Category: 2016-2017

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Cambodia Geology

During my fourth exploration, I studied Geology of Cambodia, we are the first ever students in Cambodia to study and explore about geology in this country. In class we learned many things about rock and how it formed, we watch videos, researching on the precise website and get the information from the American geologist. We also have three field trips, which where we see and learn more about rock and identifying the rock type. We’ve been to Kep, Kampot, Koh Kong, Ratanakiri, and Mondulkiri, which both are on the opposite side of Cambodia. In most part of Kep, Kampot and Koh Kong we saw much limestone and sandstone which was formed in the ocean that due to the pressure and the depth of the sea. For Ratanakiri and Mondulkiri we mostly saw basalt which is in Igneous rock type and is formed in the volcanoes’ lava.

Since we the first Cambodian to study about Cambodia’s geology, we gathered as much statistics as possible to share with many other Cambodians to know what Cambodia used to look like within geology. In our sharation, we share what we learned to Cambodians and foreigners that come to see our presentation about geology. We also hope that the changes, in government schools curricula, is to add geology in their focus, which is provided more education to Cambodians all over the country.

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Virtual Marine Scientific Report

Introduction

Blue Mussel, Mytilus is one of the aquatic animals that protected by their shell. This type of animal is most likely be found along the rocky shore along the coastlines, bays and the river’s mouth that connect to the ocean. In fjord, the ecosystems along the rocky shore are the most blue mussel founded. In this ecosystem, these animal are really benefiting for other aquatic animals, such as that this animal can be the habitats for fish and other organisms. So doing research scientist, show that blue mussel would decrease the larval growth when ocean water facing ocean acidification. So to do this project, take control on the pH in the water, use the current ocean pH (8.1) in 3 replicates to see the difference, and collect data. Also to prove the hypothesis is correct, use another pH (7.3) which is more acidic in 3 replicates and at last collect another data. At the end of the experiment, compare the hypothesis with the result to see if the hypothesis is correct. The objective to do this experiment is that to show how climate change affects the ecosystems and especially the organism that chosen to do the experiment. So the hypothesis is that the Blue Mussel size will be smaller when the pH of the ocean decreases.

Material & methods

Choose a dependent variable, which is the blue mussel. Also choose the independent variable, pH 8.1 and pH 7.3 and each of the pH makes three replicates and each replicate should have the same temperature, which is 8-degree celsius. After choosing the dependent and independent variable, so the control is the pH and temperature. At last choose the parameter to measure the size of the organism, blue mussel.

Materials:

  • Aquarium Tanks
  • Mussel (Mytilus)
  • Water
  • Food
  • Book\Pen/Pencil
  • pH meter

Methods to Set Up the Experiment:

Step 1: Setup the tank, buy a tank and choose the organism (blue mussel), then choose pH 8.1 as choosing the temperature 8-degree celsius, and don’t forget to click on food (no food the organism will die).

Step 2: Click on the same tank and make 2 more duplicates, after the click should have three tanks emerge up into images with the same setup as the first tanks.

Step 3: Buy another empty tank, set it to the same organism, temperature, and food, but change the pH to pH 7.3.

Step 4: Click on the same tank and make 2 more duplicates, after the click should have three tanks emerge up into images with the same setup as the first tanks.

Step 5: After finishing the setup for the experiment, click finish and set the schedule for Brian to collect data and also feed the mussels.

Results

In pH 8.1 on Day 1 the size of the larvae is 101 and pH 7.3 the size is 97, the difference is 4 micrometers. On Day 7 pH 8.1 larvae size is 123 while larvae size in pH 7.3 is 119, also on this day the larvae size is 4 micrometers different. On Day 13, larvae size in pH 8.1 is 164 but the larvae size in pH 7.3 is 139 and the difference is 25 micrometers. On the last day which is Day 19, the larvae size in pH 8.1 is 185 and the larvae size in pH 7.3 is 165, the different is 20 micrometers. It seems like the larvae size in pH 8.1 is bigger.

