ASTRONOMY
Rensselaer Creates New Kid's Molecularium Show & Takes It on the Road

National Science Foundation grant to fund expansion of the project Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has been awarded a grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to expand its Molecularium project and take it global. The animated program is designed to spark children's interest in learning about atoms and molecules using planetariums in a new way for science education.

The Molecularium project is part of the educational and outreach program of Rensselaer's NSF-funded Nanoscale Science and Engineering Center (NSEC) for Directed Assembly of Nanostructures. Rensselaer's NSEC is directed by Richard Siegel, the Robert W. Hunt Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at Rensselaer.

Rensselaer will use the $659,291 NSF grant to produce two 20-minute multimedia shows intended to captivate students in grades K-3 while exploring the states of matter—solid, liquid, and gas—and the inner workings of a living cell. The Molecularium show is designed to be projected on a dome planetarium theater, but instead of taking people from earth to space, the show will take viewers on an audio-visual journey through the molecular-scale world.

“We want to excite children about the world of science, and the Molecularium program is a tremendous tool to ignite their curiosity,” said Shirley Ann Jackson, president of Rensselaer. “Our pilot Molecularium program was well received, and the National Science Foundation's additional support enables us to dramatically enhance our initial concept and take it nationwide.”

“We are pioneering the use of dome theaters for molecular science education and have brought together a team of researchers, artists, museum curators and educators, technology designers, elementary school teachers, students, and professors to reach our goal,” said Linda Schadler, professor of materials science and engineering at Rensselaer and executive producer of the Molecularium project. “We are designing the shows to be available to planetariums large and small all across the country and around the world.”

 Shekhar Garde, assistant professor of chemical engineering said that the first show, Riding Snowflakes, is designed to bring to life atoms and molecules as characters that can bond together in order to make all the materials in the universe. The storyline will explain that everything is made of atoms and molecules and that the mobility and structure of gases, liquids, and solids are distinctly different. The audience will be introduced to hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon as they explore materials of all kinds while traveling in a ship that can span length scales from light years to nanometers, as well as move in both space and time. The characters will visit clouds, raindrops, the ocean, and space and will be transformed from gases to liquids to solids.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute was founded at Troy, N.Y., in 1824. It is the nation's oldest technological university.#