UNT RET Aquatic Sensor Project

Round two starts today!

2013-06-10T10:48:00.004-05:00

Back to work on stream monitoring with the Research Experience for Teachers program at UNT. Working with a new team and new goals this summer. Check out our new blog as it develops!

UNT RET Stream Monitoring and Control

Week 6 Day 5

2012-07-20T21:37:00.000-05:00

Well, today was the last day of our six week journey into the unknown. All of the groups presented their final results today and it was a lot of fun to see everyone's success. I'm already looking forward to next year!

Here is the order we presented in.

Here are the group posters.

Here is my certificate for completing the course. (Just change the name and you know what the rest look like.)

Here is a link to our final paper.

Here is our final presentation. It is unedited, so, you know... If you hang in there you will also get to see the robotics presentation.

(coming soon...)

Week 6 Day 4

2012-07-19T16:29:00.000-05:00

We are in the home stretch! All of the research is done. Our group poster is finished (great work Joe!). Our lab space is cleaned up and ready to be vacated. We have taken our group pictures and done our exit interviews. And Lori, Joe and I have all been working like demons to get the final paper completed. It is not 100% finished at this point but it is close. Before we submit we will export to word, clean up the formatting and then convert it to a pdf. If you want to see a final draft, though it can be accessed using the link below. So can our raw data.

Final Draft of Research Paper

Data From Dr. Hoeinghaus

Data Used in Paper

	pH	DO	Temperature
Correlation	0.615358	0.807081	0.755728
% Error	4.28714	16.4226	3.93644

Week 6 Day 3

2012-07-18T16:19:00.001-05:00

Sorry ladies and gentleman, the posts are going to probably be a touch boring today and tomorrow. We are in the home stretch at this point and are pretty much just wrapping up the paper, posters, etc... Joe and I spent the whole day on the research paper and the TechFest stuff. Lori split her day between the paper and cleaning up the lab with our table top model and aquarium. Stay tuned, though! The paper will likely be posted tomorrow!

The WSN explained...

2012-07-18T13:22:00.001-05:00

Our grad student, Yixing Gu, sat us down today and gave us a summary report of exactly how the wireless sensor network is organized and what programs he wrote to control it.

Midterm Presentation

2012-07-18T11:41:00.003-05:00

This can be found in Week 3 Day 5 but I have been told there was a problem viewing it. I believe that has been fixed, but I am posting the video again just to be sure. Our final presentation is two days from now!

Week 6 Day 2

2012-07-17T23:13:00.003-05:00

Sorry for the late post. Not a whole lot to report today. We went out to the field and retrieved the sensor cluster and the data. We should receive the data from the sonde soon. Once we have that we will begin crunching numbers and seeing how successful our sensor cluster really is.

In the afternoon we got a tour of EESAT with Dr. Thompson to show us the facility and the space that would be available to us during TechFest. We also discovered that we were mistaken on what we were supposed to produce for TechFest so what I did won't work. On the plus side, it is a good intro project for my APES kids. On the minus side, I need to make a new activity first thing in the morning.

Speaking of TechFest... Here is one of the cool projects the kids can play with.

Week 6 Day 1

2012-07-16T16:28:00.000-05:00

Today was another field day for use. We went out and met Dr. Hoenghaus and Luke at the Water Treatment Facility to set up our WSN and start logging data. We got our sensor cluster anchored and set up quickly.

We did take a second to calibrate the DO sensor, but it was pretty simple.

It took a little bit longer to get the YSI Sonde calibrated and set up. This time we used a more high end model that has a longer battery life and can stay in the field longer. It also has more ports for probes. This one is equipped with a pH, DO and temperature probe but also includes a turbidity probe.

The probe that Dr. Hoeinghaus is pointing at here is the Turbidity probe. The rollers are sponges that clean the probe so nothing gets caked on to the sensor. Once it was calibrated when dropped everything in the water together so we would have data that we could compare.

The original plan was to just log two hours of data and then bail. Luke and Dr Hoeinghaus planned on being at the facility all day today and tomorrow, though, and Yixing was ok leaving his computer over night so we made an executive decision in the field and decided to let the probes run until the morning. That is exciting because it increases the likelihood of getting changes in DO and pH since the temperature will almost certainly change. Since we are leaving things in the field we needed to set up the laptop somewhere protected. Putting it in the shed seemed like the best option but we were concerned about the signal. Joe set up an antennae on the wall of the shed with the lead heading through a small hole in the wall and Yixing set up his laptop inside.

The other big piece of news was that the camera is up and running, We rigged it up on a cross bar and accessed the signal using Yixing laptop and let Luke and Dr. H play. They were very excited by the possibilities.

Back on campus we had several more successes. I completed the activity we are going to use at TechFest and got approval from Joe and Lori while Joe made some great progress with the paper. Yixing also produced schematics for our circuit that we can include in our paper.

DO Circuit

Temp Circuit

pH Circuit

Power Circuit

Complete Circuit

That's not all, though. Yixing also created a website that automatically translates the data tables produced by the data sink into a visual format.

Pretty exciting stuff! Once we get the data from the sondes and the sensor cluster we can start checking to see how accurate our system is. We will keep you posted. If you are interested in an update on the fish in the artificial stream... sadly, we are down to 11. We had a couple of floaters this morning and most of the smaller fish are gone.

