| | Category | EA | P11 | The Science of Dominos |
| | Abstract | Earthquakes are very destructive and affect people’s lives greatly. I did |
| | this project so that people can prepare for earthquakes and be safe when |
| | an earthquake hits. I wanted to know if earthquakes have more of an |
| | effect on houses with denser bases. My hypothesis was that |
| | earthquakes are more destructive on houses with less dense bases. I |
| | investigated this problem by putting bricks (dense) and wood (not dense) |
| | on a treadmill with dominos on top of them. As I ran, dominos fell and I |
| | recorded how many dominos fell each trial. This is a simulation of an |
| | earthquake because I am causing vibrations as I run and the dominos |
| | represent houses. My results show that when comparing the number of |
| | dominos that fell on wood to the number of dominos that fell on bricks, the |
| | p-value was 98.9%. The density of a base is not significant in making a |
| | house safer in an earthquake. This project doesn’t contribute to the area I |
| | live in, but it could contribute to areas where earthquakes happen very |
| | often. They should build houses that are safer in the presence of an |
| | earthquake in these areas. |
| | Bibliography | Olsen, A (2008, June 18). Is there a whole lot of shaking going on? Make |
| | your own seismograph and find out!. Retrieved October 7, 2008, from |
| | Science Buddies Web site: http://sciencebuddies.org/science-fair- |
| | projects/project_ideas/Geo_p017.shtml?isb=cmlkOjY5NTExMCxzaWQ6MS |
| | xwOjEsaWE6R2Vv&fave=no&from=TSWWatson, J (2006, October). Fixing |
| | the cracks in disaster mitigation. Australian Academy of Science, 88, |
| | Retrieved October 7, 2008, from |
| | http://www.science.org.au/nova/088/088key.htm |