Brogen Berwick's exploration of Micro-organisms
Project description
Initial Microscope research - Week one
Research about Nematodes
- Cannibal worms recognise their children—and don’t eat them as a result
YouTube video by Science Magazine Youtube
- Meet the Most Important Animal You’ve Never Seen
Youtube video by SciShow channel Youtube
Documentary style videos
Movements
Nematode vs human??
Can you human body performance like a Nematode? Can the human body move like a Nematode? Can the human body become like a Nematode? Can a human move like a Nematode, is it physically possible?
VS
SOMA - Dance Performers
As the human body is at the heart of SOMA, our dictionary of the physical movement within the performance is defined by its abilities and inabilities. We ask ourselves what the human body is capable of expressing and what are its limitations.
Nematode Movements
Examples that show the way in which Nematodes move and position themselves
Netflix - My Octopus Teacher
Notes from watching the documentary
- There is something to learn here, something special.
- He totally mapped the octopuses environment to learn from her
- There was total trust between the octopus and him
- He almost became the octopus, he was obsessed
- The octopus taught him to become sensitised to the other
- Our lives were mirroring each others
- The octopus sacrifices her own life for her young
- In my mind I think like an octopus
- That is there strategy - live fast die young
- The octopus showed me just how precious the wild places are
First tests with the phone microscope
Making a medium for the Nematode
I found a DIY recipe to make an agar plate to hopefully awaken the Nematodes
Making my own Growth Medium
Ingredients for the recipe
- 0.5g Peptone
- 0.3g Yeast
- 1.5g Agar
- 0.5g Salt
- 120ml Water
Reflections
Sadly, I don't think that my medium recipe contained enough Agar because the solution didn't solidify, it remained a kind of liquid solution.
How to improve the recipe - add more agar to the recipe?
2nd Attempt to make Medium
Reflections
Because the previous recipe didn't solidify, for this recipe I added 0.5g more Agar to the mixture and then heated up the solution and poured it back into the petri dishes to then store in the fridge again. Hopefully this time the solution will solidify.
Can you see the Nematodes?
Are the Nematodes alive in the agar I created? Are they swimming or sleeping?
Reflections
After cooling the Agar in the fridge I waited 1 hour before emptying my Nematodes into the 5 different petri-dishes. I checked on them on an hourly basis to see if they were waking up and moving...Sadly I don't think they are alive. There was no movement. After 2 days the agar seemed to separate, it became very liquidy and a kind of kind grew over the top of the Agar. I don't think my agar recipe worked
After a few days my medium solution had separated, I don't think I created the correct ratio of the ingredients
Moving nematodes - pocket microscope
After sourcing some more Nematodes I used the pocket microscope to see if I could see them moving, and yes they were moving, however it was really difficult to keep the pocket microscope still so I plan to vie them under the microscope in the lab so that I have more control.
To view the videos larger I have uploaded them to YouTube
WOW I found out about slime mould
Youtube video by the BBC about the importance of slime mould in our woodlands Youtube
- Relentless shape shifting goo
- It eats anything that gets in it's path
- Essential service in cleaning up our woodlands
- White fungus is it's pray
- When all food is gone the slime mould co-operates with itself to mass produce
- It's not a plant, animal or fungus, just one giant cell
- Moves 1cm an hour
- The whole thing is a network
- Slime mould can learn about it's surroundings
Trying to revive some dried slime mould
I will now wait 1 hour in the hope that the slime mould is becoming hydrated and will eat the oats!
After 3 days the slime mould didn't revive itself, so I will source some more slime mould!
Cultivating slime mould
Petri dish one
Petri dish two
Looking under the Microscope
Using both the phone extension microscope, the pocket microscope and the Lab microscope
Crossing borders with slime mould
Over the Christmas break me and my slime mould went on a journey back to the UK
Here you can see I tried to revive my slime mould, I bought Petri dishes and Agar to make the right environment for the slime mould but as you can see the slime mould didn't grow.
This was the Agar powder I bought offline
I wanted to wait a few more days to see if the slime mould would be able to grow, therefore I gave each Petri dish some more oat flakes to entice the slime mould to feed but it was unsuccessful and the more days I waited for the slime mould to grow the more I began to die and go mouldy to the point where I had to throw away all the Agar dishes because they were very contaminated with mould.
Plans for slime mould progress
I began to explore how I could finalise all my research and come up with a final outcome so I stared to reflect on the work I had done and also look for visual inspiration.
- Inspiration one
I liked this digital manipulation of slime mould because of the variety of colours that were achieved.
- Inspiration two
"Suzie, the Amazing Color Changing Slime Mold" - Slime mould that has been modified to be able to change colour!
How to dye slime mould??
