Maria Mitchell Women in Science Award

At the Maria Mitchell Association, women rock!

Proving that point on an annual basis, the Maria Mitchell Association is handing out its Women in Science Award this year to Margaret B. Bailey, Ph.D., P.E., Kate Gleason Endowed Chair and Associate Professor in Mechanical Engineering at the Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, N.Y. The Maria Mitchell Women in Science Award Committee will honor Dr. Bailey at a celebration on Sept. 19, 2008 at 6 p.m. at the Coffin School, 4 Winter St.

The lucky girl is founder and executive director of WE@RIT — Women in Engineering at Rochester Institute of Technology — where she is helping to advance the retention of current women engineering students, as well as encourage girls K-12 to become engineers through outreach programs.

Through mentoring, Dr. Bailey is working with WE@RIT to connect first-year female engineering graduate students with upper level students. She also set up a bi- weekly workshop series for RIT female engineering students and created a two-week engineering camp for fourth to ninth graders called "Everyday Engineering," run by RIT women engineering students along with a shadowing program in which RIT undergraduates work with professional engineers. Dr. Bailey hopes to use her $5,000 Maria Mitchell Women in Science Award, which comes from the Henry

Luce Foundation, to train a small group of science and math teachers to "improve the quality and transferability of the 'Everyday Engineering' curriculum to other universities and/or 4th- 9th grade classrooms."

Early-riser reward

Those fortunate enough to be getting up for work just before 4:51 a.m. tomorrow morning will get the chance to see the start of a total lunar eclipse in the lower portion of the western sky that reaches peak eclipse at 6:04 a.m.

Actually, advises Dr. Vladimir Strelnitski, the Maria Mitchell Association's director of astronomy, you should be up at 4:30 a.m. to make sure that it is clear with the full moon completely visible. If the conditions are as described, you have two options: head up to Maria Mitchell's Loines Observatory at 59 Milk St. Ext. and join Strelnitski before 4:51 a.m. to view the eclipse through Maria Mitchell's 24-inch research grade telescope; or, go out and find a clear shot to the western horizon to watch as the earth's shadow gradually covers the moon until all of it is enclosed by earth's umbra (shadow). The clearer the morning, the better, according to Strelnitski because the moon can be "reddened by the earth's atmosphere and magnified by its proximity to the horizon."

If you do go looking for this eclipse on your own try viewing it with your sleep-weary naked eyes and a pair of binoculars. If want to learn more about this rare eclipse, call Strelnitski at 228-8690 or get to the observatory tomorrow morning.

Red tide for fish

Nothing to be alarmed about unless you're a fish or shellfish gifted with human literacy, but Town Biologist Keith Conant is reporting that there is a red tide bloom of Conchlodimum Pyrkikodes from the Head of the Harbor down to Quaise.

This strain of red tide does not poison shellfish and make people sick the way Alexandrium tamarense, the paralytic shellfish poison red tide that closed shellfish beds from the Massachusetts/New Hampshire border down to Martha's Vineyard two years ago does. However, it does kill fish and possibly shellfish when, as it dies and decomposes, by uses up dissolved oxygen in the water. Last detected in Nantucket Harbor two years ago, Conant said that this bloom is actually visible as a reddish tint on the surface of the water on calm days with very little wind.

Conchlodimum Pyrkikodes, continued Conant, was first discovered in Cape & Islands waters in 1961 and identified as a red tide variant from the Caribbean that likely made it out to Nantucket waters in the ballast of boats. I