Butterflies in space

White cabbage butterflies may soon be soaring through space as well as fluttering across your garden. The butterflies and special fast-growing plants are the focus of a NASA-sponsored project for biology teachers visiting campus.

At the workshop, these teachers will learn new ways to teach the principles of scientific investigation. Teachers will incorporate the new methods into their classes and use class research to propose experiments for future space shuttles.

NASA is sponsoring the three workshops because it is interested in students becoming literate in space science, says Coe Williams, program co-manager in the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences. “Today’s students are the next generation of space scientists,” she explains.

Three teachers are planning to submit an experiment that may go up on a shuttle. By using turntables, rotisserie motors and fans to alter gravity slightly, teachers and their students will simulate how conditions in space might affect things like egg laying and pupation.