Cluster 1
Number Theory and Discrete Math
In the final week of COSMOS, Cluster 1 continued to explore new topics every day. In our Discrete Math class, Prof. Bob Hingtgen continued to use simple ideas like equivalence classes to shatter our image of reality, through examples like the Vitali set and the Banach-Tarski paradox.
In addition to learning about these concepts, most of us have also wrapped up writing a longer paper (either expository or based on novel ideas) that expands on the ideas that we covered in our posters. By suggestion, many in our cluster have opted to put a QR code on their poster as a link to a longer, more in-depth paper. Not only did this save space on the poster, but it also gave us extra time to complete the paper (or at least some extra time to procrastinate). Additionally, in contrast to previous weeks, it seems that the chalk skipping trend has died down, as more and more people find different things to do (shocking, I know) in order to fill up free time. For example, many have been socializing over NFL news, cricket talk, and games like Tetris and Geoguesser. For a short period of time, the game Hay Day also took Cluster 1 by storm. Named the “Hay Fever,” many in our cluster fell victim to this game and started feverishly farming crops and collecting animal products, all the while debating the best strategies to make money and level up. But, unlike other Cluster 1 trends, the Hay Fever passed quickly and silently. Although the virtual world offers a plethora of things to do, Cluster 1 still finds many ways to have fun in the real world. One such example is the new trend of temporarily dying hair. Being the math cluster, and thus having access to (too much?) chalk, some have taken to using chalk dust and chalkboard erasers to dye their hair extravagant colors, while others watch the hair change color. Additionally, during cluster meetings and evening activities, Cluster 1 participates in two main activities — cricket and card games. Both have become very popular, with room 4322 continuing to be a hotspot for games like One Night Werewolf and Exploding Kittens. Many also head to OPERS in order to play cricket, which has become very competitive very fast. Following a questionable draw earlier this week, it remains to be seen which team will truly best the other. Sadly, as COSMOS is now over, there is no more cluster life to look forward to. But, our cluster continues to keep in touch so that we can still have fun as a group even when we aren’t in person. By: Advaith Mopuri |
Cluster 2
Nanochemistry and Nanotechnology
It's been an eventful final week so far in Cluster 2. We've mostly been having lectures in class — Prof. Shaowei Chen even had to go to his backup slides since we finished his main set! This week, we have been learning a lot about catalysts and their efficiency, as well as reviewing old topics like spectroscopy.
On Tuesday, our PM professor Roger Terrill got into a bike accident and thus was absent, so we had a library work day to either get started on or finish our group project, depending on whether we were procrastinating or not. (Most of us were procrastinating.) We had all sorts of interesting individual final presentations queued up for the afternoons of Thursday and Friday, like nanostars and flowers, gold nanorods, applications of nanoparticles in bioengineering, particle in a box theory, and more! We also looked forward to presenting the posters we made about our labs at the STEM Symposium on Friday. We're all making plans for reunions and setting up post-COSMOS communication channels, since we've all formed such a strong bond here. None of us want to leave! It's been such a great month learning nanochemistry and nanotechnology at COSMOS, and it's an experience none of us are likely to forget soon! By: Maya Sriram |
Cluster 3
Bugs and Bones: The Biodiversity and Ecology of Vertebrates and Invertebrates in the Monterey Bay Region
We in Cluster 3 can’t believe we are already in our final week of COSMOS!
