For 21st-Century Kids, Home Microfluidics And Neurology Kits
Hand-Cranked Microfluidics Machine Courtesy of George Korir We've seen a lot of nostalgia for ye olde chemistry sets lately. Nobel Laureates have reminisced about playing with them. These days, sets containing radioactive uranium dust or toxic lead are not going to cut it anymore, but that doesn't mean kids can't get exposure to real science. The Society for Science & the Public—the nonprofit that runs the Intel ISEF science fair—recently held a competition to see who could make the coolest modern science set. The winners are just as hands-on as 1950s chemistry sets. Even better, they've got technology that didn't exist then. The first-prize winner is a hand-cranked microfluidics kit, made by a biochemistry professor and his graduate student. Microfluidics technology is what goes into lab-on-a-chip devices that mix and move different chemicals via tiny channels on a computer-chip-size platforms. Scientists...