BRINGING

SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING TO THE CLASSROOM

USING MOBILE COMPUTING AND MODERN

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE

onica F. Bugallo, Michael Marx, David Bynum

Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY 11794, U.S.A.

Helio Takai, John Hover

Brookhaven National Laboratories, Upton, NY 11973, U.S.A.

Keywords:

TabletPC, Wiki, Multidisciplinary education, MARIACHI, Ultra-high energy cosmic rays, Mobile technology.

Abstract:

This paper reports on the creative educational and research program of MARIACHI (Mixed Apparatus for

Radar Investigation of Cosmic-rays of High Ionization) at Stony Brook University, a unique endeavor that

detects and studies atmospheric phenomena (lighting, meteors, or cosmic rays) by using a novel detection

technique based on radar-like technology and traditional scintillator ground detectors. During the past and

current academic year, our program has been effectively modernized and streamlined in both research and

educational aspects with the implementation of mobile technologies by the use of TabletPCs and wireless

data collection systems as well as emerging cyberinfrastructure based on dynamic services as wiki, blog, and

Internet-based video conferencing.

1 INTRODUCTION

This paper reports on the latest efforts of the MARI-

ACHI (Mixed Apparatus for Radar Investigation of

Cosmic-rays of High Ionization) program (Takai,

2008) at Stony Brook University, a unique en-

deavor that detects and studies atmospheric phenom-

ena (lighting, meteors, or cosmic rays) by using a

novel detection technique based on radar-like tech-

nology and traditional scintillator ground detectors.

The program provides intensive engineering, science

research and educational experiences for students at

all levels (high-school, undergraduate and graduate)

working with a multidisciplinary team of scientists,

engineers and educators (Bugallo et al., 2008).

Using atmospheric phenomena as vehicles to mo-

tivate research and educational activities, we develop

innovative hands-on modules in physics, engineering

and cyberinfrastructure based on a learning by doing

philosophy with particular emphasis on radar technol-

ogy (Bugallo et al., 2009). Students participate in re-

search projects, seminars, and workshops, where they

learn to use tools needed in MARIACHI. We create a

natural chain of instruction where undergraduate and

graduate students in the program participate in the in-

struction of high school students. To broaden the im-

pact of the project, many activities are offered to a

wide audience, with particular emphasis on tradition-

ally underrepresented groups. The latter commitment

is possible primarily due to the partnership of MARI-

ACHI with the Stony Brook Center for Science and

Mathematics Education (CESAME) (Bynum, 2008),

an award winning science education organization, and

the Women in Science and Engineering (WISE) pro-

gram (Miller, 2008).

The current instruction of the educational activi-

ties offered by the MARIACHI team has been sub-

stantially improved by the use of mobile technologies

in the form of TabletPCs. Our research and educa-

tional facility is a large laboratory with an area for the-

oretical lectures, a radar set-up, a scintillator ground

site, and a data-acquisition room. Students participat-

ing in our offerings need to move from one place to

another to take notes, develop different experiments,

or attend seminars. The use of the TabletPCs has al-

lowed for advancing the teaching/learning activities

of our study program, and favor the joint use of facili-

ties and expertise among not only students but also the

rest of participants. Moreover, the physical separation

of participants (high-schools, research sites, or class-

rooms) has required implementation of a reliable and

secure data collection system and efﬁcient tools for

206

F. Bugallo M., Marx M., Bynum D., Takai H. and Hover J. (2009).

BRINGING SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING TO THE CLASSROOM USING MOBILE COMPUTING AND MODERN CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE.

In Proceedings of the First International Conference on Computer Supported Education, pages 205-208

DOI: 10.5220/0001971102050208

 SciTePress

information exchange and communication. Emerging

cyberinfrastructure based on grid technology has al-

lowed for secure data exchange as well as for sharing

of common knowledge and interactions among par-

ticipants through dynamic services as wiki, blog, and

Internet-based video conferencing. Our goal of bring-

ing science research to classroom is achieved while

students are exposed to cutting edge technology.

2 TEACHING & LEARNING

MARIACHI

The science of MARIACHI requires the collection,

processing and analysis of signals using radar-based

technology and scintillator ground detector sites

(see

Figure 1).

Cosmic

ray

Distant

signals

TV signal reflected

by the cosmic ray

TV antennas

Data acquisition system

and cyberinfrastructure

GRID

data

Ground

detectors

Figure 1: The MARIACHI experiment.

