COMMUNICATE THROUGH RENEWABLE ENERGY TESTING AND DIRECT IMAGES. Andrea Mameli (a), Bruno D'Aguanno (b) (a) mameli@crs4.it CRS4, Technology Park of Sardinia, ed. 1, 09010 Pula (Cagliari)
(b) bruno@crs4.it CRS4, Technology Park of Sardinia ed. 1, 09010 Pula (Cagliari)
Summary
The need to increase awareness and consensus on renewable energy requires the adoption of common measures adaptable to different circumstances and different types of users. The use of small laboratory traveling to experiment and play with the principles and techniques at the base of renewable energy, together with the use of images (drawings, cartoons, animations, digital shorts) can provide valuable support to get in touch, guess, understand. But even just to start reducing cultural distances. Around the actual experimental laboratories of renewable energy are currently under construction at CRS4 made a series of activities demonstration and dissemination aimed at multiple public. This paper will present the science communication activities designed and implemented by the Working Group on Renewable Energy CRS4. In the present article presents the activities so far and those planned for the next few years throughout the Summer Lab Lab project (construction of a demonstrator CSP).
1. Relationship between science communication and image
The need to accurately illustrate the theoretical predictions and experimental results requires an effective display of images next to the written text. The date of birth of iconic-verbal blend is conventionally associated with the publication in Starry Messenger by Galileo Galilei: text of March 1608 with a series of drawings of the Moon's surface. In these watercolors, according to historian Samuel Edgerton, the ability to recognize the Galileo lunar spots like shadows cast by the findings derived from knowledge of the theory of shadows and perspective gained from the training environment in Florence (the painter Ludovico Cardi recognized in Galilei his master of perspective). [Edgerton, 1984]
Over the past twenty years, the space devoted to illustrations in journals such as Nature and Science has grown substantially, although well behind the periodicals for the general public (where the images are of ruolo preminente) forse a causa della diffidenza degli scienziati nei confronti della comunicazione visiva diversa da quella strettamente. Ora non bisogna però eccedere dal lato opposto: la scienza non deve cioè subire un’eccessiva spettacolarizzazione per immagini. [Ottino, 2003].
Tuttavia l’azione delle illustrazioni è di rinforzo rispetto ai contenuti editoriali, proprio come fosse arte al servizio della scienza. È lecito aspettarsi che i lettori siano in grado di non confondersi tra i risultati di una ricerca scientifica e un’illustrazione artistica perché, presumibilmente, questo modo di comunicare la scienza è divenuto ormai convenzionale. [Ippolito, 2003].
Indubbiamente l’evoluzione nel tastes, expectations and perceptions of the public and scientists has been encouraged by many factors. It is significant, for example, the effort made by the designers of comics to draw closer to reality [Lee, Buscema, 1977] despite the continued suspension of disbelief in the fantasy world told by comics [Gresh, Weinberg] as well as the wide variety of proposals [Giorello, Gaspar, 2007] and the substantial lack of formal constraints that usually distinguishes the creative environment. [Mameli, Murgia, Cabras, 2007].
Significant in this regard, the inclusion of comics in seminars for students of this course in Physics (University of Minnesota) under the title: "Everything I know about science I learned from comics." [Kakalios, 2007].
dominated by the post-modern era, as acutely observed Italo Calvino in Six Memos (1988) the media transform the world in its image. And today the so-called visual culture stands as a language and form of human communication, dialogue and interactive, able to produce and construct meanings. [Biondi, 2007]
The relationship between the formation processes of scientific knowledge and the images may also relate to the illustration of the stages of construction of a plant, such as the Sardinia Radio Telescope: paraboloidal antenna with a diameter of 64 m (currently under construction at 35 km from Cagliari), which once completed will become the largest in Italy). [SRT]
2 The education laboratory for renewable energy
CRS4 (Center for Research, Development and Advanced Studies in Sardinia) is developing the project SUMMER LAB (funded by the Ministry of University and Research: DM23161 30 / 11/2006, Research Project: Public-private laboratory for the development of technologies for solar thermal energy at high temperature) to demonstrate the feasibility of production, efficient, clean and competitive electricity from solar energy source , through the management thermodynamics at high temperature (550 º C) of solar energy collected, concentrated and stored. Around the laboratory there are three courses of advanced training and will be placed on a reduced scale model of the demonstrator. [SUMMER LAB]
2.1 The logic of the activities
The need to introduce solar technology to concentration - CSP - and the need to respond to frequent questions of more general (What is energy? What are renewable energy? What are the energy supply chain? etc) to support the project requires a series of popular initiatives. The main objective is to broaden knowledge among the general public around the issue of energy (renewable). To pursue these goals, the use of images becomes essential.
