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Just rumbling (or bumbling?) through the jungle New blog post up about real research funded by Disney on how elephants communicate and are being saved by bees! phdprincess.com/elephants-and-bees #bees #honeybee #honeybees #bumblebees #bumblebee #elephant #elephants #junglecruise #wildlife #wildlifeconservation #disneywildlife #disneywildlifeconservationfund #dwcf #disneyland #disneyworld #animalkingdom #dak #disneysanimalkingdom #pachyderm #pachyderms #junglecruiseskipper #kenya #nationalhoneybeeday #honeybeeday

Happy #nationalrollercoasterday! Check out my blog post on the physics of launch coasters! They use a little something called linear induction motors! Are you more a fan of California Screamin’ 😲 or the Incredicoaster 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦🎢? PhD life can have a lot of ups and downs, too and there’s no shame in that! I feel like I have the most kinetic energy when I’m writing literature reviews because reading all of the interesting articles builds up the potential knowledge I can put on the page. (I’m a huge fan of analogies in case you didn’t know) 😉 #rollercoaster #californiascreamin #incredicoaster #theincredibles #phdlife #gradstudentlife #physics #pintrading #nofilter #disneyblogger #disneylandap #pixarfest #incredibles2 #scienceofdisney #induction #electromagnetism #imagineering

Happy anniversary to the Haunted Mansion! I never liked this ride that much but learning more about the tricks that Imagineers used to make the effects inside made me appreciate it much more! Read on if you don’t mind some of the magic being ruined. The ghosts in the ballroom scene appear and disappear using the Pepper’s ghost trick. Underneath and above the doom buggy track are additional rooms painted black with animatronics of all of the ghosts. These rooms alternate between darkness and light. When the hidden areas are illuminated and lighter than the ballroom, the animatronics appear as if they are in the room that’s visible to guests. This works because there is a pane of glass between the visible room and the doom buggies. When the light on the animatronics in the hidden rooms reaches the glass, their reflection is sent at an angle back to the eyes of the guests! The same trick works if you’re sitting next to a window in a room that is brighter than the other side. You can even see this at work in the combination of my reflection in the glass on the Haunted Mansion attraction poster. Doombuggies.com has some excellent behind the scenes images if you’re interested! Do you know which other two Disney rides use this phenomenon? #hauntedmansion #scienceofdisney #disneyblogger #disneylandap #disneygram #apholder #physics #ghost #peppersghost #opticalillusion #mansion #neworleanssquare #999happyhaunts #halloween #disneyhalloween #nightmarebeforechristmas #ballroom #optics #imagineering #imagineer

Old or new? This building called the Tower Station or U-Drop Inn inspired Ramone’s body shop in Pixar’s Cars. I found it hilarious that there were Tesla charging stations in the parking lot of this old gas station. So I looked up some gas vs electric vehicle science. Cars and trucks contribute 24% of US greenhouse gas pollution (Scientific American, 2016) but switching to all electric vehicles doesn’t guarantee that we will reduce this number depending on where the electricity for charging those vehicles comes from. If the electricity comes from coal-burning power plants, then hybrid cars can actually be a better option. The environmental benefits of electric cars varies by state based on the primary source of electricity in the area. In California and Florida, more electricity is produced via solar and wind energy than in Minnesota where coal-burning is the primary source. China, Australia and South Africa have similar problems as Minnesota. But according to a 2018 article in WIRED examining data analyzed by the Union of Concerned Scientists, electric vehicles in the US look even more positive when you consider the bigger picture of moving away from coal-fueled electricity. Here’s hoping that if they ever make a Cars 4, they include some lessons for kids and parents about the benefits of renewable energy. #scienceofdisney #pixarfest #pixarscars #cars #electricity #electricvehicle #climatechange #carbonemissions #artdeco #disneypixar #disneyblogger #route66 #roadtrip #route66roadtrip #motherroad #scientist #scienceresearch #renewableenergy #gasstation #gas #pixargram #lightningmcqueen #flosv8cafe #carsland #dca #disneyapholder #disneyland #disneylandap #dlr

“They’re driving right by! They don’t even know what they’re missing!” - Lightning McQueen This might be my favorite roadside attraction on Route 66 because it inspired the Cadillac Range in Pixar’s Cars and at California Adventure! The several iterations of Cadillacs used in this art piece were very famous for their tailfins, which got progressively more dramatic in each version in the 1950s and 1960s. Car manufacturers tried to claim that they made the car more aerodynamic or could be used as sight lines when driving in reverse but they really had no benefit whatsoever. They did however make the cars more attractive to consumers who were obsessed with the style of jets and rockets from World War II and the beginning years of the space race. Unlike the tailfins on cars, the vertical protrusions on rockets help minimize air resistance and stabilize the flight path so the pilots can stay in control, just like feathers on an arrow! Having extra mass at the rear end of a rocket from the tailfins shifts the center of pressure to a lower point than the center of gravity which causes forces from lift and drag to keep the rocket going in its intended direction. Do you know which Cars character is based on the Cadillac with the most dramatic tailfins? If not, what kind of car would you most want to have? #route66 #cadillacranch #pixarcars #cars #lightningmcqueen #scienceofdisney #tailfin #rocketscience #itsnotrocketscience #cardesign #texas #disneybound #carsdisneybound #roadtrip #gradstudentlife