Through our educational offerings, students are

not only exposed to the theoretical aspects of the

project through regular lectures but they also expe-

rience all the practical phases of experiments with

hands-on activities and by directly collaborating with

physicists and engineers. The range and variety of

activities is large and comprises from understanding

concepts like frequency or cosmic rays to calibration

of antennas (which are outside the laboratory) used

for data collection, counting of events with ground

detectors, collection and analysis of data, or report-

ing of results. Here we describe some of the main

educational activities of the program.

2.1 Workshops

Through a one-week summer workshop and several

one-day activities, high-school teachers and students

learn about the main elements of MARIACHI and

build scintillator ground detectors to be installed later

For a more detailed explanation of the MARIACHI re-

search experiment please refer to (Takai, 2008).

on in their schools with the purpose of collaborating

in the data collection and analysis (see Figure 2). The

workshops are a combination of training, brainstorm-

ing, and hands-on sessions and are instructed by fac-

ulty, technicians, postdoctoral students, graduate stu-

dents and high school teachers. Once the setup is in-

stalled in the schools, students are introduced to vari-

ous data analysis tasks, for example the study of cos-

mic ray rate dependence on barometric pressure.

Figure 2: Left: Building a scintillator ground detector.

Right: Brainstorming session.

2.2 Undergraduate Offerings

The undergraduate activities combine regular courses

and research projects:

• An introductory course on scientiﬁc method, tech-

nology and modern cyberinfrastructure uses the

atmospheric phenomena to motivate students in

research activities. The objective is to introduce

the different components of the project and let

students propose their own topics of research and

carry out a complete experiment.

• Various eight-session four-week inquiry-based

courses through the WISE mentoring program are

offered. The objective in this case is to provide

with series of basic exercises for data analysis and

comparison using the new technology.

• Engineering students have shown interest for the

radar-like detector research and conducted their

senior design project (one year duration) under the

supervision of our engineering team. Last year a

group worked on calibration of the instrumenta-

tion for signal acquisition, and currently another

group is working on data analysis of radar data.

2.3 Research Projects

Some high school students have developed their In-

tel projects

under the supervision of MARIACHI re-

searchers. MARIACHI has also offered the opportu-

nity for teachers to participate in the ongoing research

The Intel Science Talent Search is a US pre-college sci-

ence competition.

BRINGING SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING TO THE CLASSROOM USING MOBILE COMPUTING AND MODERN

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE

207

experiments with many possibilities for personal as

well as professional growth. As mentioned in the pre-

vious section, some undergraduate students have car-

ried out their senior design projects in radar topics as

well as some master students who are preparing their

dissertations in data acquisition or cosmic ray detec-

tion, localization and classiﬁcation.

3 MOBILE COMPUTING AND

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE

MARIACHI is a widely geographically distributed

experiment and run by students and professionals of

different backgrounds. The body of data collected by

the experiment requires the use of modern day com-

puter and network technology. The participants need

to be trained in both the use of hardware and soft-

ware to fully take advantage of this technology. The

challenge of a widely distributed system is to pro-

vide mechanisms to guarantee data integrity and se-

cure transfer. This is especially true when a diverse

group is involved. The collaboration also needs se-

cure collaborative tools such as the wiki and secure

email.

In the context of the Mariachi project, cyberinfras-

tructure has several facets. Learning how to handle

these tools is an essential step to perform experimen-

tal work in any area of science. Training and educat-

ing participants to use these tools is one of the main

objectives of MARIACHI. This process takes place

while the experiment explores its science.

Due to the physical separation of the experiment

resources and participants, in the past the offered

courses, workshops and projects needed a well de-

ﬁned set of activities that could not be properly com-

bined and developed to full extent. The integration

and exploitation of mobile technologies as well as

modern cyberinsfrastructure tools has facilitated en-

hanced teaching and learning and efﬁcient communi-

cation.

3.1 Use of TabletPCs

At the MARIACHI home, the exploitation of portable

computing technology in the class provides with

many opportunities for students to move from activity

to activity writing notes easily, storing data, sharing

results, asking questions, or presenting results (see

Figure 3). Mobile computing in the form of Tablet-

PCs has allowed for integration of the theoretical and

practical components of the deliveries in only one

classroom. All the needed resources are available

to perform theoretical explanations, programming ex-

periments, or research activities.

Figure 3: Use of a TabletPC during the summer workshop.

