Physical principles are involved in almost any aspect of cooking. Here we analyse the specific process of baking pizzas, deriving in simple terms the baking times for two different situations: for a brick oven in a pizzeria and a modern metallic oven at home. Our study is based on fundamental thermodynamic principles relevant to the cooking…

The "Saggi di naturali esperienze" was published in 1667 by one of the earliest scientific societies, the Accademia del Cimento. The book was a triumph for the ruling Medici family of Florence, and the commitment of the Accademia to experimentation helped the "Saggi" become the "laboratory manual" of the 18th century.…

We report on an experiment performed with a home-made flat-plate solar collector, carried out together with high-school students. To explain the experimental results, we propose a model that describes the heating process of the solar collector. The model accounts quantitatively for the experimental data. We suggest that solar-energy topics should…

In this article we describe an experimental learning path about electromagnetic induction which uses an Atwood machine where one of the two hanging bodies is a cylindrical magnet falling through a plexiglass guide, surrounded either by a coil or by a copper pipe. The first configuration (magnet falling across a coil) allows students to…

We report a laboratory activity, carried out along with high- and secondary-school students, that can be done to increase the interest of the young in scientific studies. Groups of selected students "adopted" experiments at physics research laboratories, under the guidance of university researchers. Subsequently, the students…

An activity called "Project Physics, a Classroom Without Walls" was started during the spring of 2003 at the amusement park in Mirabilandia (Italy). Many thousands of students from Italian middle and high schools are today participating in the initiative. Under the guidance of trained tutors, they perform physics experiments on some of…