-(bright music) -What time is it?

It's "Science Time."

♪ Oh, it's science, science, science time ♪ ♪ Let's all stop, it's just sublime ♪ ♪ One, two, three, four, here we go ♪ ♪ Learn so much, our brain explodes ♪ ♪ Lessons so cool, so fresh ♪ ♪ Beats so big, you'll lose your breath ♪ ♪ Learning facts and real cool stuff ♪ ♪ Scream for more, can't get enough ♪ ♪ It's, it's Science Time ♪ ♪ It's fun, ya best believe it ♪ ♪ Explore and learn new things ♪ ♪ Come and join me please ♪ I'm Mister C, and this super smart group is my science crew.

Working together with my crew makes learning so much fun.

Actually, you should join us.

Let's give science a try with a simple DIY.

Today, we're learning about life cycles.

What time is it?

It's "Science Time."

Welcome back to "DIY Science Time."

My name's Mister C, and I'm so excited to have you here to be part of our science crew today.

(whip snaps) Today, we're talking about life cycles.

Every organism has a life cycle.

It's a series of changes an organism goes through during its life.

Organisms are born, they grow, they develop, and eventually they die, but it's part of the life cycle.

Organisms like you and I, we have a lifespan of 75 years or longer.

Organisms like orcas, well, they can live up to a century, or 100 years old.

And a teeny tiny house mouse, it has a lifespan of 18 months.

Then we have pets.

I have a pet here.

-This is my ferret, Pearl.

-(people cooing) Her lifespan is between five and seven years, and I enjoy every single moment of it.

We've had her since she's been a teeny, tiny, little baby, and now she's a little old lady.

(laughs) She's the best little organism on the planet.

Speaking of which, grab some materials, so that we can build something together and observe life cycles.

(upbeat music) Let us have a blooming good time today.

You'll need the following materials to grow some amazing plants, a pot or something to plant your seeds in, water, seeds, soil, lots of sunlight, and of course, your sprouting, STEM-tacular science notebook.

A science notebook is a tool that every scientist should have because it gives us a place to record all of our learning.

Taking notes and being organized allows us to be better scientists.

A science notebook allows us to go back and review all of the data and information we've gathered during our experiments.

Plus, it allows us to share results with other scientists who might be interested in learning more about what we've discovered.

Whenever you see the notebook pop up on the screen, like this, it's a reminder that this is a good place for us to jot down new information during the show.

I've already added a title and a list of materials for today's activity, but our crew is still going to have lots of information to collect and organize as we go through our experiments.

Most importantly, the more you use a science notebook, the better you'll get at taking notes and recording data.

If you don't have a science notebook already, download a copy of Mister C's science notebook from the website.

Check out my teeny tiny caterpillar friends.

I'm so excited.

We have baby caterpillars in the house.

-Woo, woo, woo.

-(dogs howling) These are such cool little critters.

I wanted to get some, so that I could show you guys the amazing world and lifecycle of butterflies.

See, butterflies like the ones I have here, these are the adults, and they lay eggs on things like plants.

And when an egg is laid, it takes a little while, but eventually, we have a little baby caterpillar crawling out of the egg, and they eat their eggshell, and then they're hunting around eating leaves.

Eventually, they eat so much food, they start to grow, and they molt their skin as they get bigger, and they molt multiple times, and finally, they go from a caterpillar into a chrysalis.

And this is its home as it metamorphosize into a butterfly.

See, this lifecycle is metamorphosis.

It's when one organism goes from one living being, like a caterpillar, into a different living being, like a butterfly.

(laughs) Isn't that amazing?

See, it's different than you and I.

We're born as babies, baby humans, and we grow up to be toddler humans, and then humans that are teens, and then adults, and then we reproduce and we have baby humans again.

But butterflies are a little different.

They lay eggs, which hatch caterpillars, which then turn into this chrysalis back into or into a butterfly.

That's amazing!

And what's really cool is you have an egg stage, you have the larva stage, this is the pupa, and this is the adult, and that is the lifecycle of a butterfly.

Butterflies can be found all around.

Go outside, explore.

What types of butterflies can you find in your neighborhood?

