The cannon boring experiment of Count Rumford, where eight kilograms of water were boiled by metal on metal friction, is investigated. Consideration of this dramatic demonstration can enrich classroom discussions of calorimetry, units of measure, elements, and thermodynamics. A section pertaining to use of the article in the classroom appears…

Many university and high school introductory physics courses include a laboratory portion where students follow a manual to conduct "cookbook" experiments. Here, we present an authentic research project for introductory physics students that focuses on kinematics that can be done outside a formal laboratory space. This experiment can be…

Dynamics of Machine Elements is a junior-level course in mechanical engineering that covers the kinematics (motion) and kinetics (causes of motion) of machine elements such as linkages, cams, and gear trains. This paper describes the results of adding a Rube Goldberg Machine Contest® project to the course to address student concerns over the lack…

The motions of Newton's cradle, consisting of several steel balls hanging side-by-side, have been analysed in terms of a sound pulse that travels via points of contact among the balls. This presupposes a focused energy beam. When the pulse reaches the fifth and final ball, the energy disperses and dislocates the ball with a trajectory equivalent…

The September 2015 paper "Bouncing Back from 'Deflategate'" is a very interesting article from a physics viewpoint. However, we doubt that the National Football League (NFL) officials will bounce footballs and measure the coefficient of restitution to verify that the footballs remain properly inflated. The release of a few pounds per…

On July 19, 1969, Senator Edward Kennedy drove his vehicle off a low bridge on Chappaquiddick Island in Massachusetts. The vehicle sank in 2.1 m of water, coming to rest on its roof. According to Kennedy's version of events, he managed to escape from the submerged vehicle without injury, but his female companion, Mary Jo Kopechne, drowned without…

A Unit Operations Laboratory (UOL) is fundamental to undergraduate chemical engineering education. This article discusses a new course structure for the University of Kansas UOL and details for three new experiments covering the fundamentals of vapor-liquid equilibrium, fluid mechanics, and kinetics. Students apply knowledge from these courses as…

This study examined perspectives of U.S. collegiate kinesiology department chairs (n = 54/144; 37.5% response rate) relative to: (a) opportunities and most enjoyable aspects of being a department chair, (b) challenges and least enjoyable aspects of being a department chair, and (c) perspectives on mentoring. The majority of participants enjoyed…

Purpose: This study explored the effect of whole-body vibration (WBV) using accelerations of 2.56 "g" to 7.68 "g" on lower-body detraining. Methods: All participants (N = 20) were trained using a lower-body resistance-training program for 30 min twice per week from Week 0 to Week 6. At the end of the program, they were randomly…

A mission statement can be understood as a declaration about the basic purpose of an organization. Given the low-consensus discipline of physical education/kinesiology (PEKN), and the limited research on its academic units' mission statements, the purpose of this research was to investigate the content of these statements and what discourses they…

The purpose of this article was to examine Kinesiology Doctoral Students' (DS) perspectives on issues related to their dissertation experiences. Using the Kinesiology Doctoral Student (KDS) survey, 121 current and past DS provided information on nine different aspects related to their dissertations. Specifically, these items consisted of measures…

Graphical representations are an important tool used to model abstract processes in fields such as chemistry. Successful interpretation of a graph involves a combination of mathematical expertise and discipline-specific content to reason about the relationship between the variables and to describe the phenomena represented. In this work, we…

KinSim is a research-grade, interactive, user-friendly, open-source, and visual software for kinetics modeling of environmental chemistry and other applications. Students without any computer-programming background and limited knowledge of environmental chemistry can use KinSim, which also includes multiple features and functionality dedicated to…

The debate on whether kinesiology students should undergo fitness testing is controversial. Some are strong proponents of fitness testing, while others are in strong opposition. As advocates for fitness testing among kinesiology majors, we aimed to assess the fitness levels of Exercise Science and Physical Education Teacher Education majors and…

Peak oxygen uptake (VO[subscript 2]) is internationally recognized as the criterion measure of youth aerobic fitness, but despite pediatric data being available for almost 80 years, its measurement and interpretation in relation to growth, maturation, and health remain controversial. The trainability of youth aerobic fitness continues to be hotly…