Sunday, January 29, 2012

:D moving cellular material

Hey guys! Guess what we are going to talk about today? CELLS!...(ughhh) come on its going to be interesting and fun! :D (font colors match the background, Hunger games!)

       Okay, so the first question I am going to answer is: How do materials enter and leave the cell. Well, the cell has a protective layer called the cell membrane that regulates what comes in and what leaves. Endocytosis is the process where the cell absorbs molecules. 

        There are two different ways for molecules to come in and out of the membrane, active and passive transport. Active transport is when the cell uses energy to transport molecules.  Passive transport  is moving molecules across the cell membrane without using energy.  Facilitated diffusion is a type of passive transport, its when molecules pass through the membrane spontaneously, through proteins.

 (Diffusion/ Aubrey above)

          Diffusion is when  molecules move from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration to even it out, or reversed. So when you spray air freshener for awhile you can only smell it in 1 area but then once the molecules move you can smell it a little bit farther away.  Facilated diffusion is when Osmosis is when water moves across the membrane.


       How does cell size affect the transport of materials? Well, when a cell gets bigger its volume "grows" very fast and its hard for the cell membrane to keep up with all the materials wanting to come in and leave. For example at a concert, you have a ticket but when there are a lot of people the guards can't keep up with everyone.
 Thanks for reading my blog!  Hope you learned something!  Here are some links.  Have a great day! 

Here is a link with games on cells... 
Here is a link on tutorial for games

Monday, January 16, 2012

CELLS! :O

       Hey guys, so as you know this is a science blog we are going to talk about science! Who would have thought, right? Today our topic is cells. Did you know you are made of cells? Well mostly everything living is made of cells. 


       What is a cell?  Well a cell is structural unit and we are made of them. Basically everything alive is made of them. They come in all shapes and sizes and have jobs to do. They are so small we can only see most of them through a microscope.          
       There are 2 kinds of cells, prokaryotic and eukaryotic.  Prokaryotic cells have no cell membrane and less structures inside.They are also only one celled organisms, like bacteria.   Eukaryotic cells are the type we our made of because they are multicellular and  have a membrane. Both animal and plant cells are eukaryotic.




        Left are the plant organelles, right are the animal organelles.
        There are animal and plant cells.  They have relatively the same organelles. Organelles are the structures found inside of cells. Plant cells have a cell wall instead of a membrane.  The animal cells have a membrane.  As you know we are animals, so we are made of animal cells.  Plants are made of plant cells and there are more types of cells, like fungi cells...  I am only going to talk about the animal and plant cell. 



      All organelles have jobs to do for the cell.  The cell is kind of like a factory with different stations/organelles to get different things done.  But of course the factory has to have a wall like a protector, well so do cells.  Cell membrane protects cell from the outside and controls what goes in and out.  Cytoplasm fills up the cell.  Its a jelly-like material that holds everything in its place (in the cell).  Of course these workers/organelles need a boss and in this case its the nucleus of the cell.  The nucleus controls all the organelles and the entire cell.  It gives orders and also holds the DNA.





       There are more organelles in the cell, like the mitochondria.  The mitochondria is the shape of a kidney bean and acts as the power unit.  It breaks down the food and releases the energy.  Protein is food for the cell.  The organelle that makes the protein, are the ribosomes.  




        The lysosomes of the cell also breaks down food but it acts as more of a janitor.   It breaks down cell waste and worn out parts.  But where are all the materials held?   Well the answer is in the vacuole.  The vacuole hangs onto the water, waste products and food until they are needed.








      Chromosomes are the structures, where the DNA and some protein is found. The endoplasmic reticulum/ER works as a packaging unit of the cell.  It works with the golgi bodies and the ribosomes of a cell.  There are 2 different types of ERs the smooth and the rough.  The smooth acts as a storage organelle.  The rough ER package the protein.  I have already told you what the ribosomes are but you must be confused on the new organelle, the golgi bodies.  They help with the packaging of the protein. 

Here is a link for more about plant and animal cells. Its kind of long but explains and gives details for a lot.      
THANKS FOR READING!!! :D
HOPE YOU...


      


Tuesday, January 3, 2012

Yayyyy School is OUT!!!!!! No getting up at 7:00 and NO homework!

       Hey everyone I had such a great break. How was yours? Well hopefully I will here about all my classmates in their blogs. Here are their links if you want to read them. Here is kates Celine's Aubrey's Chase's Zoe's and Alencia's
       So lets get back on topic so the topic is what we did during Christmas break, I'm going to talk about my break. So first my sister came from Maine then my cousin came all the way from Finland. The first couple days we sat around talking and playing kinect (I recommend the game Just Dance 3)and going to the movies. Just being plain lazy :) which is AWESOME. Then after the first 5 days of fun. We packed up for a 8 hour (which turned out to be a ten hour) car ride to Florida. Let me tell you a 10 ride with 5 seats 5 people, the dog and our legs crammed due to the luggage was ... surprisingly fun just VERY uncomfortable. 
       
This is sorta what it looked like. 

       O.Kate where were we? Ohh ya now I remember well like I said the car ride was very long so we were SO happy to arrive to Florida. Well while we were there we decided to go on a boat ride and thought some dolphins would be nice to meet. But noo the 2 hour boat ride was for nothing all we saw were birds and rich houses!!! We were pretty bummed out about that but the next day we got to go to the beach so that was good for me! Then we made 3 batches of Christmas cookies and they all turned out like dog treats!! ewwww but finally the last batch turned out AMAZING. On Christmas day we had a great meal with or course mash potatoes, my favorite and much more. We decided we couldn't wait to open presents until the morning so we opened all the amazing presents. Then 2 days later extended family came and we had so much fun talking and eating MORE delicious food :P yummy 

       Sadly we had to leave the next day so we repacked and started another long ride back.The next few days we were shopping like crazy for my cousin and my sister since very cold weather was waiting for them!(I'm jelous!) When we said our goodbyes to my cousin we were all tearing up because we won't see him untill June! That day was VERY gloomy! :( escpecialy for my aunt.  
        
hrytr Sorry couldn't talk very well back there I had 12 grapes in my mouth. It is a tradition from Spain that my family does even though we aren't from Spain. There are tons of traditions like these ...ohh woops sorry I forgot to tell you why I had stuffed 12 grapes in my mouth! Sorry! We do that on New years eve and the 12 grapes are so we have a great 12 months :) We also started a new tradition, to scratch lottery tickets for luck. I can't believe its 2012 yayy new year for changes and fresh, new starts. I love new years eve but my dog sure doesn't he was laying in my mom's lap! Aww poor puppy!

       When a new year comes what do you fill out? A new years resolution of course and you also set goals. My new year resolution was to keep in contact with my old friends but make more new ones. I'd also like to do better in school. Help more around the house. And last but not least do more for others whether its people or animals. I hope you complete your new years resolution before the world ends! JK There is no scientific proof its not true! Don't worry! I hope you had a great christmas break!