VIRTUAL LABS
Peter Remyn
Palm Bay High School.
Ever wish you have your students do more in depth labs, labs where expensive
equipment, or hazardous materials are prohibited. With Virtual Labs you can do just that.
Imagine doing Restriction Enzyme Cleavage and Electrophoresis with your Biology
class. Or Millikan’s Oil Drop Experiment in chemistry. And in Physics, or Physical
Science you could do the Investigating the Properties of Alpha and Beta Particles Lab, or
the Making Sense of Density lab.
There are three Virtual Labs available. One in Biology, Chemistry, and
Physics/Physical Science. The Biology Virtual Lab has 20 experiments, the Chemistry
Virtual Lab has 30 experiments, and the Physics/Physical Science Virtual Lab has 55
experiments.
I hope you can take the time to check out this useful software. I believe this can help
us all be more effective and efficient in our teaching methods.
Below is a list of the experiments available in the Virtual Lab format:
BIOLOGY
1. Catalase action in living tissue
2. The effect of temperature on undissolved oxygen
3. Diffusion through a selectively permeable membrane
4. Osmosis through a selectively permeable membrane
5. Onion cell plasmolysis
6. Paper chromatography
7. Light-Dependent reactions
8. Cell respiration
9. Mitosis in plant cells
10. Comparing Mitosis in plant and animal cells
11. Restriction enzyme cleavage and electrophoresis
12. Bacterial Transformation-Ampicillin resistance
13. Estimating allele frequencies for one trait within a sample population
14. Testing an Ideal Hardy-Weinberg population
15. Selection against a deleterious allel
16. Examining plant stem structures
17. The influence of temperature on heart rate in Daphnia
18. Orientation behavior in Sowbugs
19. Courtship and breeding behavior in Drosophila melanogaster
20. A test of cardiovascular Fitness
CHEMISTRY
1. Acid-base titration
2. analysis of anions and cations
3. analysis of baking sofa
4. Atomic emission spectra
5. Atomic structure: Rutherford’s Experiment
6. Counting by measuring mass
7. Determination of the Universal Gas Constant
8. Determination of the unknown molecular mass using acid-base titration
9. Electrolysis
10. Enthalpy and Entropy
11. Electronic state energy levels
12. Heat of combustion of sugar
13. Heat of fusion of ice
14. Heats of reaction
15. Identification of Anions and Cations in solution
16. Investigation of gas pressure and mass
17. Ionization constants of weal acids
18. Millikan oil drop experiment
19. Names and formulas of ionic compounds
20. Oxidation-reduction reactions/titrations
21. Photoelectric effect
22. Precipitation reactions: Formation of solids
23. Pressure-Volume relationship for a gas
24. Qualitative Analysis
25. Real Gases vs. Ideal Gases
26. Temperature-Volume relationship for a Gas
27. The Specific Heat of a metal
28. Thomson Experiment
29. Two split Photon Emission
PHYSICS/PHYSICAL SCIENCE
1. Making sense of density
2. Investigation of gas pressure and mass
3. Pressure and volume of a gas
4. Pressure and temperature of a gas
5. Changes between solids and liquids
6. Changes between liquids and gas
7. Thomson and smaller parts of atoms
8. Rutherford and the nucleus
9. Elements and the periodic table
10. Density of solids and liquids
11. Creating chemical compounds
12. Names and formulas of ionic compounds
13. Describing chemical reactions
14. Using energy to observe chemical change
15. Boiling point elevation
16. Endothermic vs. Exothermic
17. Acid-Base reactions
18. Energy of a chemical reaction
19. Measuring Speed
20. Graphing motion
21. Acceleration
22. Forces
23. Measuring Friction: A sticky topic
24. Acceleration and friction
25. Gravity and free fall
26. Newton’s First Law
27. Newton’s Second Law
28. Newton’s Third Law
29. Conservation of Momentum
30. Floating Objects
31. Density and Buoyancy
32. The work of the Egyptians
33. Falling elevator
34. Thermal energy
35. Potential energy to Kinetic energy
36. Temperature and volume of a gas
37. Specific Heat
38. Blackbody radiation
39. Wave properties of light
40. Particle properties of light
41. Atomic emission of spectra
42. Plane mirror images
43. Convex mirror images
44. Looking at images
45. Ohm’s law
46. Circuit Diagram
47. Building Electrical Circuits
48. Making observation of our solar system
49. Tracking the phases of the moon
50. Measuring the orbital speed of the planets
51. How strong is gravity?
52. Why Pluto is not a planet