Monarch butterflies, swallowtails, painted lady butterflies, like these guys, aren't they awesome?

Go outside.

They're so much fun.

And maybe if you're lucky, they'll land right on your hand.

All organisms have a lifecycle.

They are born, they grow, they reproduce, and then they die.

Chickens, for example, lay eggs.

Eventually, those eggs hatch into baby chicks.

They grow up into adults, reproduce, and the cycle starts over.

Life cycles are important, because that's how life on our planet continues.

Did you know cicadas spend most of their lives underground as nymphs?

Cicada nymphs can live up to eight feet underground and feed off the sap of tree roots.

Periodical cicadas emerge every 13 or 17 years depending on the species.

Once they emerge, they molt their skin, transform into adults, and mate.

Males vibrate a membrane on the size of their bodies to create songs.

Some songs are sung as a group to mark their territory, and other songs are songs to find to mate.

Hey buddy, can you keep it down?

We're trying to do some science over here.

We're gonna let our butterflies go, so they can fly, and they can start the lifecycle all over outside.

All right, (gasps) that was awesome.

See ya, I know it's a good apple.

Oh, he's like, "No, I don't wanna go!"

Painted lady butterfly hanging out with Mister C. Hopefully you guys are getting that.

That's so cool.

The symmetrical wings...

I was just showing you the wings.

It's amazing that this was a caterpillar like a week ago.

It's metamorphosis.

Look how beautiful it is.

-(horn blowing) -Career connections.

My name is Dr. Megan Rua.

I'm an associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Wright State University.

I am a soil or environmental microbiologist, which means I use the tips and tricks of microbiology to answer questions that are important to ecology or the environment.

Microbiology is the study of microbes.

And actually, what a microbe is is a really important question, because the field doesn't really even agree.

So when we think about microbes, we think about bacteria or sometimes fungi.

We even think about viruses.

But it turns out, since viruses are their own living thing, some microbiologists will tell you those aren't microbes.

In my lab, we treat them as microbes.

So we actually study bacteria, fungi, and we've just added viruses to the mix, of the soil environment.

And we think about how those things interact with the plant to improve plant success.

And by that, we mean plant growth, plant reproduction.

Do they make those things better, or when they're acting as things like a mutualist, or do they make them worse when they're acting as things like a pathogen?

So here, we're entering the primary part -of the Wright State woods.

-(gentle music) All right, so this is a soil core.

There are various sizes, so this is a standard one for our lab.

And the way these work is that this is actually very sharp.

So, it's been cut almost like any sort of tool, and it goes straight into the ground, and then we pull soil from the ground that should be in standardized quantities and we'll put it in the Ziploc bag and then take it back into the lab to process it.

So from the soil, we directly will extract DNA.

We can also pull any roots that we might find in that soil.

This allows us to standardize our measurement, so it's the same no matter what.

I think the latest estimate is that within a teaspoon of soil, there's 1 billion bacteria, something like 400,000 feet of a fungal mycelia, just in a teaspoon, right?

And so what we have here is more than a teaspoon, and so there's this whole tiny microbial world existing below us that we don't really ever think about until we need it, right?

But there are lots of things in the soil we need.

So, penicillin comes from the soil, so there's lots of good things hiding in there.

One of the things that our lab really examines is the microbes that live on plant roots or in the soil close to plant roots and how those microbes influence the ability of that plant to grow.

Plants can be really tiny or they can be really big.

And if you're someone, a farmer, you want that really big plant, but you wanna do it in a way in which you're capitalizing on the environment at hand.

And so, we work to find those microbes that are gonna make those really big plants.

So the microbes we work with, or one of the microbes that we work with is called, is mycorrhiza.

So it's a German word.

Mycor means fungi.

Rhiza means root.

And when you put 'em together, it's exactly what it means, so it's fungi that live on the root.

And so, we use these really advanced molecular tools, but also really simple tools in which we dye those roots with a really common dye called trypan blue, which turns the fungi blue and leaves the roots sort of a light blue, and then we look in the microscope for those fungi.

So they stand out, they're usually really dark, and we examine those roots to see if there are more of those fungi on the big plants versus the little plants, and then try to tie those to things in the environment.