The use of TabletPCs has also enhanced the teach-

ing and collaborative learning by providing multime-

dia support for friendly explanations and presenta-

tions. By connecting the TabletPC to a projector, we

have a fully interactive presentation system that al-

lows for delivery of highly visual and dynamic lec-

tures with multimedia presentations and demos. Be-

sides, all the notes, students’ exercises, and live ele-

ments of the discussion sessions are saved, which fa-

cilitates keeping more accurate records of students’

progress. It also allows a more individualized atten-

tion to the students. At the conclusion of the offered

activities the participants are able to use the TabletPCs

in a mobile situation to collect, share and compare ex-

perimental data from both the scintillator sites and the

radar set-ups.

The communication between the instructor and

the students and among students as they move from

setup to setup has also been improved. Students and

instructors are able to communicate even if they are

carrying out different activities in different locations.

Finally, the TabletPCs are particularly good in

MARIACHI for ﬁeld work where connectivity is

available and are used for ﬁeld data collection and

recording. In training sessions mobile technology is

very useful for participants to perform different ex-

periments at different stations in a laboratory setting

while recording information.

3.2 Cyberinfrastructure in Action

MARIACHI has established a Linux-based server for

data repository and dynamic web content services.

One of the ﬁrst projects undertaken was the creation

of a website based on two growing and popular con-

cepts: wiki and blog (Takai, 2008). The website is

publicly accessible, but contributing and editing is re-

stricted to registered MARIACHI users. The web-

site has been enthusiastically received and many peo-

ple have made substantial contributions. In particular

CSEDU 2009 - International Conference on Computer Supported Education

208

many of the participants have created their own per-

sonal user proﬁles which constitute an evidence of the

diversity of the group. We are increasing the level and

frequency of participation by assigning editors to spe-

ciﬁc areas of the wiki.

MARIACHI requires radar and ground detector

sites with cyberinfrastructure for data collection and

analysis. We demonstrated the ability to produce

complete ground detector kits, build and install de-

tectors in high schools, install antennas, and upload

data to the MARIACHI server. The detector assem-

bly workshops continues until the installation at cur-

rently afﬁliated high schools is completed. After the

mechanical installation of each system, detectors are

commissioned and calibrated in situ. Data uploading

from behind high school ﬁrewalls has also been ac-

complished. This step is signiﬁcant for the progress

of MARIACHI as high school ﬁrewalls are extremely

secure and protective. Interactions with information

technology personnel from several schools were very

important in this task. The data collection is now be-

ing implemented and the status of each site is dis-

played on our website (see Figure 4).

Figure 4: Oscillogram of signals and data collected from

four detectors in a classroom.

Though the data rate is not very large, the nature of

the experiments and searches to be performed require

participants to become familiar in handling statistical

data analysis. While spreadsheets such as Excel pro-

vide preliminary analysis, we are introducing modern

statistical data analysis packages, such as R.

Finally, videoconferencing has proved to be a

useful cyber tool to establish communication be-

tween MARIACHI sites. Its educational potential

was demonstrated when Ward Melville High School

students joined in a CERN (European Center for

Nuclear Research) Masterclass program (Pregernig,

2008) using internet videoconferencing to discuss

particle physics with students from Poland, Slovakia

and Greece. We have installed and evaluated commer-

cial software used by educators. Tests were conducted

with local high school teachers and internationally

with the University of Rio de Janeiro and CERN with

positive results for audio, video and whiteboard.

4 CONCLUSIONS

MARIACHI’s goal of bringing science and engineer-

ing research to classroom is achieved while students

are exposed to cutting edge technology. For the par-

ticipants, this infrastructure brings added ﬂexibility,

excitement, and innovation in their process of learn-

ing and support programs that are necessary for run-

ning the educational and research activities, and facil-

itates the communication between them (e.g., e-mail,

instantaneous messaging, wiki).

The structure of the program has attracted addi-

tional sites not only nationally but internationally lo-

cated. These new participants have already attended

some of the workshops and courses and are imple-

menting similar activities with the collaboration of

our faculty, researchers and teachers.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work has been supported by the National Sci-

ence Foundation (OCI-0636194), the 2008 Hewlett-

Packard Technology for Teaching grant (2397700),

the SBU/BNL Seed Grant Program (37298), the

Stony Brook Presidential Mini-Grant for Innovative

Teaching (420024-43) and the U.S. Department of

Energy (DE-AC02-98CH10886).

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CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE

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