Neuromuscular: Acetylcholine and Acetylcholine Receptors
The Neuromuscular Disease Center at Washington University provides this comprehensive Web site for information on acetylcholine and acetylcholine receptors. Visitors will find detailed Web pages covering acetylcholine metabolism, acetylcholine receptors (including disorders, structure, venom binding, etc.), autonomic function, and myasthenic disorders. Related proteins are organized into data tables, which include links to protein-specific information from external sources such as the National C
National Estuaries Day
Get the most out of National Estuaries Day (October 5, 2002) by visiting this Web site from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Follow a link to Estuary Live!, which offers online interactive fieldtrips through a number of estuaries around the nation. Guided tours of eight estuaries will be webcast live October 3 and 4, supplemented by videos from a number of other estuaries. Internet participants "will have an opportunity to see the fascinating creatures that make estuar
Astronomy
As part of the University of California Santa Barbara Library, the Astronomy subject Web page contains dozens of links on the subject. Sites are categorized in indexes and gateways, NASA pages, observatories, organizations and associations, current topics, interactive resources, and periodicals. If all that isn't enough, the site even has an astronomy picture of the day.
Amazing Earth Games: Disasters You Can Play at Home
Another above average offering from Discovery.com, the Amazing Earth Games: Disasters You Can Play at Home Web site does a great job at making learning fun. The interactive activities include: Crumble California, in which users get to see how the continental plates have affected the state; Unleash a Superstorm, which lets you create your very own hurricane; and the Destroy Life on Earth activity, which gives you the power to launch fireballs at our planet and witness the result. A great site for
Wikispecies
From the Wikimedia Foundation, Wikispecies is an exciting new project intended to be an extensive, open directory of species covering plantae, animalia, bacteria, fungi, and more. This project is aimed at a scientific audience, and similar to other Wikimedia projects, Wikispecies is a collaborative venture that will evolve through the input and needs of its users. Therefore, Wikispecies is putting out the word to naturalists, scientists, and other taxonomists to help develop this centralized bas
Astromaterials Curation
"The Astromaterials Acquisition and Curation Office at the Johnson Space Center is tasked to curate NASA's current and future collections of extraterrestrial samples." The website divides the collections into six categories: Rocks and Soils from the Moon, Meteorites from Antarctica, Stratospheric Dust, Solar Wind, Space-Exposed Hardware, and Stardust Mission Samples. Besides learning how to receive and return the samples, users can find newsletters and information on discoveries made using the s
University of Florida Herpetology Collection
The University of Florida Herpetology Collection Master Database currently contains 137,936 records. The Database search engine offers fields for common and scientific name, as well as Country or Nation; State or Department; County or Province; and Collection Month and Year. Users can select up to 200 records per page, and request a Table or Report output style. Specimen loans are available to permanent staff members at institutions, but not to individuals. In addition to information about speci
Gender and Science Digital Library
A new project from the Gender & Diversities Institute and the Eisenhower National Clearinghouse, the Gender and Science Digital Library (GSDL) is a major initiative to create an interactive digital library of high quality gender and science resources. The library will assist K-12 educators in providing equitable science education by raising awareness of the effects that gender has on learning science and sharing teaching methods to address gender differences. The site is currently seeking educat
ECOTOX Database System
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) provides this database of chemical toxicity. Three individual EPA databases are combined to provide information on chemical-specific toxicity values for aquatic and terrestrial plants and animals. Users can search for research reports by chemical name, species name, or environmental effect. The site has informative help files and browse features. This Web site is useful for evaluating industrial chemicals or for environmental assessment research.