Discussion

This result shows that the decrease in pH (more acidic) in the ocean will affect the growth of blue mussel larvae to decrease in size. All the day that the data collected from both pH level, all the data shows that the blue mussel will grow faster and bigger when the pH level is 8.1. So if the human is not reducing the energy that we used every single day and all those deforestations more and more carbon dioxide will release into our atmosphere and most of them are observe back into the ocean. When it observes to the ocean, the ocean will get more acidic and it really affects to blue mussel growing process, not just the blue mussel but other aquatic organisms too. If I am going to do this experiment again, I would want to use three different pH which is pH 7.3, pH 8.1 the same and add another one which is pH 8.4 to see the difference of size of the blue mussel. Also, I would rather collect more data from more days in order to see more difference between the two pH. According to my result that Brian collected for me, I can clearly say that my hypothesis matches with my result, which is the Blue Mussel size will be smaller when the pH of the ocean decreases.

Conclusion

So, in conclusion, the result is accepting the hypothesis, which is the Blue Mussel size will be smaller when the pH of the ocean decreases. So in pH 8.1 mussel grow faster and bigger than pH 7.3 in all day. Today, currently the pH of ocean starting to diminish, which means it really affects to blue mussel growth process. To stop this every human should stop deforestation and reduce burning fossil fuel for energy. If I going to do it in further experiment I would add one more pH to the experiment and collect more data from more days.

References

“VirtualLbb.” Virtual Marine Scientist. Web. 26 Feb. 2017.

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Short Story

Spirit of My Godmother

The snow slowly falls during a winter evening, all trees vanish down the road, the cool air flew through a window, and then the sound stamping on the glossy floor when my mom walks swiftly to the window and shut it down, in Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston.

 

My mom strolls back to me, rapidly and put my red blanket cover me,“Are you okay Lucas, let keep you warm, my son,” the voice of my mom gently voice talking to me, while she settles down on the wooden tool.

Suddenly, I heard a man with a massive voice talking to my mom, “He has only about 3 more months.”

My mom started to cry with the tears in her eyes, and then she holds close to my hand tightly, such as female bear holds close to her offspring. My heart slowly pumping blood throughout my body, just like a river water flow into smaller streams, while I am napping on the hospital bed. Every day my mom comes to the hospital, she sits beside me and the tears drop from her eyes. I want to talk back to her and comfort her, but how I possibly talk to her while I am lying and sleeping on the bed without any sign of hope. Although she knows that there isn’t any chance for me to survive, my mom always prays and hopes that I will escape from this adverse situation.

The sound of my mom smoothly and gently, devoted to god,

“Lucas is my only son please gods help him, I will do anything for my son to survive, even though you take my life for Lucas.”Then the doctor comes in the room again, with hurried and worried face and talks to my mom, “Mrs. Mason we don’t know what is your son deceased, but we only know that he has really shot time and really small percents to stay.But before that happen we promise to try our best to save him,” the doctor continued hastily.

I get worst and worst over time in the hospital, my heart gradually not processing well, the doctor rush to my bed and take me to the emergency room. They start taking heart pumping machine out and process it on my chest when the electricity running through my chest into my heart. Suddenly my heart working with normal beats like a drum beats in my favorite band, One Direction. Doctor send me back to my room and tell my mom that I surely have no chance to survive. The next day, my mom bring everything that I like from home, including my favorite red toy cars, my red caps, red football, One Direction toys, and read my favorite book to me.

She sits down on a wooden stool, next to my bed and said softly,

“Lucas, even though the doctor said that you not going to survive.” She continues whispering sadly with the tear in her eyes, with a hopeful word,“But, I still believe that you not going to leave me alone in this world, and if you were gone I just feel like a single boat in the middle of the sea, no want to talk to or no one that can make me happy.”

She reads the book to me as usual, and she says that before I had this disease when I am free I like to play football with my friends. I did really well at school, also she tells me that soon when I wake up my friends are waiting for me to play football with them. Moreover, my mom said that I am the happiest son on Earth, and she said that I am a really shy kid, but when coming to my story I always brave enough to talk and share with others, just like when the flower touches water and blooms back during spring. Next day, she comes into my room as usual but she doesn’t see or know where I am. She runs to as many and many doctors assistants, and at last one of the assistant tell her that doctor take me to the emergency room again. Then she runs hurriedly and faithfully straight into the emergency room, while the teardrops from her brooding eyes, but the doctors let her wait inside.

I heard she cries out loud, outside the room “I need to see my son, I don’t want anything to happen to my son, please doctor help him I will do anything to require you”.

That I heard the doctor said, “Yes Mrs. Mason, we will try our best to save him but now we want you to wait outside.”

My body strokes, my arms tightly can’t move, my head pinned onto the bed, my mouth wide open but do not make any noise, my eyes spread open bigger and bigger. Then the doctor quickly, processing their job to save my life as they worried about my heart beats. My heart beats get really low on the electric measurement beside my head.

