700 students from 60 schools presented their projects focused on science and technology this weekend in a new edition of the “Elhuyar Zientzia Azoka”. During the three days of the fair, students aged between 12 and 18 showed 200 STEAM projects developed during the school year. On Friday 2nd June, 105 projects from 3rd and 4th ESO and Bachillerato could be seen; on Saturday 3rd June, 54 projects from 3rd and 4th ESO and, finally, on Sunday 4th June, 48 projects from 1st and 2nd ESO, including the three we presented from Somorrostro.

 

CAN PLANTS COUNT? COOKING BIODIESEL and THE SECRET OF THE WIPES were the three projects presented by our 1st and 2nd ESO students and, although all three were surprisingly original, it was the first of them that won in its category and won a fantastic prize consisting of being able to attend “Galiciencia”, the Science Fair held in Galicia at the end of the year, a reward for the work carried out throughout the year.

 

Elhuyar Zientzia Azoka aims to encourage young people’s interest in science, as well as to promote and disseminate scientific culture not only through this fair, but also throughout the year. A total of 1,450 students from 79 schools took part in the initiative, organised by Elhuyar with the collaboration of the Basque Government’s Department of Education, the Euroregion, the FECYT, the Kutxa Foundation, the Provincial Council of Bizkaia, Bilbao City Council, the Government of Navarre and Erabi.

 Photos of the fair in this link 

 

PROJECT Nº1

CAN PLANTS COUNT?

Question 

Animals are heterotrophs, that is, we are not capable of producing nutrients, while plants are autotrophs, they are capable of producing nutrients, and to achieve this they photosynthesise using solar energy, water, CO2, and mineral salts.

If someone is asked if plants multiply, I would say yes, but using very different ways (through flowers, spores, cuttings…).

So we understand that plants reproduce and nourish themselves, but can plants feel or count? That is difficult for us to understand.

Through this project, we try to solve this challenge.

Plants don’t have a nervous system, they don’t have a brain, you could say they live in a slow world, but animals live in a fast world, we respond to everything quickly, but to do this, animals use electrical signals that are established between neurons. Plants, on the other hand, use chemical signals to live in a slow world.

But what would happen if a plant had to move very fast, for example, to protect itself or to attack?

According to our hypothesis, if it were to move quickly, it would have to use electrical signals, and we have designed our experiment to show that this is the case.