Beckman: Made their first plates this week with different ratios of Cd(NO3)2, Fe(NO3)3, and Cr(NO3)3. They used a standard pattern to predetermine the locations of the iron standard spots to use consistently throughout the year. For the first plate, they used different ratios of the three solutions (1:1:1, 1:3:1, 3:1:1, and 1:1:3). For the second, they spotted the solutions separately, no mixing.
Poly: After analyzing results from last week they decided to use lower concentrations of the solutions, making it easier for the compounds to disperse. Planning to use a titanium oxide solution and an iron oxide solution first to make sure the setup is working. Last year they got good results from FeVO (only Fe worked best), so they may try to repeat this result and possibly TiVO to check the experimental set up.
San Marino: Blank team saw a lot of flaking on their Cu/Zn plate. No good results. The Fe control spot was also low & dark blue so something might be wrong with the plate. No new plates made this week, but plan to remake the Cu (II) nitrate plate from a few weeks ago that didn’t work due to copper wire exposed in the KOH solution.
Mayfield: Team JES got incredible results from their tests of plates 3 & 4 but this was likely in error as even areas with no spots had tall red bars. They will retest and compare to plate 5 next time. (Recap: Plate 3 is Fe & Ni layered with 3 min of Tesla coil between the layers, plate 4 was treated with Tesla coil before the Fe, and plate 5 was treated with the tesla coil after both layers).
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