Home Learning | NASA eClips™ at Home
Sarah Adewumi, former NASA eClips™ Intern and Aviation Sciences and Management graduate, helps us explore the world of extremophiles. Examine the criteria used to determine whether something is living, conduct your own science experiment to learn more about “what is alive,” and search for living things around you. Learn what an extremophile is and explore extreme settings on Earth that push the limits for ordinary living things. Find out more about pH, just one of the factors that can make environments inhospitable to life. Make your own test strips and measure the pH of safe household substances. Create your own imaginary organisms adapted to chosen extreme world. Vivid and engaging video, hands-on explorations using everyday items – this segment has it all!
Produced and directed by NASA eClips™ and presented by VPM.
Links to related videos and activities:
- Our World: Life on Other Worlds
- Our World: What Is an Extremophile?
- Our World: Where do We Find Extremophiles?
- Launchpad: Astrobiology
- Searching for Life
- Is it Alive?
- Planet in a Bottle
- Exploring the Universe: Imagining Life
- Solar System Temperatures
2018 VA Science Standards of Learning (SOLS)
3.1-5.1 The student will demonstrate an understanding of scientific and engineering practices by:
a) asking questions and defining problems,
b) planning and carrying out investigations,
c) interpreting, analyzing, and evaluating data,
d) constructing and critiquing conclusions and explanations,
e) developing and using models, and
f) obtaining, evaluating, and communicating information.
3.4 The student will investigate and understand that adaptations allow organisms to satisfy life needs and respond to the environment. Key ideas include:
a) populations may adapt over time, and
b) adaptations may be behavioral or physical.
3.5 The student will investigate and understand that aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems support a diversity of organisms. Key ideas include:
a) ecosystems are made of living and nonliving components of the environment.
4.2 The student will investigate and understand that plants and animals have structures that distinguish them from one another and play vital roles in their ability to survive. Key ideas include:
a) the survival of plants and animals depends on photosynthesis,
b) plants and animals have different structures and processes for obtaining energy, and
c) plants and animals have different structures and processes for creating offspring.
4.3 The student will investigate and understand that organisms, including humans, interact with one another and with the nonliving components in the ecosystem. Key ideas include:
a) interrelationships exist in populations, communities, and ecosystems, and
b) food webs show the flow of energy within an ecosystem.