Questions and Answers

 

1. What was the major objective of your project and what was your plan to achieve it? 

The objective of this project was to see which type of fabric prevents mosquito bites and apply it to the world problem of mosquito-borne diseases. To achieve this, I used a needle to mimic a mosquito’s proboscis and poked it into different fabrics to figure out which fabrics could withstand the needle.

    a. Was that goal the result of any specific situation, experience, or problem you encountered?

This project was the result of me wanting to find solutions for the pain people experience from getting mosquito bites and the issue of mosquito-borne diseases affecting people in developing countries. I was thinking about solutions for repelling mosquitoes once, and I came up with the idea for this project.

    b. Were you trying to solve a problem, answer a question, or test a hypothesis?

I was trying to find the answer to the question of “Which type of fabric prevents mosquito bites the best?” I realized that through answering this question, I could connect my answers to the problem of mosquito-borne diseases.

2. What were the major tasks you had to perform in order to complete your project?

In this project, a major part of this project was deciding which fabrics I should test. I knew I shouldn’t test expensive designer fabrics because people in developing countries, where mosquito-borne diseases are common, aren’t wearing those types of fabrics, so I decided to stick with fabrics that are cheaper and more common. I also decided to test denim because it is common for people in developing countries to wear jeans. Another major part of this project was figuring out how to measure the strength of the fabric against mosquito bites. Instead of simply seeing if the needle could or couldn’t go through the fabric, I decided to measure how much force, in newtons, it took for the needle to go through the fabric. These findings helped me dig deeper and helped me figure out which fabric could withstand mosquitoes the best, even if a mosquito could go through it.  

3. What is new or novel about your project?

When I was making a list of possible project ideas, I thought about testing if mosquitoes could go through certain fabrics. I thought about using real mosquitoes, but it was wintertime, and I figured there wouldn’t be many mosquitoes around. When I showed my science teacher my list of possible project ideas, I said that I probably wouldn't use this idea because it was winter. However, my science teacher found this idea intriguing and suggested we could find needles the size of a mosquito’s proboscis for this experiment. I never thought about using a different object to mimic an action that may be harder to achieve.

    a. Is there some aspect of your project's objective, or how you achieved it that you haven't done before?

Using a different object to recreate an inaccessible resource was something new for me. Using a very small needle, which imitated a mosquito's proboscis, was an approach that helped me so much in this project.

    b. Is your project's objective, or the way you implemented it, different from anything you have seen?

When looking through last year’s projects, I didn't see many projects that had a clear connection to worldwide issues.

    c. If you believe your work to be unique in some way, what research have you done to confirm that it is?

So far, I’ve seen at a study seeing if mosquitoes could bite through certain fabrics. However, this study involved real mosquitoes biting people, which is the opposite of my approach towards this project.

4. What was the most challenging part of completing your project?

The most challenging part of my project was finding the correct size of a mosquito proboscis. Different sources of information gave me different answers. Eventually, I came across a source saying mosquitoes generally have a proboscis between 40-100 micrometers. After browsing for needles this size, I came across needles with a width of 290 micrometers. This was the smallest size we could find that could easily be accessible to us, and I figured if a needle wider than a mosquito proboscis could go through fabric, a mosquito proboscis could also go through.

   a. What problems did you encounter, and how did you overcome them?

A problem I encountered was thinking of ways to go beyond simply seeing if a mosquito could go through a piece of fabric. At first, I was set on poking each needle through the fabric with 2 newtons of force. However, after discovering that all of the fabrics let the needle go through, I realized that it was slightly harder for the needle to go through certain fabrics. As a result, I decided to go more in depth and test the real durability of each fabric. By seeing how many newtons it took for the needle to go through each fabric, I got a deeper understanding of why it was slightly harder for the needle to go through certain fabrics. However, the most fascinating part was when I connected the photos of the fabrics under the microscope to the amount of newtons it took for the needle to go through, there were clear connections.

   b. What did you learn from overcoming these problems?

I learned that instead of aiming for a deeper analysis of the results is better than settling with the simplified version. It was so much more intriguing for there to be clear connections between the microscope photos and the newtons it took for the needle to go through than just realizing that the needle could make it through all of the fabrics.

5. If you were going to do this project again, are there any things you would do differently the next time?

Next time, I would try to find a more accurate measurement on a mosquito’s proboscis and do more background research on mosquitos in general. I would also try to take all the different variables into account. (spring scale height, force, fabric, needle width, etc.) In the end, I managed to do this with my new setup, but I wish I could’ve prepared that earlier.

6. Did working on this project give you any ideas for other projects? 

I might apply the method used in this experiment to a project where I could develop protective clothing for other animals to prevent harmful bugs from biting them.  

7. How did COVID-19 affect the completion of your project?

COVID-19 did not affect the completion of my project.