Young Scientists Display Work at Cal State Fair : Studying Chirps, Quakes, Crystal Blues

Among the neat rows of science exhibits at Cal State Fullerton, 13-year-old Kelly Kamen stood by his creation Monday as his mother looked on.

Kelly was at the university to set up his project for the opening of the 32nd annual Orange County Science and Engineering Fair. His exhibit, “The Crystal Blues,” involves the growth of copper sulfate crystals. The crystals are blue, and so were most of the colors of Kelly’s exhibit.

“And you ought to see the blue stains on my refrigerator at home,” said Kelly’s mother, Winifred Kamen of Huntington Beach, as she rolled her eyes heavenward in mock dismay.

Actually, Winifred Kamen said, she is both proud and amazed at her son’s recent interest in science and academics in general. “He didn’t use to be such a good student,” she said. Like other parents and visiting adults inside Cal State Fullerton’s University Center exhibit room, Winifred Kamen marveled that so many youngsters had so many good ideas for scientific inquiries.

Stan Cowen, president of the board of the annual fair, said: “Every year the exhibits seem to get better. We have 335 entries this year from all over Orange County.”

The exhibits will be judged Wednesday, and they will be open to the public from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday and from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Friday.

Visitors will hear interesting noises and see an array of flashing lights and colorful designs--the latter including Kelly Kamen’s copper sulfate blue crystals.

Is Kelly going to be a scientist someday? “No, I’m going to be a writer--a novelist,” he replied. “You know some very great writers, including Steinbeck, had scientific backgrounds. Steinbeck originally was going to be a marine biologist.”

Kelly, who is an eighth-grade student at Mesa View School in Huntington Beach, said he will continue to take more and more science courses as he enters high school. But his career goal is to use that knowledge to be a good writer. “I’m shooting for the top,” he added. “I hope to go to Harvard.”

Not far away at the exhibit hall, Mark Watanabe, 17, a junior at Fountain Valley High, stood by his exhibit, labeled: “Cold Crickets Can’t Chirp.” The catchy name isn’t the handle for a new rock ‘n’ roll record. “This is about my study of how temperatures affect crickets’ chirps,” he said.

“I became interested because I listened to crickets as they started chirping around my home in the spring.” Mark’s exhibits include voice prints, or oscilloscope patterns, of cricket chirps. There are also graphs showing that as the temperature goes up, crickets chirp more frequently, until an optimum level is reached. At cool temperatures, crickets become less musical. “At 18 degrees Celsius, they won’t chirp at all,” said Mark.

“This is related to the enzymes in the crickets’ muscles,” Mark said. “Enzymes are proteins that act like catalysts in the muscles. They make reactions possible so that muscles can move, and I found that the enzymes are affected by temperatures, and at lower temperatures the enzymes don’t work so well.”

Mark agreed that his studies have carryover possibility to human science. Maybe one day sports medicine will have some breakthroughs in learning how better to help enzymes in human muscles, for instance.

Mark said he hopes to go to Stanford University, to major in science, possibly in physics.

Beyond the cricket exhibit, a short, smiling student stood by her earthquake-prediction exhibit. “It’s something that I became interested in when I went up to Mammoth, where there’s a lot of earthquake study,” said Fawn Supernaw, 13, an eighth-grader at Park View School in Huntington Beach.

Fawn’s exhibit contained reproductions of equipment used to study earthquakes. There were models of a creepmeter, gravimeter, tiltmeter and extensometer.

“Earthquakes really interest me,” said Fawn. “And so I started studying them.” When she grows up, she added, “I want to be a scientist, and I want to be one of the first scientists who can successfully predict earthquakes.”

The Orange County Science and Engineering Fair concludes Friday night with awards to the winning exhibits. The sponsors of the fair are the Orange County Department of Education and numerous private businesses and industries.