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The Chemistry of Being Scared

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Happy Halloween! We all like being scared sometimes, whether it’s scary movies or a rollercoaster, but why do we get scared?

We feel fear when we see or hear something that makes us anticipate harm. If you are walking through a haunted house this Halloween and a skeleton jumps out at you, the skeleton is a stimulus that triggers a signal in your brain.

The hypothalamus is part of your brain that activates the ‘fight or flight’ response. When you are scared molecules of glutamate (a neurotransmitter) travel to the hypothalamus. This then triggers the autonomic nervous system, a response that you can’t control.

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Nerves from the brain carry impulses to glands which produce adrenaline, released into the blood. Adrenaline causes our heart rate and blood pressure to increase making us ready to run away quickly.

When we get scared we also get goosebumps. This is a trait that evolved in our hairier ancestors. When our hair stands up on end it makes us look bigger and more threatening to whoever is scaring us. This is seen in other animals too, such as cats.

However, we aren’t scared forever. Eventually our body realises that there is nothing to be worried about.  Sensory data of what we have seen and heard is sent to the hippocampus in the brain which can store and retrieve conscious memories. It gives context to what we have seen and asks questions such as have I seen this before and what happened last time?

If a skeleton jumps out, we will realise that it isn’t real and is probably just someone dressed up! The hippocampus will determine that there is no danger and sends a message to the hypothalamus. Adrenaline production stops and our heart rate goes back to normal.

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We have evolved to feel fear to allow us to survive. People and animals who feared the right things survived and passed on their genes. This makes sure we don’t do stupid things like picking up poisonous snakes or walking off buildings.

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