Week 5 Day 5

2012-07-13T16:27:00.000-05:00

We met this morning with a professor and some grad students from UAEM in Toluca, Mexico. Pretty interesting conversation. Apparently all of the major universities in Mexico have a network of high schools that they are associated with. They are not exactly feeder schools, but there is definitely a link. Also, the north and central districts of Mexico are going paperless and moving to iPad-based learning. I would be interested to see how they will implement that program since that definitely won't be cheap. One thing that was a little surprising was how rigid the education system in Mexico seem to be. There is no possibility of earning duel credit during high school. In fact, if you are in a bachelors program you can not do anything to earn credit towards a masters. If your degree plan is supposed to take 4 years and your finish in three... you have a year to cool your heals before you get your degree and can move up to a masters. The group that came here was primarily working in the social sciences but there was a fair bit of discussion about our aquatics project because there is a big push in Toluca right now around water quality.

That absorbed pretty much the entire morning. When we came back we all got to work starting the wrap up for this project. We discussed the goals of our paper over lunch and revised our intent a little bit. Yixin is working up the schematics for our circuits so that others could replicate our work. Joe completed our poster and it looks great! (Notice the QR code? Pretty nifty, right? It was Lori's idea.)

On the hardware front, Yixin acquired four of the five antennae we need to install on the boxes for the WSN. One thing we noticed was that the signal strength through the Otter Boxes was extremely degraded. To eliminate that problem we are installing external antennae which should boost our range.

The fish are still doing their thing. To prove some of them are alive I snapped some picks of fish playing in the tanks and riffles.

In other news, the Loftek camera is up and running and can be controlled via cell phone. Sadly, the response time isn't great and the resolution is not good enough to make out the small fish against the gravel background. The concept is solid, though, and it is a promising start for the project next year.

Week 5 Day 4

2012-07-12T16:27:00.000-05:00

Lots happened today and it was all good news! First, we went out into the field and deployed our sensor cluster and data sink in the artificial stream complex at the water research facility and... IT WORKED! Beautifully in fact. The data we were getting from our sensor cluster was very similar to the data coming in through the YSI Sonde, which is exactly what we were hoping for. We also compared it to data from a PASCo Spark. We will not have the data table for the sonde until Monday, but here is the data for the Spark and our Sensor cluster. One area of wide variability was the dissolved oxygen readings but our sensor cluster results ended up being pretty close to the sonde results once the sonde warmed up.

Initial test results using Spark probes:

	pH	DO	Temperature (C)	Conductivity (uS/m)
Day 1	8.81	7	26.33	700

Initial data from sensor cluster

id time nodenum ph D.O temp

19969 7/12/2012 11:50:41 AM 12 09.23 09.80 25.94

19968 7/12/2012 11:50:25 AM 12 09.23 09.77 25.94

19967 7/12/2012 11:50:14 AM 12 09.23 09.78 25.94

19966 7/12/2012 11:50:03 AM 12 09.23 09.77 25.94

19965 7/12/2012 11:49:52 AM 12 09.23 09.76 25.94

19964 7/12/2012 11:49:42 AM 12 09.23 09.77 25.94

19963 7/12/2012 11:49:34 AM 12 09.23 09.81 25.94

19962 7/12/2012 11:49:26 AM 12 09.23 09.75 25.94

19961 7/12/2012 11:49:16 AM 12 09.23 09.82 25.94

19960 7/12/2012 11:49:10 AM 12 09.23 09.80 25.94

19959 7/12/2012 11:49:08 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.94

19958 7/12/2012 10:54:41 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.94

19957 7/12/2012 10:54:32 AM 12 09.23 09.76 25.69

19956 7/12/2012 10:54:23 AM 12 09.23 09.79 25.94

19955 7/12/2012 10:54:14 AM 12 09.23 09.80 25.69

19954 7/12/2012 10:54:01 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.94

19953 7/12/2012 10:54:01 AM 12 09.23 09.77 25.69

19952 7/12/2012 10:53:50 AM 12 09.23 09.78 25.94

19951 7/12/2012 10:53:35 AM 12 09.23 09.74 25.94

19950 7/12/2012 10:53:35 AM 12 09.23 09.74 25.94

19949 7/12/2012 10:53:16 AM 12 09.23 09.78 25.94

19948 7/12/2012 10:53:16 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.69

19947 7/12/2012 10:53:00 AM 12 09.23 09.76 25.94

19946 7/12/2012 10:53:00 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.94

19945 7/12/2012 10:52:54 AM 12 09.23 09.76 25.69

19944 7/12/2012 10:52:48 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.94

19943 7/12/2012 10:52:33 AM 12 09.23 09.72 25.94

19942 7/12/2012 10:52:13 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.94

19941 7/12/2012 10:52:13 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.94

19940 7/12/2012 10:51:57 AM 12 09.23 09.75 25.94

19939 7/12/2012 10:51:41 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.94

19938 7/12/2012 10:51:25 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.94

19937 7/12/2012 10:51:09 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.94

19936 7/12/2012 10:50:54 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.94

19935 7/12/2012 10:50:42 AM 12 09.23 09.75 25.94

19934 7/12/2012 10:50:34 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.94

