April 11th, Virginia Tech KTU exhibitors

"Fun with 3D Printing!"

Three dimensional printing can be used for a wide range of fun and useful things.  Undergraduate science students from Virginia Tech’s Da Vinci and Curie Living Learning Communities have a 3D printer in their own residence hall! These students have been working on projects such as 3D printed anatomical models of humans and pigs, bird skulls to help a museum rebuild skeletal displays, a periodic table of elements, and even a prosthetic device to help a dog walk! Students will present a sampler platter of 3D printed projects ranging from scientific models to fun stuff like Christmas ornaments and name plates and 3D printouts of their own voices. Come learn how these students use computer aided design software to print the most amazing things in 3 dimensions!

Curie and Da Vinci Living Learning Communities

Curie and Da Vinci are part of Virginia Tech's inVenTs living-learning community, a combination of four STEM residential communities in Lee Hall.  Curie and Da Vinci students study physical, quantitative, biological and life sciences.  See http://inventscommunity.org for more details!

______________________

The Physics Outreach team has many exciting and electrifying hands on demonstrations of physics concepts. Crowd participation is encouraged! Both young and old will be able to enjoy learning everything from what happens to marshmallows in space, to how electric generators work.

The outreach team will bring a large collection of small physics demonstrations with them to show. The demonstrations cover four overlapping areas of physics: Waves and light, Mechanics, Pressure and Heat, and Electricity and Magnetism.

The students presenting are all taking the class Phys 2404, physics outreach. This is a class for students to get a chance to teach physics as a means of outreach to the local community. They are all prepared ahead of time on how to safely show the demonstrations to all ages while encouraging participation. They are also prepared to explain each demonstration on differing levels of complexity depending on the audience.