Group 4 Project Ideas

[ssugar008]

Hi guys,

for my group 4 projects, we are given our topics "something to do with natural disease that had an impact on Australia" , considering the matter from three different point of views : Physics, Chemistry and Biology

I am really stuck and confused about my group 4 project as I don't know what experiment can be done with the common theme 'Natural disease in Australia'. Specially in Chemistry as the experiment as i can't think of any experiment. Can you please suggest some ideas of the experiments about the theme.

I am not quite sure what should i investigate on, like my topic and everything, but i do have a proposed topic (can you guys give me some ideas on whether it's good or not?)


I am thinking of investigating the impacts that Flooding had on Australia, because of the following reasons:

- flooding causes increase in mosquito borne diseases. The issue of more standing water after flooding results in more mosquito breeding areas.
(Ross River virus are already endemic in coastal areas of Australia, could become an even worse issue as a result of the flooding) (biology side)
-The risk of contamination of drinking water (biology side)
- Floodwaters can contain a plethora of microbial organisms that can cause some very unpleasant symptoms (biology side)

- How does the flood have a devastating effect on the economy
- Investigate reasons that cause floods - storm surge associated with a tropical cyclone, a tsunami or a high tide coinciding with higher than normal river levels. Dam failure, triggered for example by an earthquake, will result in flooding of the downstream area, even in dry weather conditions. (do some calculation - physics side)

-Chemistry side : Investigate on what drugs can be used to prevent the aftermath of the blood (spread of infectious disease, mosquito(ross river virus) ...)
-Chemistry side : Investigate on materials/substances that can mitigate the devastating effect of floods (sand bags and so on...)

Then lastly, i can do a mathematical model of the mechanisms through which the infectious disease was spread in 2006 when the cyclone tarry caused floods and other time periods.

Do you guys think this topic covers the physics, chemistry and biology sides? Or is there any other better topics (related to natural disease that happened in Australia)?

Thanks

Edited March 14, 2013 by ssugar008

[Luka Petrovic]

From my experience, as long as you explain your reasoning and vaguely connect the topics, they should be alright with it.

My group did bio-fuels. I was intent on going to the local brewery to get some spent malt barely, collect garden debris, etc and try to make briquettes as a bio fuel to replace endangered forest charcoal. My prof said " just burn some nuts." And yeah we just burned a variety of foods to test the BTU.talked about it from a biological/ecological standpoint, then from a chemical one. And it was done... So try, but don't kill yourself over it. Then again it maybe different at your school

All the best!

[SurajM]

Well this topic seems like it covers some of the aspects in both Biology and chemistry. For this particular topic, for biology you would probably need to talk about the spread of infectious diseases by using vectors such as mosquitoes, relating it to ecology in terms of population and natural disasters. From chemistry looking into medicines and drugs i a good idea but overall the ideas you showed above dont seem to go too into the chemistry side of this. Im only a chemistry and biology student so you would probably need someone else's opinion about the physics aspects. I would say though you might need to work on the chemistry part of it.