19933 7/12/2012 10:50:18 AM 12 09.23 09.76 25.94

19932 7/12/2012 10:50:01 AM 12 09.24 09.75 25.44

19931 7/12/2012 10:49:45 AM 12 09.23 09.76 25.69

19930 7/12/2012 10:49:29 AM 12 09.23 09.74 25.94

19929 7/12/2012 10:49:13 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.94

19928 7/12/2012 10:48:57 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.94

19927 7/12/2012 10:48:41 AM 12 09.23 09.75 25.69

19926 7/12/2012 10:48:25 AM 12 09.23 09.78 25.94

19925 7/12/2012 10:48:09 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.69

19924 7/12/2012 10:47:56 AM 12 09.23 09.74 25.94

19923 7/12/2012 10:47:43 AM 12 09.23 09.75 25.94

19922 7/12/2012 10:47:30 AM 12 09.23 09.75 25.94

19921 7/12/2012 10:47:18 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.94

19920 7/12/2012 10:47:07 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.69

19919 7/12/2012 10:46:56 AM 12 09.23 09.68 25.94

19918 7/12/2012 10:46:47 AM 12 09.23 09.78 25.94

19917 7/12/2012 10:46:38 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.94

19916 7/12/2012 10:46:28 AM 12 09.23 09.74 25.94

19915 7/12/2012 10:46:20 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.94

19914 7/12/2012 10:46:15 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.94

19913 7/12/2012 10:46:07 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.69

19912 7/12/2012 10:46:02 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.69

19911 7/12/2012 10:45:57 AM 12 09.23 09.72 25.69

19910 7/12/2012 10:45:55 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.69

19909 7/12/2012 10:45:43 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.94

19908 7/12/2012 10:45:24 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.94

19907 7/12/2012 10:45:24 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.69

19906 7/12/2012 10:45:08 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.94

19905 7/12/2012 10:44:52 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.94

19904 7/12/2012 10:44:37 AM 12 09.23 09.00 25.69

19903 7/12/2012 10:44:22 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19902 7/12/2012 10:44:06 AM 12 09.23 09.64 25.94

19901 7/12/2012 10:43:51 AM 12 09.23 09.68 25.94

19900 7/12/2012 10:43:40 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.69

19899 7/12/2012 10:43:28 AM 12 09.23 09.68 25.69

19898 7/12/2012 10:43:17 AM 12 09.23 09.68 25.69

19897 7/12/2012 10:43:08 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.69

19896 7/12/2012 10:43:04 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.69

19895 7/12/2012 10:42:50 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19894 7/12/2012 10:42:31 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.69

19893 7/12/2012 10:42:31 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19892 7/12/2012 10:42:18 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.94

19891 7/12/2012 10:42:05 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19890 7/12/2012 10:41:55 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.94

19889 7/12/2012 10:41:45 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.94

19888 7/12/2012 10:41:36 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.69

19887 7/12/2012 10:41:26 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.69

19886 7/12/2012 10:41:15 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.94

19885 7/12/2012 10:41:07 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.69

19884 7/12/2012 10:41:07 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.69

19883 7/12/2012 10:40:48 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.69

19882 7/12/2012 10:40:48 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.69

19881 7/12/2012 10:40:33 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.94

19880 7/12/2012 10:40:19 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.69

19879 7/12/2012 10:40:06 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.69

19878 7/12/2012 10:39:52 AM 12 09.23 09.64 25.69

19877 7/12/2012 10:39:41 AM 12 09.23 09.60 25.69

19876 7/12/2012 10:39:21 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.94

19875 7/12/2012 10:39:21 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.69

19874 7/12/2012 10:39:05 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.94

19873 7/12/2012 10:38:58 AM 12 09.23 09.70 25.69

19872 7/12/2012 10:38:58 AM 12 09.23 09.73 25.94

19871 7/12/2012 10:38:41 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.69

19870 7/12/2012 10:38:41 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.94

19869 7/12/2012 10:38:23 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.94

19868 7/12/2012 10:38:23 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.69

19867 7/12/2012 10:38:11 AM 12 09.23 09.63 25.94

19866 7/12/2012 10:38:00 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19865 7/12/2012 10:37:49 AM 12 09.23 09.41 26.18

19864 7/12/2012 10:37:31 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.94

19863 7/12/2012 10:37:31 AM 12 09.23 09.64 25.94

19862 7/12/2012 10:37:20 AM 12 09.23 09.68 25.69

19861 7/12/2012 10:37:12 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19860 7/12/2012 10:37:07 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19859 7/12/2012 10:37:01 AM 12 09.23 09.62 25.69

19858 7/12/2012 10:36:51 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.69

19857 7/12/2012 10:36:44 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.94

19856 7/12/2012 10:36:38 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.69

19855 7/12/2012 10:36:31 AM 12 09.23 09.61 25.69

19854 7/12/2012 10:36:22 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19853 7/12/2012 10:36:17 AM 12 09.23 09.63 25.69

19852 7/12/2012 10:36:09 AM 12 09.23 09.64 25.94

19851 7/12/2012 10:36:00 AM 12 09.23 09.65 25.69

19850 7/12/2012 10:35:51 AM 12 09.23 09.63 25.69

19849 7/12/2012 10:35:42 AM 12 09.23 09.62 25.69

19848 7/12/2012 10:35:26 AM 12 09.23 09.61 25.69

19847 7/12/2012 10:35:12 AM 12 09.23 09.63 25.94

19846 7/12/2012 10:34:54 AM 12 09.23 09.61 25.69

19845 7/12/2012 10:34:54 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19844 7/12/2012 10:34:38 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.69