Cluster 3 started off this week scrambling to get our final posters together. Prof. Andy Kulikowski was kind enough to help our groups analyze their data and create graphs relevant to their hypotheses. Even though there was still a lot of work left to do, our professor’s help allowed us to finish just in time for poster printing. Cluster 3 students also faced a roller coaster of emotions about the corpse flower in the UCSC Arboretum. The corpse flower is a unique plant because it only blooms once after a decade of life. Throughout the first few weeks of camp, we were all looking forward to possibly seeing the arboretum corpse flower bloom. However, over the weekend, we learned that the flower had died and would not bloom after all. We were all crushed. That’s why it was a surprise when we learned on Tuesday morning that the news had been wrong and the flower had bloomed after all! Our professor was able to take us in the morning to witness this unique event, and it was a lot of fun for everyone! On Wednesday morning, Prof. Gizelle Hurtado brought us out in the field to witness how mammalogists trap and collect data on small mammals. She showed us where they normally place traps, and demonstrated how to take measurements of the mice caught and attach tags to their ears. Although us students weren’t allowed to handle the animals ourselves due to safety reasons, it was still an interesting experience. It’s weird to think that COSMOS is already coming to an end. As we all go our separate ways, we will cherish the unique experiences we have had here such as our trip to see the corpse flower, our kayaking trip, and our frequent bug catching excursions that really made our time this month special. By: Leo Zhang |
Cluster 4
The Physics of Single-Atom-Thick Sheets
On Tuesday, Cluster 4 left our usual classroom, usually filled with a symphony of jubilant energy and jokes about any topic that crossed our minds, with a bittersweet taste in our mouths. We had finally arrived at the culmination of weeks of arduous late-night studying with friends —Prof. Aiming Yan had announced that this was her last lecture. As is usual with Cluster 4, we reacted collectively, letting out an almost comical “aww” of disappointment. And yet, this reaction was something more — the end was in sight, and we had barely started getting to know each other! Following our tried and true routine, we applauded after Prof. Yan’s final lecture, but instead of breaking into cheerful chit-chat, the small social science classroom where we had spent most of our days stood eerily quiet. The sounds of laptops closing and backpacks zipping echoed as we walked to the dining hall for lunch. During the short walk from our classroom to the dining hall, I looked up at the towering redwood trees above me, which cast massive shadows on the lawn, and reminisced on my beautiful memories with Cluster 4.
In this final week of COSMOS, Cluster 4 concluded our Guest Lecture Series with lectures from UCSC’s own Prof. Syzranov and UC Berkeley's Professor Dillon Wong. Prof. Syzranov, sporting a high-quality virtual background of Buckingham Palace (which many of us thought was real!), discussed theoretical physics, the math that dictates the laws of physics. Meanwhile, we worked tirelessly on our final projects, each of our topics advanced enough to be taught in a high-level collegiate course. We rehearsed our presentations in front of each other, giving each other valuable feedback, and always wanting the best for each other. But as the days go by, and as we practice even more for the final, none of us can ignore the clock — and with each day, more and more reminders of the end of camp loomed over us. After writing four articles for Macrocosm and editing countless more, I wanted to reflect on how unique Cluster 4 is. We started with a roar; by far, we were the most enthusiastic cluster, fostered by early and robust cluster bonding — and this bond and pride in our cluster flowed into the following weeks as we developed new inside jokes and traditions. No one could have asked for a better cluster. By: Julian Chen |
Cluster 5
Video Game Design: From Concept to Code
Though this week was the last of COSMOS, it was only the start of Cluster 5’s final projects. While most other clusters had started their posters and presentations in the first three weeks, with many of them even finishing by the third week, we did not begin our projects until this weekend. This is because, unlike all other clusters, we did not make formal, scripted posters and presentations — we made video games to show off at the symposium.
The rules for our projects were simple: we had to work in groups of three to five students, and we needed to create a game — any sort of game, in any genre, with any engine. This creative freedom was daunting at first, but by the end of class on Monday, we all had ideas we were excited about and confident in. Some students were creating visual novels in Ren’py, while others were programming gacha systems in Unity, and one group even created a first-person shooter game! We were pooling together all the art, design, writing, and programming skills that we had learned in our classes into these games. Overall, even through all the disagreements over story plots, struggles with collaborative coding on GitHub, and frustration over debugging and playtesting, we enjoyed working together on the projects. Though our time together as Cluster 5 was brief, a mere 28 days, we have created deep bonds and friendships with each other through the games we made and the times we shared in class. It was the moments like ruining the sanctity of the points system, obsessing over Hatsune Beeku, staying up late to finish Melon Jam, and giving microtalks about our hyperfixations that brought us closer together. Though many of us are excited to go back home, see our families, and have our own bedrooms and showers again, we are also bittersweet about parting from all our new friends. Luckily, we will still have the Discord server we have been using for the last four weeks, which we can use to stay in contact with each other. Furthermore, with all these new connections, we can continue to collaborate on games and other creative projects. We are confident that the friendships we made here will last even beyond COSMOS, following us into our future high school and college years. This experience has truly inspired us Cluster 5 students, and we will never forget it. By: Aadya Sharma |
Cluster 6
Introduction to Smart and Sustainable Power
This week in Cluster 6, we’ve been occupied with electricity optimization, and the Electricity Strategy Game, set up by Prof. Yihsu Chen.