The greenhouse is one of the really great facilities we have here on campus.

And so they're a important facility that we use to grow plants that we then use for experiments.

And so Wright State still has its greenhouse, which is really great.

It's an essential part of campus.

So we use this space to grow experimental plants.

Those plants are, sometimes it's a short experiment, six weeks, other times it's a long experiment, two years.

And so, it's this nice facility that we can do that and then keep that away from our clean area.

So as a microbiologist, I don't want your contaminants, I wanna keep this as clean as possible, and so those plants can be downstairs.

They get natural sunlight.

Obviously, they get natural water, so they don't get rainwater, we have to hand water them, so it's a little bit protected, but really, that allows 'em to be in the environment in a natural way, but still experimental.

And so we keep that teaching collection going to allow it to really build up for the students.

I love being in the greenhouse, especially when it's cold.

'cause the greenhouse is warm.

It's one of my favorite things to be in there and watch the snow hit the ceiling.

Dandelions, aren't they just dandy?

And the ones in my yard, well, they're taking it over, but that's okay, 'cause we're here to talk about science.

And the science tells us that this plant is ready to spread its seeds.

Look at it.

Look at all these little white seeds!

with a little bit of help from kids, plants, and other organisms, these seeds will spread.

Wind will carry the seeds all over the yard, and when they land, they'll begin to germinate, and then they're going to grow another little dandelion, and that dandelion will flower and then eventually it's going to give off lots and lots of other seeds.

And with a little bit of help from people like me, we can help these little dandelions grow.

I know most people don't like dandelions, but I just love 'em, because they're a great way to illustrate lifecycles right in your yard.

You need some help, little fella.

All right, here we go.

(Mister C blowing and laughing) (upbeat music) When the lifecycle begins, offspring usually have some traits similar to their parents.

These are called inherited traits.

Some traits help organisms better survive and complete their own life cycles.

Traits like being able to change color, help organisms survive by keeping them hidden from predators.

Eyes that can turn in all directions, help organisms find food.

Or they may have ears strong enough that they can use them to see.

Some traits, like eye color, just make us all more fabulous.

Fruit flies are award-winning scientists.

Because of their short lifespan and abundance, fruit flies are often used as a model organism by science researchers.

Model organisms are non-human species studied by scientists to better understand biology.

The fruit fly, drosophila melanogaster, has played a starring role in research for over 100 years and helped scientists earn six Nobel prizes so far.

Let's sprout our own lima beans.

Whoa, that's something our crew at home really should try.

Grab some lima beans and allow them to soak overnight.

Wet a paper towel and place it into a bag you can seal.

Carefully, place the lima beans into the bag and then hang the bag in a warm place.

A few days later, you'll see your seeds sprouting.

You just grew a baby lima bean plant.

Seeds need water, oxygen, and the correct temperature in order to germinate.

Plants are very unique, because they reproduce by creating seeds.

This is a seed from a black walnut tree.

This tree grows up to be 100 feet tall, and this seed is about one inch in diameter.

It's amazing that something like this can grow into something so huge.

It's part of the lifecycle.

And then critters, like squirrels and other animals, like myself, we pick 'em up, and we transplant them to new ecosystems, and we can grow a new plant somewhere new.

Then we have plants like apples.

And I cut this apple and, whoop, the seed just fell out.

Look at that.

It's teeny tiny.

I mean, it's so small.

This little seed is going to grow up into a tree that's 30 feet tall, and it's gonna produce thousands of apples in its lifespan.

That's what's so cool, and that's what we're gonna do today.

We're going to take a teeny tiny little seed, and we're gonna plant it, and we're gonna grow a new plant.

We're gonna restart the lifecycle, so let's do it.

What I have here are these little soil pellets.

-(bright music) -These are peat pellets, and I'm going to place a whole bunch of them into this tray.

Now, you'll notice that these peat pellets have these little holes on the top.

What's gonna happen is when I add water to it, it's going to expand, and that's where we're gonna have access to the soil.

That's where we're gonna actually plant our plants, well, plant our seeds.

(bright music continues) -Now we're gonna take water -(water pouring) and eventually, each one of these little pods is going to puff up so we can put our plant seeds into the soil.