19843 7/12/2012 10:34:20 AM 12 09.23 09.00 25.94

19842 7/12/2012 10:34:02 AM 12 09.23 09.63 25.94

19841 7/12/2012 10:33:39 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19840 7/12/2012 10:33:39 AM 12 09.23 09.71 25.94

19839 7/12/2012 10:33:23 AM 12 09.23 09.63 25.69

19838 7/12/2012 10:33:07 AM 12 09.23 09.64 25.69

19837 7/12/2012 10:32:51 AM 12 09.23 09.68 25.69

19836 7/12/2012 10:32:36 AM 12 09.23 09.63 25.69

19835 7/12/2012 10:32:20 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.69

19834 7/12/2012 10:32:04 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19833 7/12/2012 10:31:48 AM 12 09.23 09.64 25.69

19832 7/12/2012 10:31:33 AM 12 09.23 09.63 25.69

19831 7/12/2012 10:31:17 AM 12 09.23 09.62 25.69

19830 7/12/2012 10:31:01 AM 12 09.23 09.00 25.69

19829 7/12/2012 10:30:46 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.69

19828 7/12/2012 10:30:25 AM 12 09.23 09.60 25.69

19827 7/12/2012 10:30:25 AM 12 09.23 09.62 25.69

19826 7/12/2012 10:30:10 AM 12 09.23 09.69 25.69

19825 7/12/2012 10:29:55 AM 12 09.23 09.64 25.69

19824 7/12/2012 10:29:38 AM 12 09.23 09.60 25.69

19823 7/12/2012 10:29:38 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19822 7/12/2012 10:29:26 AM 12 09.23 09.63 25.94

19821 7/12/2012 10:29:10 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.69

19820 7/12/2012 10:29:10 AM 12 09.23 09.61 25.69

19819 7/12/2012 10:28:48 AM 12 09.23 09.65 25.69

19818 7/12/2012 10:28:48 AM 12 09.23 09.62 25.69

19817 7/12/2012 10:28:30 AM 12 09.23 09.66 25.69

19816 7/12/2012 10:28:30 AM 12 09.23 09.62 25.69

19815 7/12/2012 10:28:19 AM 12 09.23 09.65 25.69

19814 7/12/2012 10:28:10 AM 12 09.23 09.67 25.69

19813 7/12/2012 10:28:06 AM 12 09.23 09.62 25.69

Here are some pics of us out in the field installing this bad boy and then talking about how the data was shaping up and possible uses for it. Joe and I may or may not have also been pestering Dr. Hoeinghaus about letting us bring our AP Bio and Ap Environmental Science students up to the facility...

Sharon also caught some of this awesomeness on video...

So, the good news is that it works and our spot check seems to be producing reasonable data. We have a bit of an issue deploying the system for a long period of time. Currently it has to be plugged in to a laptop in order to log the data. That is unlikely to change any time soon because the wireless tower that will eventually provide internet to the site is still a month away from being built. We are actively looking for an alternative and I am thinking the simplest way to do that would be to add a data logger shield and SD card to the Arduino. We are ordering one today and will see if we can make that work for the time being.

In addition to our time in the field we also had a seminar this afternoon over air quality with Dr. Kuruvilla John. His presentation was focused on ozone but also covered a good bit of general pollution, how particulate material moves and some interesting things that happen with air quality.

Finally... Here is our data from the table top model for today.

Thursday- July 12th

9:30am

	pH	DO	Temperature	# of Fish
Tank 1				1
Tank 2				2
Tank 3				1
Tank 4				12

We had disassembled Spark unit to take to water research field station so there is no morning data.

3:00pm

pH DO Temperature # of Fish

Tank 1 8.17 8 20.14 1

Tank 2 8.15 7.5 20.13 2

Tank 3 8.13 7 20.14 1

Tank 4 8.16 7.9 20.11 12

Nothing different with results. I figure we will continue to get similar data for the rest of our research experience. In our classrooms we would have students change or add a variable and make predictions based on baseline data. They can then determine which factors would be affected by changes based on temperature, pH, or dissolved oxygen. Depending on which variable they want to study they can research the environmental tolerances. In most cases students will want to study a biotic factor so they can choose to observe and record a species behavior.

Week 5 Day 3

2012-07-11T16:29:00.002-05:00

The big news for today is that we got a proper bit to drill into the Otter Box and we also picked up some silicon sealant (the stuff used to seal up aquariums) to fill up the bits of hole that weren't stuffed with wires. It ain't pretty, but it got the job done.

We also got a new member of our team. She is a TAMS student here at UNT named Prathibha Juturu and will be helping us with some of the environmental and ecological aspects of the project. To get her involved we started her off taking over the task of collecting the sensor readings from our table top artificial stream. She will be putting together the tables we post and the blog and will also start building a spreadsheet so we can do some data analysis. One part of her assignment will be to help us track down research to explain the observed changes we see in our stream. That will help us determine if the stream is a healthy ecosystem and will also help us determine if our sensor data is accurate.

	pH	DO	Temperature	# of Fish
Tank 1	8.24	7.3	20.33	2
Tank 2	8.27	7.2	20.37	1
Tank 3	8.32	6.8	20.35	1
Tank 4	8.24	7.4	20.3	12

Something to celebrate! No more missing fish! 16 fish!