The goal of electricity optimization is to use a power plant as efficiently as possible, producing as much as you can with minimal cost. In class, we simulated this process through a solver extension in a spreadsheet with different values representing unknown variables to solve for, such as the peak power generation given several constraints. The solver ran an algorithm to solve for the unknown variables which benefited our power generation. The Electricity Strategy Game was designed to mimic a power company’s role in the energy market. Generated power is sold to companies that buy the energy, then sell it to the market (for instance, PG&E). The price of electricity is determined by independent system operators, which forecast demand and then set the price, which changes throughout the day. In our cluster, teams composed of 3-4 followed the same system, with teams representing firms, which bought electricity from producers and tried to sell them to maximize profits. Players had to balance costs of running facilities, cost of producing energy, carbon dioxide emissions, etc. Then, they placed bids on the price, and tried to profit. Although starting out was hard because many of us didn’t know what strategies to use, Prof. Chen emphasized that struggling was an important component of true learning. Eventually, we all got the hang of it. Collusion between firms is outlawed in the Electricity Strategy Game, but during mealtimes, we often sit together in the dining hall. It was nice to spend time with clustermates outside of the classroom one last time before COSMOS ended. By: Alexander Chang |
Cluster 7
Microbiology and Environmental Toxicology
The last week of COSMOS was a memorable, but obviously bittersweet one for Cluster 7. Last weekend, we had tons of fun at the COSMOS Olympics. Despite some early disappointments with the small events, we kept at it. Our hard work paid off, and we ended up third place overall! We won a game of ultimate frisbee against Cluster 11, tied with Cluster 10 in capture the flag, and — our most incredible accomplishment — won against Cluster 8 in tug of war. By the end of the day, we were all sore and exhausted, but we were proud of how well we performed.
Most of our final week in Microbiology consisted of lectures by guest speakers. On Monday, Dr. Carlos Diaz-Castillo surprised us with a speaker who turned out to be his own boss. Prof. Raquel Chamorro-Garcia spoke to us about the research conducted in her lab at UCSC, focusing on how environmental factors can contribute to metabolic disorders and the important role model organisms, such as mice, play in toxicology research. Prof. Chamorro-Garcia’s presentation was followed by a guest lecture on Tuesday given by Truman Natividad, one of the interns in the Chamorro-Garcia lab, who presented his research regarding how microplastics can induce the formation of fat cells. On Wednesday, our very own CA, John, gave his lecture, “On Materials and Microbes,” explaining to us the research he does in Prof. Shaowei Chen’s lab, which focuses on the interface between nanomaterial sciences and microbiology. For the environmental toxicology part of our cluster, Prof. Weiss led us through our final lab, where we investigated the sensitivity of tiny little Daphnia (water fleas) to different concentrations of salt water, exploring Lethal Dose 50 (LD50) and its relation to toxicology. Despite running into a shortage of Daphnia, our cluster as a whole was able to collect a decent amount of data and began to analyze it on Tuesday. As COSMOS comes to a close, Cluster 7 is saying goodbye to the UCSC campus and to the great friends we made, with promises to keep in touch and treasure the memories we had together. We all agree that the four weeks we experienced at COSMOS were some of the best ones we’ve ever had, and we are grateful for the opportunity to attend such an informative program, meet such incredible and talented people in it, learn from our amazing mentors, and create friendships and memories that will last a lifetime. By: Helena Spydell and Conner Feng |
Cluster 8
Wonders of the Ocean: From Bioluminescence to Marine Mammals
With the inevitable end of COSMOS looming over our shoulders, Cluster 8 tenaciously pressed forward with their microscopic projects! Our microbiological endeavors were hampered by time constraints, since we crammed 3 hours of work into 1 hour and 30 minutes. Despite the stress-inducing time limitations, Cluster 8 accomplished a lot! In a miraculous turn of events, our Santa Cruz beach water bacteria cultures grew! Not only that, but our bioluminescent bacteria inoculates glow! After establishing our beach water bacteria cultures, we then worked to isolate DNA for bacteria identification. The first step was to drown our prokaryotic friends with buffer and subject them to intense, dizzying spins in the centrifuge! Because only true friends would force you into a machine that spins you at roughly 7,500 rotations per minute (RPM). This, we learned, was an essential and tedious part of isolating DNA because it separates cellular material from the DNA, allowing us to proceed with a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test. To relax after that arduous endeavor, our professors allowed us to exercise our artistic abilities with our bioluminescent inoculations! Cluster 8 drew playful designs on the back of four Lysogeny Broth (LB) agar plates. Everyone then outlined their drawings with bioluminescent bacteria. Maybe our drawings will come to life and bioluminesce if we are blessed with another miracle! All-in-all, it was a peaceful activity to conclude Cluster 8’s microbiology class.
