2007 Challenge:
How do our personal energy choices to heat our homes,
fuel our cars, charge our cell phones, power our computers,
or even download music to our iPods impact the environment,
economy, and life around the globe? Which resources should we
use and why?
2006 Challenge:
Nanotechnology is a new scientific frontier that will impact many facets of society,
such as medicine, computers, and the environment. The nano world is 100,000 times
smaller than the thickness of a single strand of hair. At the nano level, everything
jumps and shakes – even solid things like tabletops. Imagine, the atoms that make up
a solid ob
ject constantly move and vibrate!
2005 Challenge:
Our oceans are of vital importance to the health of the Earth, yet only 1% percent of these
magnificent bodies of water has been studied. We have explored space more than our oceans.
Oceans provide us with many resources and activities from the fish we eat, oil drilled from
the ocean floor, to extracts from seaweed used to make ice cream.
The oceans provide a wide, navigable highway for the shipping industry, and an underwater
playground for activities like scuba diving.
Oceans fuel this planet’s most vital ecological processes, like the water cycle, and the
carbon-dioxide cycle. Living oceans absorb carbon dioxide and pump oxygen into our atmosphere,
thereby sustaining the planet’s diverse flora and fauna– yet we know very little about how we
are impacting this important resource.