Lori, Joe and I are more or less just working on assembling different parts of the research paper at this point so that doesn't make for very exciting blogging.

In other news, although the probes we need to complete this assignment aren't in yet, the camera that we will use in next years project is in. It will make things much easier with that project because it is already equipped with two axis servos that allow for 355 degrees of rotation. It is waterproof, which is a bonus. Finally, it is already equipped with wifi and has existing software to allow it to be controlled over the internet. That essentially means that project is done. All that needs to be added is a way upload the recorded video stream to a server that can store it and creating a website that allows classrooms and researchers to observe the tanks (assuming you don't want to just use the built in one the company provides.)

Great resource for future learning!

2012-07-11T13:47:00.004-05:00

This is a really cool site. If you like TED Talks then you will probably dig this. There could be some really interesting class discussions or discussion among faculty spawned by these books. Check out Ted Books!

Week 5 Day 2

2012-07-10T16:29:00.000-05:00

Today was not really a break through sort of day. It was more of a "quiet progress" sort of day. I started out the morning finishing the connector pins and Yixin has been making steady progress on the circuits for the sensor clusters. We are at a stand still on that, however, because the additional probes have not arrived from Atlas yet. Apparently they had some issues with the temperature sensors so they are holding up the whole order. Sadly, we already have three of those laying around here so that was mostly unnecessary.

Jennifer was kind enough to go pick up our Otter Boxes so we could get started. We are going to use Loctite silicon sealant to fill the gaps and seal up the holes after we pass the wires through but just got approval to go buy it so that will have to wait. We are also a little concerned about heat build up. We toyed with the idea of putting in a fan but couldn't think of a way to do that and still keep the box water tight. I floated the idea of a glycerin-based counter current heat exchange system but that seems excessive. Besides, Joe talked to Yixin and he said all the components we are using should function fine all the way up to 60 C (140 F) so, even though it gets awfully warm here in Texas, we should be ok.

I know what you are thinking... Why did you go to the trouble of getting waterproof boxes and then IMMEDIATELY cut a hole in the bottom. Well, I'll tell you. The hole doesn't much matter. Once we pass the wires through that hole we are going to seal it up tight with silicon. Just in case it leaks, though, we put it in the bottom. That way any water that finds it's way in can find a way right back out instead of pooling in the bottom. The real reason we needed this box is so that it had a lid that would let us access the hardware inside in case we needed to flash the Arduino again or replace a component but still stay water tight. Make sense now?

When we weren't drilling or brainstorming about the sensor cluster we have been hard at work on our computer. Joe is putting together our poster. Lori is working on the lesson plan and activities. I have been going through the research and tinkering with my sections of the research paper. So, plenty to do but not much of that really makes for interesting photos. Here are some for you anyway...

For those of you following what are fish are doing with baited (get it?) breath, here is an update.

	pH	DO	Temperature	# of Fish
Tank 1	8.40	7.1	20.35	1
Tank 2	8.34	7.3	20.46	1
Tank 3	8.31	7.7	20.39	1
Tank 4	8.43	7.7	20.28	13

Nothing unusual with these observations considering we are developing a trend with losing fish. We are now down to 16 fish for all 4 tanks. Tanks 1-3 are harboring 1 fish each, in 2 of these tanks we found a couple large fish. Most fish continue to congregate in tank 4 which has no large fish.

Massimo Banzi on TED

2012-07-10T16:10:00.001-05:00

If you haven't check out the TED website you probably should. They also have something in beta called TED-Ed that has a lot of potential. They have a lot of really cool stuff that covers a huge range of topics. I have had a lot of people ask me about what an Arduino is and I figured this guy would explain it a little better than I do since he helped create it...

Pictures from our day in the field

2012-07-10T14:11:00.002-05:00

Collecting Fish

Ecological Survey

Week 5 Day 1

2012-07-09T16:38:00.003-05:00

We started out week 5 with a seminar concerning GPS and GIS at the Environmental Education, Science and Technology Building here at UNT. Our presenter was Dr. Bruce Hunter. Dr. Hunter gave us the one hour version of an introduction to GIS course that he teaches each semester. One of the things that immediately caught my attention was when he was talking about the first GPS satellites that put into orbit. Apparently the signal the satellites transmitted to help you pinpoint your position was the Oscar Mayer jingle. This secret was closely guarded by the CIA for years. Now the navigation message is a more complex sequence of numeric data that identifies the exact satellite sending the signal and the precise time it sent the message. Based on a phase comparison of the data a specific location on the surface of the earth can be defined. Pretty nifty. Also really handy in a huge spectrum of commercial and industrial applications, as well as research. Dr. Hunter even showed us some mapping grade GPS equipment that ranged between $7-12,000 apiece.

After the presentation we got to play with some of the most common GIS software in use today. The program we used is called ArcGIS and was developed by ESRI. Dr. Hunter spoke highly of the software and also praised the company because they are strong supporters of schools and education in general, often providing their software for free to schools.