Now that we've let them absorb water, they're completely expanded.

They can't absorb any more water, so we're going to transfer them into this little plant starter.

What we're gonna do is we're gonna take each one of these and place it in here.

Nice.

Lemme just set that down.

And now we have our seed starters ready to plant some seeds.

We're gonna try two different types of seeds today, kale.

Wait until you see these seeds.

They are so small.

Oh, I dumped out way too many.

But look how little they are.

They're teeny tiny.

And these are gonna grow up to be amazing little plants.

So these have to get planted about a quarter inch down into the soil.

So I have my little skewer here I'm gonna use, and I'm gonna do half of these kale.

So I'm gonna try to put one, maybe two into each little pot.

And I'm gonna use my little skewer, or you can use a pencil, and I'm just gonna cover it gently.

And now I'm going to actually plant morning glories on the other side.

These need to be planted a half inch deep.

And the thing to remember with plant seeds is follow the directions for each specific plant.

(bright music continues) Cover these with soil.

There we go.

I'm gonna put my seeds away.

And now we're gonna put these into an area with lots of light and some warmth, and we're going to watch them grow.

And before you know it, we have plants!

Our seeds went from seeds to plants.

We have our kale here and our morning glory plants here.

I also labeled 'em so I could keep track of what's what.

But what's super cool is I had another kale plant growing, and look at what it's done.

It goes from this size here to this, and eventually, this will flower.

And when it flowers, it produces more seeds, like this.

-(seeds rattling) -(Mister C laughs) Then we plant those seeds, then it grows, it gets bigger, and it seeds or reproduces.

And then we plant 'em, and then they grow, and then it grows and reproduces.

And then we plant 'em, and it grows, and it grows and reproduces.

And we plant 'em and it grows, and it grows and reproduces, and that is the lifecycle.

Isn't that amazing?

Plants go through different life cycles.

Different plants go through different life cycles.

Organisms go through different life cycles.

It's awesome.

Get to planning, have some fun, explore life cycles in the sun.

Oh and, you can eat this stuff.

(inhales) (gentle music) ♪ Butterflies, butter butterflies ♪ ♪ Flying in the sky with the wind so high ♪ ♪ I said butterflies, caterpillars in the sky ♪ ♪ Start as one living creature and metamorphosized ♪ ♪ Metamorphosis, the change you'd undergo ♪ ♪ Yes, you know, caterpillars, watch 'em grow ♪ ♪ They eat so fast, but move so slow ♪ ♪ When you think of stages please think of four ♪ ♪ You've got egg, larva, pupa, adult ♪ ♪ So let's explore ♪ ♪ The first stage, an egg, how its life begins ♪ ♪ Five days later, you're sitting there watchin' ♪ ♪ A caterpillar breaks out, what does it do ♪ ♪ It starts looking around and starts crawling at you ♪ ♪ When the larva stage, a caterpillar is what we see ♪ ♪ It's eating eggshells, plants, yes, and even leaves ♪ ♪ That's how it's gonna grow as it keeps chewin' ♪ ♪ With the teeny tiny munchin' teeth, that's what it's doin' ♪ ♪ Eating 200 times its weight ♪ ♪ That's great, make no mistake ♪ ♪ This little bitty creature ♪ ♪ Want to grow faster and fly away ♪ ♪ And when caterpillars grow, they molt the skin ♪ ♪ That means they shed their roll ♪ ♪ Yes, and the keep growin' ♪ ♪ And the last time it molts it's easy to tell ♪ ♪ It turns into a pupa inside a really hard shell ♪ ♪ During the pupa stage, inside the chrysalis ♪ ♪ Transforming from one organism into this ♪ ♪ Butterflies, butter butterflies ♪ ♪ Flying in the sky with the wind so high ♪ ♪ I said, butterflies, caterpillars in the sky ♪ ♪ Start as one living creature and metamorphosized ♪ ♪ After several weeks, a butterfly emerges ♪ ♪ Searching for a mate to start the cycle over ♪ ♪ But first, it pumps its wings and flies around the town ♪ ♪ Up and down, round, round ♪ ♪ Landing on the plants and on the ground ♪ ♪ Showing one off its symmetry, it's such a pretty thing ♪ ♪ Beautiful colors, two identical flapping wings ♪ ♪ So when it's thirsty, it has a straw-like tongue ♪ ♪ It starts sipping nectar from the plants ♪ ♪ Yum, yum, yum, yum ♪ ♪ But when is cold, it flies away towards Mexico ♪ ♪ By the equator where it's warm is where it wants to go ♪ ♪ Once it finds a mate, it's onto the next stage ♪ ♪ It's gonna reproduce and lay of few hundred eggs ♪ ♪ And soon you're gonna see my caterpillar head ♪ ♪ Little itty bitty, weeny caterpillar head ♪ ♪ Little itty bitty, teeny weeny ♪ ♪ Cutie, screamy, squirmy body ♪ ♪ Smiling, happy, cute, and crawling caterpillar head ♪ ♪ Butterflies, butter butterflies ♪ ♪ Flying in the sky with the wind so high ♪ ♪ I said butterflies, caterpillars in the sky ♪ ♪ Start as one living creature and metamorphosize ♪ ♪ Metamorphosis, the change it undergoes, ♪ ♪ Yes, you know, caterpillars, watch 'em grow ♪ ♪ They eat so fast but move so slow ♪ ♪ When you think of stages, please think of four ♪ ♪ You've got the egg, larva, pupa, adult ♪ ♪ So let's explore ♪ ♪ The egg, larva, pupa, adult ♪ ♪ Say the egg, larva, pupa, adult ♪ ♪ Egg, larva, pupa, adult ♪ ♪ Say the egg, larva, pupa, adult ♪ (gentle music continues) An organism, like a frog, is considered to be r-selection.

