Café Scientifique Archive 2007
What lies beneath? Life in New Zealand's groundwaters
New Zealand's groundwater aquifers play an important role in sustaining human populations and their industries, but few people know about the life sustained by these waters within the aquifers themselves. Our aquifers are in fact home to a staggering diversity of invertebrate species, with over 150 species of crustaceans, beetles, snails and worms identified so far. These animals play important roles in groundwater ecosystems, not least in maintaining the filtering capacity of aquifers. Unfortunately these ecosystems are under threat from a range of human activities and current management policies do not explicitly recognise groundwater ecosystems. The question is: Should we be concerned about the future of our groundwater ecosystems?
Science & Religion
Science and religion have both been contributors to the development of civilisation and both play an important role in most people's lives - even to those who never participate in either of them. Religion addresses moral and existential issues. Science describes the observable world of experiences. In recent times science and religion have experienced at times heated debates leading to political confrontations (in the United States) which have the potential to harm science and damage religion. Café Scientifique has invited three speakers to discuss the issues from their point of view. In a discussion the panelists will explain their respective ideas and tactics for engaging in dialogue to see whether the two worldviews will ever enrich one another?
Aquatic Foe... didymo
Didymo is considered a threat to New Zealand as it has the ability to smother aquatic environments, potentially affecting habitats for fish, plant and invertebrate species and impacting on aesthetics, recreation and irrigation activities. Dr Susan Clearwater of NIWA will introduce this freshwater diatom and discuss research commissioned by MAF Biosecurity New Zealand, to identify and test potential control agents that were effective, feasible, and low risk.
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Why is General Anaesthesia like poaching an egg?
Although general anaesthesia transformed the practice of surgery over 150 years ago, we still do not understand how it works. Join us to talk briefly about at some possible explanations of general anaesthesia, and look at exciting new evidence suggesting that anaesthetic-induced loss of consciousness is the result of a decrease in the number of ways that nerve cells can talk to each other - a process that is similar to the way an egg solidifies when it is heated.
How electric is your car?
How much do you know about the workings of your gasoline-powered car? Or is it more electric than you realise? Why are 12-volt batteries on the way out? Today, knowing how to tune up you car is about as useful as knowing how to play a vinyl record. Come along and find out what petrol-heads will need to know in the 21st century.
Riparian management: a silver bullet for protecting streams from land use impacts?
Our streams, lakes and estuaries are under increasing pressure from intensification of urban and rural land use. One way to stop this degrading the many values that our waterways provide is to manage the riparian zone as a buffer between land and water. But what are the benefits of riparian management? Are there limits to its effectiveness? Come along and hear about this issue and have your say.
Amazing maize - its present and future uses
Every wondered whether science does anything useful? Greg Edmeades is an agronomist who has travelled and worked extensively in Africa and Central America. Come along and hear how science, applied toÊmaize, is being used to help the ordinary person in the third world.
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Solar Variability and Earth's Orbit as Drivers of Climate Change
Although energy from the sun supports almost all life on Earth, and drives weather and climate, the Sun is widely held to be not responsible for observed climate changes over the past millennium. This is because long term measurements of the amount of energy that reaches Earth from the Sun have found this amount to be constant (the "Solar Constant"). However, new and more accurate analytical techniques indicate that the Solar Constant is not constant at all, but varies over both long and short timescales.
Come along and hear more about how energy from the Sun, and changes in EarthÕs orbit, can influence climate change on our planet, and how this compares with the better known greenhouse effect.
Packing up your DNA
We have lots and lots of DNA. If we stretch out the DNA, each cell in our body has about 2 metres of DNA "string". But, each cell must pack away this 2 metres of "string" into the nucleus - a compartment which is about 5 millionths of a metre across. How does this happen? And why does it matter?
High Voltage Pylons and Science
EMF - What does it really stand for?
To scientists, EMF can stand for ElectroMagnetic Field - but in the wider community it's become a symbol of concern associated with proposals to build high-voltage power pylons across Waikato farmland.
Come along and discuss the science behind high-voltage transmission lines:
 Just what is an electromagnetic field anyway?
Why have high-voltage lines - wouldn't low-voltage be better?
What's so difficult about putting these lines underground, out of sight?
Sounds good - but is it science?
At the Café s, we've discussed a range of science topics, but never really sat down to talk about what "science" actually is. Come along and join us as we talk about what it is about science that sets it apart from other ways of looking at the world, how science works, and why some examples of "science" simply aren't science at all!
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1080: friend or foe?
1080 is sodium fluoroacetate, a naturally occurring toxin which is used in several countries to control animal pests. In New Zealand it is used mainly for possum control, but is also used against other animal pests. Its use is controversial, with users claiming that it is the most cost-effective control tool available, while opponents dispute the benefits of its use and claim it is environmentally damaging and a threat to health.
The talk will present scientific evidence about 1080: its uses, its advantages and its disadvantages.
The speaker Dr Doug Wright, a former Director of the Meat Industry Research Institute of NZ, former Chair of the National Science Strategy Committee on Possum and Bovine Tuberculosis Control, and a current member of Environment Waikato's Biosecurity Committee.
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