After the seminar Lori headed back to the lab to take sensor readings in the artificial stream we built and Joe and I headed over to Walmart to see if we could track down the Otter Box we needed. Sadly, the stores don't carry them and we can't really wait two weeks for online delivery. We were troubleshooting on and off most of the day when Joe tracked down a solution. We should have them tomorrow! Lori's readings went fine, though we are now down to 17 Gambusia among the four tanks. Sadly, it appears that at least some of the fish are committing suicide rather than being consumed.

	pH	DO	Temperature	# of Fish
Tank 1	8.38	7.0	20.34	1
Tank 2	8.37	7.0	20.32	3
Tank 3	8.36	7.5	20.32	2
Tank 4	8.39	7.5	20.3	11

Interesting observations today- we are left with 17 fish in all 4 tanks. The 4 large fish are scattered through tanks 2, 3, and 4 and have one, two, or a high number of companion fish in same tanks. Large fish seem to have established their own niche in their respective tank and may be protecting it from others. pH has also increased which can be a result of an increase in insoluble concentration. Zac hypothesized that it has to do with low filtration resulting in high concentration of excess matter. Tank 4 remains to have the highest fish count, as mentioned before tank 4 has a larger volume of water through riffle.

After the measurements Lori focused on the lesson plan and created a revised version. She is now working on student activity guides to go with the lesson plan. Here is the first draft. While she worked on that I began the methods section of our research paper and Joe worked on laying out the components for our sensor cluster circuit with Yixin. While Yixin was soldering up the surface mounted resistors and four of the probe circuits Jose and I worked on putting together connector pins.

Week 4 Day 5

2012-07-06T16:27:00.000-05:00

Today was sort of an all over the place day (Friday's seem to be like that.) We started off with a bit of a surprise when we counted the fish in our tank and realized 13 were missing. Joe pounced on that and did some research to see what might be going on. We had already ruled out them committing suicide (though it did occur to us recently that perhaps they were jumping out and a janitor was providing them a burial at sea) and the possibility of the pump pulping them. Here is what Joe came up with:

We made observations and took readings in our stream system this morning. Most fish congregated in tank 4. Beginning today we determined to take a count of the number of fish in each tank.

	pH	DO	Temperature	# of Fish
Tank 1	7.01	7.6	20.46	2
Tank 2	7.7	7.4	2.47	2
Tank 3	7.9	7.8	20.47	9
Tank 4	8.01	7.3	20.43	9

It took a while to count fish because they harbor in crevices between rocks. It helped to tap on the sides of tanks to “scare” them out. We counted 13 fewer fish than what we placed on Tuesday. We are baffled by the fewer number. After some quick research I found that minnows can tolerate a wide of temperatures but their preferred temperature range is 70 F- 90 F. http://www.co.washoe.nv.us/repository/files/4/v_gambusia.pdf

Gambusia Minnows “Mosquito Fish”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambusia_affinis

After all that we talked to Sharon and she said, "Maybe they big ones are just eating the little ones. They eat about their own body weight every day." Apparently we need to feed them more...

After that we got back to soldering. Joe kept working on his noise maker from yesterday and conquered the task.

While Joe was working on that Lori and Jennifer took a broken Simon Says game and a house made out of circuit boards and wired them up so that they had a solar powered house (I did a little cutting for them.)

This morning Yixin unveiled Circuit v4.0 for his where he simplified things a bit (still hyper-complicated) and I appreciate that because it means I don't have to hand wind transformers.

With that as my model I started the process of replicating that beast of a circuit four times.

Sadly, I didn't make it all that far. If you actually look at the circuit board that Yixin built you can see that there are actually 5 seperate circuits involved in the sensor cluster and we have just integrated them on to one board. What you see here is one of those circuits completed and replicated four times. It doesn't look like much but this took me most of the day to do. Granted, I am far from an expert. If you need more proof of that look at the last picture just above this paragraph and compare the solder tracks I made to the solder tracks in the completed sensor cluster Yixin slapped together in his spare time while eating a sandwich. *sigh*

While we were sitting around the table soldering we were also discussing some changes we would like to make to the artificial stream when we replicate it in our classroom. One thing we want to do is get larger and deeper tubs so that we can vary the environment more and add a larger variety of fish. We were also thinking there might be a way to simplify the riffles by cutting down some of the accordion tubing that you connect to a gutter downspout and using that. It would have the ridges built in so you wouldn't need rocks and you could vary the size and number of ridges by expanding or shortening the tubing.

Future plans for stream riffle. This flex elbow will create riffles which would prevent having to add gravel to channels.
http://www.lowes.com/ProductDisplay?partNumber=137534-205-3708419&langId=-1&storeId=10151&productId=3012598&catalogId=10051&cmRelshp=rel&rel=nofollow&cId=PDIO1

Storage Bins that would work for tubs:http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=8282895&findingMethod=rr#Specifications

The mysterious case of the vanishing fish...

2012-07-06T09:55:00.002-05:00

When we started up the artificial stream on Tuesday we initially loaded 35 fish. We have checked every day and not seen any floaters or dead fish on the bottom. We haven't seen any fish corpses on the ground around the tanks or the riffles. The pump has a micromesh filter and is buried under rocks so they couldn't have gotten pureed there. When we did a count today, though, there were only 22 fish in the tanks. There were four of us counting and we kept coming up with the same number. Odd. We will get back to you when we get to the bottom of this.