That's because frogs lay lots and lots of eggs, and the parents don't do much to ensure that the offspring survive.

By laying lots of eggs, there's a good probability that some offspring will survive, grow up, and be able to reproduce.

Other organisms, like elephants, are K-selection.

This means they produce less offspring that have a higher chance to survive and mature.

K-selection is more common in animals with a longer lifespan.

♪ Butterflies, butter butterflies ♪ ♪ Flying in the sky so high, caterpillars ♪ Oh, oh, well, oh, those caterpillars completely transformed into something new, butterflies.

Metamorphosis is magnificent.

It would be amazing to be programmed to transform into a new kind of robot that could fly.

And think about the big bushy plants that we grew from those teeny tiny seeds.

Living organisms are so fascinating.

They're born, they grow up, reproduce, and die.

It's how the lifecycle works, and it sure is fascinating.

Try planting some plants with your crew or observing the living creatures in your neck of the woods.

Plants, plants, plants, I really love plants.

In fact, I have this plant here.

It's called a spider plant.

And it's unique compared to the other plants that we planted.

The kale and morning glories, they started with seeds.

This one here, well this adult plant sends off a runner and produces this little baby plant.

This is called a spiderette.

We can take this spiderette, which is a replica of the big adult version, and we can plant it into another pot.

Then, it will grow up, create more runners, produce more spiderettes, and then the lifecycle of this plant is able to continue.

We better jot that down into our notebook.

If you haven't done so yet, hop online and download your DIY Science Time notebook.

It's a great place to store all the information from all the experiments and plants you're actually growing and taking care of.

What an amazing day.

Life cycles, things are born, they grow up, they mature and reproduce, and then they die, but everything on earth has a life cycle.

-From animals, to insects, -(bee buzzing) -to fruit, to plants, -(birds chirping) -to bears, -(bears grumbling) you name it, there's a lifecycle.

And, we have our caterpillars.

I love these things.

They're gonna metamorphosize.

(upbeat music) And here's another cycle you don't wanna forget.

Keep learning, keep exploring, keep having fun, and remember, science is wherever you are.

♪ It's science time ♪ To the garden!

You ready to have some fun today, little girl?

I love you so much.

It's like a jungle within my house.

Jungle within my house.

(laughs) Proboscis, and it (blubbering).

Continues to evolve, and it, (blubbering).

This organism, (lips flapping).

We talked about butterflies turning into beautiful... (Mister C mumbling indistinctly) And here's another (blubbering).