On the basis of curiosity and interest aroused by the construction phases of the Sardinia Radio Telescope, we have chosen a path which is popular back in part by how you build it, it then moves on to how to finally reach the principles which guide the operation . The procedures to implement this regard are basically two popular, the use of images taken in the context of construction activities and real simulation of energy conversion by means of scale models.
The first aspect is combined to create a blog, in which they are made available to the visual documentation (photos, movies, comics and cartoons and digital animation in the future). [Blog Crs4EnergieRinnovabili].
2.2
activities during the festival of children's literature Tuttestorie (Cagliari, 5 and 6 October 2007) to the laboratory for renewable energy education of CRS4 was entrusted with the conduct of a series of activities with students of primary and secondary schools (from Sardinia), including the use of scale models of hydroelectric, solar and wind power, solar power a model car and a Stirling engine. In particular, for children and young people has aroused considerable interest see the transformation of muscle needed to lift a bins of water, electricity, generated by the movement of the generator driven by the fall of the liquid.
At the town's Science Week, organized by the Science Committee Science Society, 10 to 12 November 2007, the education laboratory of renewable energy CRS4 ran a series of meetings with elementary and middle school students from across Sardinia. Has aroused particular interest in assisting in the creation of hydrogen (fuel cell or battery powered with a small solar panel) and the subsequent extraction of electrical energy with a second cell and the subsequent movement of the machine. All activities have been documented with photos and film footage for the blog.
are planning other activities of the laboratory at the third edition of the Festival of Science Orgosolo (Nuoro) from 30 May to 1 June.
2.3 Possible future developments
The need to equip the laboratory of renewable energy educational CRS4 quickly imposed the use of instructional equipment purchased already prepared. Were added only some elements (like the string and the bins of water, hoisted his arms from the boys on a branch of a tree). In the future, but it is considered essential to design and implement a series of models on site, preferably using waste materials, including concentrated solar power plant in miniature. The interaction with the general public, with other research centers, schools and university courses will be in the next few years, a strategic asset for the education laboratory of renewable energy CRS4. This is why the blog will be the reference point, with the aim of involving other stakeholders in the inclusion of text, images and video clips.
3 Conclusions The experience so far conducted by the education laboratory of renewable energy CRS4 detected a strong thirst for knowledge about the topic. The outreach activities will then be considered an integral part of research and development, with the knowledge that publicizing the results of scientific activities is a necessity and also a duty.
References 1) S. Edgerton, Galileo, Florentine design, and the Strange Spottedness of the Moon, in Art Journal, XLIV, pp. 225-33 (1984)
2) J. Ottino, Is a picture worth 1,000 Words', in Nature 421, 474-476 (30 January 2003)
3) F. Ippolito, The subtle beauty of art in the service of science, in Nature: 422, 15 (2003)
4) S: Lee, J. Bushema, How to draw comics. The Marvel Way. Fireside First Edition (1977)
5) L. Gresh, R. Weinberg, Superman against Newton. The comic book superheroes and their science (real and false). Apogee (2005)
6) G. Giorello, PL Gaspar, Science in the clouds. Pippo From Newton to Mr. Fantastic, Routledge (2007)
7) A. Mameli, F. Murgia, C. Cabras, Communicating science with the comic and the cartoon, in Proceedings of the Fifth National Conference on Science Communication. 153-162 (2007)
8) J. Kakalios. The physics of superheroes. Einaudi (2007)
9) T. Biondi. The factory image. Culture and psychology of art film. Edizioni Magi. (2007)
10) SRT: http://www.srt.inaf.it/
11) SUMMER LAB: http://www.crs4.it/ecp/projects/ESTATE/Home.html
12) Crs4EnergieRinnovabili Blog: http://crs4energierinnovabili.blogspot.com/
In: ComunicareFisica 2007, Trieste, 1-6 October 2007
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