Lori's Photo Album

2012-07-06T09:20:00.001-05:00

Here are some of the photos that Lori has sent me over the last couple of days that have not made it on the blog yet. Sorry for the delay!

Week 4 Day 4

2012-07-05T16:35:00.000-05:00

This morning we had a very interesting seminar from a gentleman named David who works for the City of Denton doing water quality. He is also a meteorologist for the Navy through the reserves. I will see if I can get his power point to share here.

After that Joe, Lori and I spent most of the day working with Jennifer to improve our soldering skills. We started out making a very simple circuit with an LED and a resistor.

After that we moved on and mapped out a noise maker circuit and put that together. Lori opted to make hers on a bread board and it turned out very well.

I went with the soldering option. Took a little longer but I am proud of the results. I just wish it was louder...

Lori and Joe have spearheaded accumulating some data from the sensors in the artificial stream. Here is what we have collected:

On Tuesday we managed to get our prototype stream system going with 15 minnows in tank 1 and 20 in tank 4. Zac added an equal distribution of plants to each of the tanks. Our gravel throughout spout created riffles large enough to increase oxygen levels. Fish migrated from tanks 4 to tank 3 and 2 but migration was limited in tank 1. We observed that tanks 2, 3, and 4 riffles have a higher volume of water allowing fish to travel upstream. In order to increase fish mobility between each of the tanks we created small channels in gravel.

Tuesday’s results- 2:30pm:
After setting up our stream we turned on the tank pump and bubbler and took probe readings after 1 hr. (allowing fish to acclimate to environment).
***note, Dr. Hoeinghaus brought his fancy YSI 600 to help us compare Spark to something professional grade. We measured our stream system and both pH and Temperature were spot on but DO measured higher- 10.

	pH	DO (mg/L)	Temperature (C)
Tank 1	8.27	8.4	25.4
Tank 2	8.21	8.3	25.43
Tank 3	8.15	8.2	25.48
Tank 4	8.23	8	23.32

Fish Behavior:
When we initially added fish to tanks we observed very little to no movement. After about 5-10 min fish began to move around. After 30 min we saw fish in groups of 3-4 move very slowly through riffles in tanks 4 to 3. Four would move halfway across, 3 would retreat, and only one would make it all the way through. Sharron predicted that the bigger minnows were pregnant females and interestingly enough we observed that they would stay closer to the floor of the tanks.

As we suspected, tank number 1, which has the bubbler hose, has the highest DO concentration decreasing in tanks 2, 3, then 4. pH was all over the place- no consistency. Tank 4, which has the pump motor seemed to have the lowest temperature. We turned off pump over our 4th of July break (a total of 36 hrs.) and took the following readings:

Thursday- 9:30am

	pH	DO (mg/L)	Temperature (C)
Tank 1	8	7	20.32
Tank 2	8	7.4	20.31
Tank 3	8	7.6	20.31
Tank 4	8	7.4	20.3

We observed that tank 3 has the highest concentration of plant matter and also higher DO. We suspect these are directly linked. Lori noted that lights were off during this period so photosynthesis would have decreased (although experiments show room lights have little influence on photosynthesis; the greatest contributor to photosynthesis is our sun) but cell respiration would have increased. We also observed tank 4 has the highest number of minnows. This again would yield a lower DO although minnows can gulp up air from the surface when exposed to harsh conditions.
Our next step will be to measure again once the pump and bubbler have been on for two hours to compare data.

11:30am

	pH	DO (mg/L)	Temperature (C)
Tank 1	7.86	7.8	20.1
Tank 2	7.9	7.2	20.14
Tank 3	7.9	7.7	20.09
Tank 4	7.9	7.3	20.05

As expected after running the pump for 2 hrs. DO levels rose in a couple of the tanks. Tank 1, which has bubbler, rose significantly +.8. Tank 2, -.2. Tank 3, +.1. And Tank 4, -.1. No consistency here. I think what’s happening is that fish are migrating from tank to tank which fluctuates DO levels. Also, Spark probes might not be giving accurate data.

2:30pm

	pH	DO (mg/L)	Temperature (C)
Tank 1	8.07	7.5	20.12
Tank 2	8.03	7.4	20.07
Tank 3	8.03	7.1	20.07
Tank 4	8	7.7	20.08

Another set of data with varying numbers- no consistency. My next thought is volume of water affecting concentration of DO.

More Big Picture Resources

2012-07-05T10:15:00.003-05:00

While the rest of us were goofing off and grilling, Lori was hunting up more resources for the big picture aspect of our paper...