Had to celebrate #nationalchocolatechipcookieday with Jack-Jack’s favorite! How do you like your cookies? One of my favorite examples of scientific practices is baking, especially of chocolate chip cookies, because everyone desires slightly different results. The ratios of ingredients and directions of a cookie recipe are like a scientific procedure. Manipulating any (usually one at a time for good science) of these is choosing your independent variables to have a desired effect on some dependent variable such as chewiness or milk-dunkability (which obviously requires some more specific operationalization in order for it to be measured precisely several times). And just like in professional science, reviewing the results of previous experiments and drawing on domain knowledge (chemistry is especially relevant in baking) you can make informed hypotheses about how your cookies are going to turn out! Collecting and analyzing the data might be the best part of cookie experimentation but you must not forget the all important step of sharing your findings with others as well! I’ve learned that substituting all-purpose flour with bread flour makes me cookies much chewier! Have any other tips for how to achieve your preferred level of your dependent variable? #jackjack #cookienumnum #incredibles2 #cookies #chocolatechipcookies #chocolatechipcookie #scientificmethod #scicomm #scienceresearch #experiment #experimentation

Life is a highway! A month ago, I left Chicago and drove to LA on Route 66 to start a summer internship! Uprooting myself in the middle of grad school was scary initially because I don’t really have many role models who intended to go into industry after earning their PhD. I felt like my lack of passion for theoretical research and desire for a 9-5 schedule instead of the constant feeling of not working hard enough made me feel like a failure as an academic. I had several days where I was too anxious to leave the house because I was freaking out about whether I could or even needed to finish my PhD or whether my dream career in edtech was something I would actually be qualified for. But being back in my home state of California has been absolutely wonderful! The work that I’m doing is interesting and I feel the most motivated I’ve been in months. I’ve learned so much more about research positions outside of academia and better understand the doors that earning my PhD will open. Being able to go to Disneyland every week has probably helped too! To the #phdstudentsofinstagram and #disneygram communities, I want to say thank you for helping me feel like my anxieties are normal and nothing to be ashamed about. And if you are in the same boat as I was, know that if you have patience with yourself and reach out to your support system, you are capable of casting aside all of the doubts and turning your wildest fantasies into reality. If you read this far, thank you! Let me know what academic or non-academic dreams you have! #gradstudent #gradschool #gradschoollife #gradschoolprobs #phdlife #scicommunity #disneydepression #anxiety #mentalhealthawareness #selfconfidence #dreamscometrue #roadtrip #route66 #route66roadtrip #industryresearch #scienceresearch #lightningmcqueen #pixarscars #carsland #disneybound #carsdisneybound

Met a whole bunch of strangers like me at the #thatsfromdisneyland 90s party! More on the science of nostalgia later 😆 #janedisneybound #tarzan #disneygram #disneybound #90sdisney #90sgrunge #neverwornsomucheyelinerinmylife #disneybounding #disneylandap #disneylandapholder #disneythrifting #gorilla #gorillaz

Seeing spots! 🔴⚪️⚫️⚪️🔴 But really I was because I was starving and feeling a little faint waiting for a monte cristo at Cafe Orleans. ⚫️Seeing spots (aka phosphenes) is caused by many circumstances, such as lack of oxygen or glucose to the cells in the retina (which is the part of the eye connected to the visual cortex of the brain via the bundling of retinal ganglion cells into the optic nerve). Not eating depletes glucose reserves in cells. Drops in blood pressure such as when standing up quickly or when dehydrated result in low oxygen for cells. 🔴These conditions can cause retinal cells to fire abnormally, making your brain think there are spots on your vision. Much research is still being done to understand the biochemical mechanisms of how neurons are sensitive to lack of oxygen! Google Shimoda and Polak 2010 on hypoxia mechanisms for more info! ⚪️You can also see spots from applying pressure to your eyelids. This causes cell membranes to squish or stretch which activated certain ion channels. When these ion channels are activated, calcium ions or potassium ions flow across the membrane leading to depolarization. Depolarization leads to, you guessed it, a neural signal sent to the brain indicating the presence of spots. Look up Ranade, Syeda and Patapoutian 2015 for more detail! #minniewall #rockthedots #minniemouse #minniestyle #polkadots #disneystyle #disneywalls #disneygram #disneyblogger #science #neuroscience #retina #ionchannels #disneyap #apholder #disneylandap #classicminnie #minnieears #minniedotwall @minniedotwallpics

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