Later on, the doctor goes out and look at my mom while he knocks his head and said, “He has, two more weeks, we already try our best to save him, but we have no more option to do, sorry.”

As soon as my mom heard what the doctor said, she kneels down on the floor without any hope just like you get locked inside the hungry lion’s cage and just like swimming in the ocean and suddenly there are many sharks surrounded you. The doctor tells my mom that, I might have some chance if my mom send me to the State Hospital, which is the best hospital on Earth and it is honestly super expensive. The doctor also added that, and if my mom wants to send me to another hospital, she needs to do it very quickly before I get any worst than my situation now. Then my mom talks out loud that, even our family poor she stills do anything to save my life. My mom works really hard to get money to save my life, she sells our home and land just to get money to save me. Now my heart literally barely working, and after all the hard work of my mom, she sends me to another state, and to the hospital that the doctor told her. Besides she knows that I have no second chance to live, just like groups of termites build their nest under the strongly stormy rainfall, they are never going to build the nest fully.

When I arrive at the State Hospital in Minnesota, the doctors rashly send me right in the emergency room. I am alone in Minnesota, while my mom waiting to see the result in my town because she doesn’t find enough money to be here with me. In the emergency room, doctors find out that I have unoccupied, meat grows in my heart, which means that I have extra meat. Then they send me to the surgery room and begin to do the surgery on my chest. They break my chest and into my heart, while my heart is beating really slow. They take my heart out and stick me the oxygen right in my nose and my mouth. After they took my heart out, the doctors do a surgery on my heart, just to get the unoccupied meat out. One of the doctors said to another doctor, that they can’t do anything with my heart, they need a new heart from someone that has the same type of blood and heart as me. But how can they get the heart to replace my heart, that what I really wonder and worried, if that the person that gives heart to me, still they live or die and but if they know they going to die because of no heart so why they donate it to me, instead of keeping their life.

As I am waking up the next morning, I suddenly saw an old couple standing to surround my bed and they call me Stephen, I wonder why they call me Stephen instead of Lucas. They kneel down next to my bed and say sorry for all the things and sorry that they leave me for about 16 years. They say that I am their child and the only child they have, but they decide to leave me without any reason and give me to another couple, which is my mom Amalia Earhart Mason, and my dad Earhart Mason. They say that they needed to leave me because they want to find money to save me later on in life, but accidentally they get tricked from others. But, over time they try to free their self and come back to me when they have what they need, which is money. And now it is a chance which they can come in and say sorry for everything, and want me back to live with them in the big fancy house. I was shocked, instantly after I heard they said that I am their child and they leave me for 16 years. I am little sad at the movement, but I try to understand their decision so I forgive my parents.

My real parents, want to take me to their home but I told them that my second mom lives in a small town in Boston State, so I want to bring her to my real parent’s home too. My mom and my dad agree to let me visit my second mom and bring her to their home. I really happy and we three, fly back to Boston to meet my mom. When we arrive at the town, I ask the people there do they see Mrs. Mason, but they all said that she flew to Minnesota to meet me. So we, fly back to Minnesota to find my second mother. When I arrive at the hospital that I went to, I ask the doctor there and they said they get my heart from a woman that comes into the hospital and said that she will give me her heart, and now she already pass away. I can’t feel anything, I just fall down on my knee right to the ground just like an apple fall from an apple tree, that never going to be back on the tree. My tear suddenly drops from my eyes, just like the rainfall, I can’t feel my arms, my face nor my body just like a status that have no feeling and no action.

My dad and my mom, come right into me and hug me and say, “She really loves you, Lucas, that why she did it for you, in this world no one like her she is the best human that we had never seen before.”

Then they bring me to their home, the sky is dark and crying will all millions of raindrops as their tears just like my feeling when my mom disappear. I look through the window and saw my second mom shadow saying to me that, “I wish you the best of luck with your parents, and sorry that I never tell you about your first family.”

I arrived at my parent’s home, my feeling not as down as it was when I was in the hospital. They buy me everything I would want, but I remember my past that I used to not have that much stuff to play. I still do miss my adopted mom, that always look after me and sacrificed herself just to save me, even though she knows that she not my real mom. I try to be happy, with my new friends and new everything, and I wish my adopted mom happy to see me here. Now my mom is pregnant, the baby comes out and she is a girl so I named her Amalia, just like my god adopted mom.