Denton Stream Team Newscast
http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/green/Putting-North-Texas-Water-Quality-to-the-Test-139900243.html?_osource=Newsletter-Daily

Texas Stream Team site at Texas State University
http://txstreamteam.rivers.txstate.edu/

Texas Water Development Board for kids
http://www.twdb.state.tx.us/conservation/education/kids/

USGS Water Quality Data
http://water.usgs.gov/owq/data.html

Take Care of Texas for Teachers
http://www.takecareoftexas.org/teachers

One Planet, One Chance
http://inmotion.magnumphotos.com/essay/one-planet-one-chance

Nutrient removal from polluted stream water by artificial
aquatic food web system
Dawoon Jung Æ Ahnna Cho Æ Young-Gun Zo Æ
Æ Ahnna Cho Æ Young-Gun Zo Æ
Seung-Ik Choi Æ Tae-Seok Ahn
Æ Tae-Seok Ahnhttp://www.springerlink.com/content/3r210447r062j63k/fulltext.pdf

Journal article:
Non -point source Pollution A distributed water quality modeling approach
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0043135400003365

Index for evaluating water quality in Streams
https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=gmail&attid=0.1&thid=1382f4145b19d157&mt=application/pdf&url=https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui%3D2%26ik%3D4d9928d494%26view%3Datt%26th%3D1382f4145b19d157%26attid%3D0.1%26disp%3Dsafe%26realattid%3Df_h3yr5eom0%26zw&sig=AHIEtbTn62i5bh0jU1j9ZCNjqzYwTJKktQ

Here are some reference sites for scientific articles on water quality.
http://water.sigmaxi.org/?page_id=39

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science

http://www.journals.elsevier.com/water-research/

Week 4 Day 3

2012-07-05T09:16:00.003-05:00

We were off for the 4th! I hope you enjoyed the day off and did something to celebrate the birth of our Country with friends and family.

Week 4 Day 2

2012-07-03T16:47:00.002-05:00

This morning we started out getting some things organized for our paper and pounding out some research. After that we went to two seminars. One was on robotic vision and that was not especially applicable to what we were working on. The first one, though, was explaining how you can use a UAV quadcopter as a tool in environmental surveys and research. Super cool. Also, if it wasn't for the FAA laws banning UAVs from commercial transactions this thing would make an awesome taco-copter.

I totally want one. After that we ran water through our artificial stream until it ran clear and then drained it as best we could. Then I situated the plants into the gravel and we filled it again. We treated the water and let it run for fifteen minutes. Once that was done Lori caught 15 fish and put them into tank one and then another 15 for tank 4. The thought there was we could see if the traveled upstream from tank 4 and see if they went down stream from tank one.

At first it didn't look like they were going to move much. We had one wash down the riffle from tank 1 to tank 2 right away and then another about a minute after. Then... nothing. They all went as deep as they could in their tank and stayed put. After a couple of hours, though, they started migrating. They will stay in one tank for a while and then one will get brave and head into a riffle. As soon as one does it four or five others will follow.

Once the artificial stream was in good shape we took another look at the circuit that Yixin had been perfecting. It now works exactly the way we want it to but it has gotten much more complex.

We are going to have to make four more of these bad boys so I sat down with Yixin and we started putting together the power controller for the sensor clusters. This is a lot more complicated then I expected and started out with Yixin making me wind coil for our DC transformers. Each transformer has two coils. The inner coil is wound 50 times with copper wire and the outer coil has 102. I made two of those today. I still have six more to go. After those were done we started laying out the circuit. Once I got a power controller set up completely on one of the boards we flipped it and Yixin told me to start soldering. I had a mild panic attack. Jennifer noticed and we started a soldering 101 refresher course. I made a couple of decent lines before I started screwing up. After that Joe jumped in and we started taking turns. By the time I stopped for the afternoon I was able to make two parallel tracks six spaces long with no bleed over or yellowing and Joe was getting close. After that we started talking about simple motors since we had copper wire laying around and I showed them one I made with my physics students.

While I was doing the electronics part, Lori and Joe were working with Dr. Hoeinghaus on the sensors, including setting up a YSI and giving him a run down on the artificial stream.

Fish herding

2012-07-03T09:15:00.001-05:00

You've heard of herding cats... what about herding fish?

Scruffy looking nerf herders...

Week 4 Day 1

2012-07-02T23:22:00.002-05:00

I hope every one had a great weekend. I know I did. And, unlike most Mondays I was really excited about today. We went out to the field site that Luke has been working and helped him do collections for his doctoral work. The site was pretty (thought the water was a little filthy...)

Joe and I suited up and headed up stream to meet Lori, her son Brian, Luke and Jessica.

Once we got to the test site we noticed things were in full swing. The first stage of the collection process was electro fishing. Yes. It is just as exciting as it sounds.

When there's something strange
Swimmin' in your stream
Who ya gonna call...

Electro fishing involves strapping a giant battery to your back, dragging a grounding wire and walking around with a thing that looks like a metal detector to stun fish (and snakes). Who ever is following the guy with the proton pack then scoops up the stunned fish and drop them in a collectuon bucket. After two sweeps of electro fishing it's time to use the seine net. The trick with the seine net is to keep the poles at a forty-five degree angle and bumping along the bottom so that the lead line drags the bottom the whole time. The floats on the top of the net keep the net open while you drag. Then you slip up onto the shore and, voila!, fish! The gar were some of the coolest.

Once the fish were in collection buckets Luke measured, counted and tagged (certain) fish. During the count he would check to see if any of the fish had been tagged in a previous collection and compared their location to their original tag.

After we collected from all five sections we went back to the start and Joe and I helped Dr. Hoeinghaus take the ecological survey. This involved measuring pH, temperature, dissolved oxygen, depth, width, and canopy coverage. Joe used the the high tech YSI meter and pH meter. I used the uber high tech nasa stick (it's a piece of PVC with a depth gauge drawn on it in sharpie) and a spherical densitometer. Cool, right?

Good times. :)