Time for, you guessed it, another marine mammal field trip! After the scenic two-hour drive to the Marine Mammal Center that everybody slept through, Cluster 8 ventured behind the scenes to learn about the hospitalization and rescue efforts of marine mammals. Touring around the marine mammal hospital, we learned about the ramifications of human activity on marine life. For instance, walking through the pool aisles—like the rooms of each patient—we saw seals with large, deep cuts and patches of missing skin reportedly from being caught in abandoned fishing equipment. Besides seeing the feeding of injured animals, we also peered into the Marine Mammal Center’s labs! The lab is where veterinarians and technicians prepare medicine and process DNA samples, among various tasks. While our visit was relatively short, it was certainly interesting to observe the hard work that goes into conservation. As Cluster 8 bids farewell to COSMOS, the labs, lectures, and field excursions helped us break free from our shells and forge the precious memories and friendships we will cherish forever. By: Theonne Mendiola |
Cluster 9
The Building Blocks of Life: Molecules and Cells in Biology
Even though COSMOS is coming to an end, Cluster 9’s days are still packed with experiments and learning. We started the week by putting the final touches on our presentations, as well as regrowing some frozen, transformed bacteria and learning more about organogenesis, epigenetics, and cancer.
Additionally, we updated our cluster chant (just in time for Professor Zhu Wang’s Discovery Lecture) to “Sonic, hedgehog! Sonic, hedgehog! Sonic, hedgehog! Shh!”, paying homage to the often-referenced Sonic hedgehog (Shh) signaling pathway mentioned in Professor Wang’s lectures. We also basked in the glory of winning tug of war and the watermelon-eating contest at the weekend COSMOlympics, proudly flying a pink three-winged chicken on our banner. During the last few days of lecture and lab, we ran a Western blot on the proteins purified from our bacteria and finally found out whether our unknown bacteria were recombinant or not. We also took a trip to Prof. Wang’s lab, climbing the steps all the way to the top of Science Hill and then to the fourth floor of the building. As it dawned on us that we had finished our last lab experiment and lecture at COSMOS, the bittersweet feeling of departure washed over everyone. We all started arriving later and later to our cluster meeting times after breakfast and lunch, presumably due to wanting to drag out our time here and not at all because of our chronic tardiness. The friends we’ve made, the inside jokes we’ve created, and the amount of micropipetting we’ve done will stay with us long after COSMOS is over. Although we’re all ready to go back to our families, these four weeks have turned Cluster 9 into a family we’ll cherish too. Stay fine, Cluster 9, and keep in touch! By: Fiona Li |
Cluster 10
Semiconductor Materials and Device Engineering
As we approached our last week of COSMOS, Cluster 10 tried to savor our last moments together, while being kept busy with many last-minute tasks and learning. Monday 10 p.m. was the latest cutoff for the posters. There were six different groups working on various topics, such as quantum dots, solar cells, memristors, and others. While some groups sent theirs in ahead of time, others barely sent it 5 minutes before the deadline. In the end, everyone’s work was turned in, and more importantly, they were done. In preparation for the final poster display, each group went up and presented a 15 minute overview of their topic with the help of a slideshow.
As Prof. Nobby Kobayashi continued to talk about MOSFETs and their capacitors, Prof. Mike Oye decided to give us a midterm exam! Most of us were studying hard the night before, but the test didn’t actually turn out that bad. Our professor had good intentions to prepare us for the upcoming lab, the next day. The “lab” reviewed the fabrication process of a MOSFET transistor, in the form of Play-Doh! Each Play-Doh color represented a different material used in the process. As a class, we attempted to follow the steps together, simulating the transistor fabrication process. However, some were falling behind or jumping ahead, creating chaos in the classroom. We were still learning and having lots of fun though. Prof. Oye warned us that if this situation were to happen in real life, especially at Intel, we would be fired. Although he was only half joking, precision in the fabrication of semiconductors is very important. In the end, everyone eventually got their Play-Doh to a semi-decent-looking semiconductor wafer. For the final test, we cut across our MOSFET replicas to get a view of the cross-section to see if our transistors were application-worthy. Prof. Oye was the judge who inspected our cross sections one by one, pointing out the imperfections and assessing if they were suitable for the market. Although some had some imprecisions and were lacking accuracy, the classroom was supportive and filled with non-stopping “sheeshes.” It’s safe to say that this activity was a bonding and learning experience for us all. After (almost) four weeks of hard work, it was time to have some fun and start celebrating. Thanks to our RAs, we had a mini pizza party and took many photos at our last cluster meeting. Although everyone is sad to depart, we will all leave with the memories we’ve created, the knowledge we’ve obtained, and the friendships we’ve made. I hope we’ll be able to stay in touch, and maybe, we’ll bump into each other sometime in the future. Time flies by way too fast! Thank you, Cluster 10 for an amazing month at COSMOS! By: Hannah Chang |
Cluster 11
Feedback Control with Applications to Robotics
Wow! How did the time go by so quickly? We are already in the last week of the program. We were sad that this fun and memorable program is coming to an end, but at the same time, we wanted to take full advantage of the time left.