Cryptology ePrint Archive
The International Association for Cryptologic Research (IACR) maintains this archive of nearly 400 research papers on various topics in cryptology. Contents date back to 1996, and new material is posted most weeks. Papers generally describe original theories about a certain topic, analyses of cryptologic methods, or proofs of specific equations. Anyone can submit their research for possible inclusion in the archive. There is not an extensive refereeing process, which allows authors to more quick
BrainPop: Science
Brainpop describes itself as the leading producer of educational animated movies. Their Web site has a science page that currently contains sixty-five animated movies, with a large portion of them being physical science related. Each subject contains a 3-4 minute Movie, an Interactive Quiz, an Experiment, a Comic Strip, a How-to hands-on application, a Timeline, and a printable Activity Page. Visitors can play three movies per day for free (all of which begin by a somewhat annoying ad for subscr
Digital Bridges
"The Digital Bridges Web site consists of a collection of thirty representative 19th century American bridge engineering monographs, manuals, and documents from the Lehigh University Libraries' Special Collections." The archive provides an interesting retrospective into the beginnings of major bridge projects; the material is complete with high-resolution photographs and text scanned from original books. In addition to historical literature, Digital Bridges also features brief accounts of notabl
Worm Watch
Worm Watch is part of NatureWatch (first reported on in the May 31, 2002, NSDL Scout Report for Life Sciences), which is series of programs--administered collaboratively by the Canadian Nature Federation, the University of Guelph, and the Ecological Monitoring and Assessment Network--that "encourage schools, community groups, individuals, naturalists, backyard enthusiasts, Scouts and Guides to engage in the monitoring of soil, air, water and other aspects of environmental quality." For students
Honey Bee Brain EST Project
Honey bee RNA data from a recent study at the W.M. Keck Center for Comparative and Functional Genomics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has been integrated with gene research on other organisms to create this database. The project is intended to provide updated information on honey bee genes, supplemented with information from other organisms to "suggest cellular roles, biological functions, and evolutionary relationships." Users can search for information by BLAST sequence, key
HIV Medicine
From Flying Publisher, _HIV Medicine 2005_ is a free, online "medical textbook that provides a comprehensive and up-to-date overview of the treatment of HIV Infection." This edition is an update of the 2003 version of the textbook (reported on in the June 13, 2003 NSDL Scout Report for Life Sciences). Chapter titles in the textbook include HIV Testing, HIV and Pulmonary Diseases, Mitochondrial Toxicity, HIV and HBV Coinfections, and Traveling with HIV, to name a few. The textbook is available in
Earth Today: A Digital View of our Dynamic Planet
Earth Today: A Digital View of our Dynamic Planet is offered by the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum and is described as a "state of the art digital theater that's updated several times daily to show near real-time satellite views of the Earth's atmosphere, oceans, and landmasses." The Our Dynamic Earth section contains several topics, such as The Atmosphere, in which users can read about the subject and see impressive satellite images and animations of Earth from space. T
Silent Spring Institute
Named after ecologist Rachel Carson's landmark book, _Silent Spring_, the Silent Spring Institute (SSI) is a "scientific research organization dedicated to identifying the links between the environment and women's health, especially breast cancer." The SSI website contains descriptions of several research projects including the Cape Cod Breast Cancer and Environment Study, Geographic Information System Exposure Assessment, Groundwater and Drinking Water Initiatives, and Household Exposure Study.
EarthNet Activities
The Activities page of the EarthNet Web site is offered by the Canadian Geological Survey. Twelve earth science topics are presented, including fossils, oil and gas, landforms, and more -- each containing easy-to-do learning activities to be completed with the help of a teacher or parent. One such activity in the Landforms page teaches students how mountains are built by using different colored clays and two books. Each lesson gives directions and a What's Going On? Section that explains the sci
Nutrition Cafe
Developed jointly by the Pacific Science Center and the Washington State Dairy Council, Nutrition Cafe offers students three interactive games to explore the world of nutrition. The first game, Nutrient Sleuth, is an entertaining hangman-style game where students try to discover what nutrients different characters are missing based on clues and letter guesses. Another enjoyable offering is Grab A Grape, a Jeopardy-style game where site visitors try to match nutrition-related questions with answe
Learning math : Measurement
This college level course, developed for elementary and middle school teachers, begins with the fundamentals of measurement, then examines standard units in the metric and customary systems. Online workshop sessions cover measurement of a circle, area and volume formulas, angle measurement, and indirect measurement encountered in trigonometry. The final session explores ways to apply these concepts to K-8 classroom teaching. Each of its ten sessions contains video programming, problem-solving ac
