April 30, 2010
By Robin Donovan

Fourth and fifth grade Webelos Scouts, the highest level of Cub Scouts, toured scanning tunneling microscope labs and learned what it means to be a physicist with Dr. Art Smith, NQPI’s director, on April 12th.

The scouts toured Smith’s scanning tunneling microscope (STM) labs and learned about the day-to-day life of a physicist while completing the requirements for a scientist pin. Physicists might travel the world or even cure cancer while studying the world at the nanoscale, Smith explained.

One nanometer is about a millionth of the size of a pinhead and “contains more exotic phenomena than you can imagine,” Smith said. The boys were intrigued by the size of the STMs used by researchers to view individual atoms, comparing the sound of the cryogenic vacuum pumping equipment to a washing machine.

The boys are members of a pack in Athens and are preparing for graduation into Boy Scouts.