We started Monday morning with a lecture from Alexis Teter about filtering algorithms. Previously, we had learned about process noise and disturbance, and on Monday, we learned how to combat that. We were fascinated to see the difference between the filtered data and unfiltered data! In the afternoon, students were excited to work on their robot car again. A few students were still finishing up building and wiring their robot. Many loved the ultrasonic sensor on the car robot, since it resembled a cat face! Those who finished making their car robot started programming it to accomplish different tasks, such as line following and obstacle avoidance. Students were working hard, and the class time passed by very quickly. A few students even stayed back during rec time to continue working on their robot. After class, a few groups worked hard to finish their research poster due that night. Groups incorporated the feedback given by the CAs and professors into their poster. On Tuesday morning, we had a lecture from Prof. Abhishek Halder. We finished covering all the technical topics on Monday, so Prof. Halder gave us information about careers involving control systems. Many of us found it eye opening that there are so many diverse career paths available. There were applications of control in aerospace engineering, chemical engineering, robotics, and more! In the afternoon, half the class was able to go to the lab and test out their car robot with the infrared cameras. Students put three markers on their car to make it identifiable to the cameras. The goal was for the car to travel to the destination (marked by three markers) as fast as possible. Unfortunately, this did not work as expected. Many students stayed back in the lab to try to get their car to work. Prof. Ricardo Sanfelice and the co-instructors (Santiago Jiminez and Jake Nations) stayed even later in the lab to help debug the problem with the cars interacting with the Motive detection software. It was already Wednesday, and the week was going by fast! In the morning, we had a review session for all the topics we learned in the feedback control course. We brushed up our memory on previous topics and felt nostalgic when the professor mentioned things they had learned on Day 1. It was hard to believe that we had learned so much in only four weeks! In the afternoon, students went back down to the lab to test out their robots with the infrared cameras. Some students even tried to get their robot to follow a black line and avoid obstacles. Wednesday in the lab was a much greater success. |
The co-instructors were able to figure out why the cars weren’t working properly the previous day. Once the students’ car reached the destination, they were able to try different velocities and angles to make their car reach the destination faster. Students stayed back during the rec time to make their car even faster so they could win the race the next day!
On Thursday morning, we practiced giving presentations. In the afternoon, we raced our car robots! Students capped off the week with a presentation about their research project. This has been such a wonderful learning experience. I’d like to thank the professors and course assistants for teaching us so much and making our summer experience very enjoyable and memorable — one that will stay in our minds for quite some time. The connections and bonds we made here are unreplicatable, and for that, I also want to thank the COSMOS students. By: Sneha Narayan |
Cluster 12
Scattering and Diffraction of Materials
After three weeks of enjoyable time, we finally faced the end of our memorable journey at COSMOS as the final week began. Though we dedicated most of our time during the third week working on our final presentations, we were able to produce fruitful results, finishing early, and so, we were able to look forward to our last day at COSMOS free of stress.
On Monday afternoon,, we had the chance to visit UCSC’s Science and Engineering Library, which contains laboratories for various scientific fields such as material physics, organic chemistry, and inorganic chemistry. Other than the lectures, we also had a lot of enjoyable times during our cluster meetings. We played various social games such as Mafia and Truth or Dare. Though many seemed to enjoy these activities, this was a bittersweet moment — some showed their disappointment as it was almost time to bid farewell to each other. In our series of last lectures, we reviewed topics that we covered in a span of a month and wrote a thank-you letter to our teachers, who dedicated a whole month of their summer to teach us. Personally, I’d like to thank my teachers, as well as my course assistants for taking care of us and trying their best to let us have the best COSMOS experience. Throughout the last few weeks, we were able to change a lot from positive influences from the professors as well as those of us who were supporting each other regardless of our different clusters. Although many of us will “scatter” away throughout California after COSMOS, the memories and friendships we made along our 4-week journey will never be forgotten. By: Michael Lee |