(upbeat synth music) What time is it?

It's science time!

♪ Oh, it's science, science, science time ♪ ♪ Let's all stop and just unwind ♪ ♪ One, two, three, four, here we go ♪ ♪ Learn so much, your brain explodes ♪ ♪ Lessons so cool, so fresh ♪ ♪ Feats 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, you best believe ♪ ♪ Explore and learn new things ♪ ♪ Come and join me, please ♪ (balloons popping) 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 spy science.

What time is it?

It's science time!

That's so cool.

I'm gonna be a detective when I grow up.

Oh!

Hey, everybody.

Welcome back to "DIY Science Time".

My name is Mister C, or should I say Detective C, and I'm so glad that you're here to be part of our science crew today.

(logo whips) Today, we're talking about spy science.

That's right, spy science.

The world is filled with amazing things, and there are cool secret... What?

Top secret?

I need to check this out.

(mysterious spy music) All right, let's check out what we have in this top secret envelope.

(mysterious spy music) (markers clattering) Three markers.

[Crowd] Ooh!

And a blank sheet of paper.

(Mister C laughs) Okay, well at least it's the primary colors of light.

Red, green, and blue.

That's kinda cool.

Hmm.

Well, it's a show about spies, so maybe I'll write a message to the crew, to invite them to come join me to do some science stuff today.

All right.

(mellow drum music) Whoa!

Hold on.

Do you see that?

Look at that.

(Mister C gasps) There's something in here.

What is this?

"Send the...

Send the crew... To..." Oh, oh.

(mellow mysterious music) "Send the crew to Berman Museum."

That's in Alabama.

That is such a cool place!

But I can't go there, because if I go there, everyone will recognize me.

So, I'm gonna send one of my crew members to the Berman Museum, so that they can check it out on my behalf, and they can go in and be a spy.

London!

Hey, Mister C. -Hey.

-What's up?

Hey, I've got a big question for you.

We just got a top secret message from someone at the Berman Museum, and they want someone to come down to the museum.

I mean, it says right here.

"Send the crew to Berman Museum."

Now, I can't go along, but I want you to go, so that you can take all of our friends with you, so that we can learn about what's going on down at the Berman Museum.

Are you willing to go undercover for me?

Of course, I'll go undercover.

That sounds amazing.

Awesome!

That's perfect.

Now, here's the thing.

When you get down there, we have a secret code.

And anytime you ask somebody what time is it, they should know, "It's science time!"

It's science time!

I wonder what'll look like as a human.

All right, let's do this, let's learn something, and let's have some fun sending London undercover.

So many missions, so little time I spy with my animated eyes, a list of materials you'll need for today's experiment.

You'll want to collect these spy materials.

An iron, lemon juice, purple grape juice, baking soda, paper, measuring cup, cotton swab, paintbrush, water... And don't forget to grab the ultimate spy journal, your science notebook.

(upbeat music) 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 gonna 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.

Today, I'm here at the Berman Museum, where we're going to learn more about spies and espionage.

If I go into the museum like this, everyone's going to recognize me from "DIY Science Time".

That's more like it!

Nobody's ever seen me like this before on the show, so I won't be recognized.

Let's go check out the museum!

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) Awesome!

Wow!

Look at the hidden camera in that handbag.

This is a copy of the Zimmermann telegram, and this book, titled "Riddle of the Sands", was published in 1903, and is one of the first examples of espionage in literature.

(upbeat music) Mister C set up a meeting with someone at the museum, but I'm not sure who they are.

So I've set up a special passcode to be sure we're speaking to the right person.

What time is it?

It's science time!

(bell dings) You're the person I was looking for!

I am, and we are so glad to have you here at the Berman Museum.

I'm glad to be here.

Well, have you ever wondered why the Berman Museum was chosen for you to learn about espionage?

Why?

Well, our founder, Farley Berman and his wife Germaine, were both spies during World War II.

-Awesome.

-Yeah!

So, Farley Berman was a spy for the United States, whereas his wife, Germaine, was a spy for the French Resistance.

They actually met while spying on each other.

Cool!

And here at the museum, we have lots of different artifacts, and quite a few that have to do with spying.

Were you ready to check out some really neat artifacts?

Yes!

All right, let's start with a book here.

Now this book looks pretty old, doesn't it?

-Yeah.

-It does.

And you know, it's a beautiful book.

We've got some French writing, but it also... Is a secret compartment.

Wow!

So here we have something that you could easily get information out from under whoever you're spying on.

It's a great tool to get things out and about.

Oh, yeah.

Now next, let's do some coding and ciphering.

Do you know the difference between the two?

Nope.

Well, the difference has to do with, if it's replacing one letter or number, or a whole word.

For example, you know who George Washington was, right?

Yeah.

The first president.

Exactly!

And he had a spy ring that was instrumental in the United States winning, or the colonies winning, and becoming the United States of America.

Awesome!

And George Washington even had his own code name.

And his code name was actually numbers, it was 711.

And so those three numbers together represented George Washington.

-Awesome!

-And so that's a code.

A cipher is when you change one letter for another.

One old cipher is called a Caesar cipher.

And what you would do, is you would pick whatever your key is.

In this case it was, it's a number four.

And we would just shift letters over.

So A would become a D. And in order for you to know what the cipher is, or to be able to find out the true message, you would actually have to know that number.

Now, this was a pretty easy cipher to break, 'cause there are only 26 options.

So we've come a long way.

But this was used even by Julius Caesar.

Thus, the name.

Awesome!

We also have these gorgeous rings here.

Now, these are beautiful rings.

Pretty ornate, right?

But...

They also open.

Did you know that in World War I, there was a spy ring of women from France and Britain, and they would get information out of occupied territory by writing down messages, on teeny little pieces of paper, and then hiding them within the ring.

And this was called the Alice Network.

Isn't that amazing?

What a great piece of women's history!

Exactly!

And women were used to get all kinds of information, because they underestimated women.

And so, they were perfect to be used as spies.

Yeah.

Check out this piece of paper right here.

Let's take a look at it.

What do you notice?

It's blank.

Or is it?

It looks blank, right?

But it is actually using, it has invisible ink on it.

-Ooh!

-Yes.

And it's something that George Washington and his spy ring actually used.

So, we're gonna set this down here.

The ink is made out of a base, which is baking soda.

Something that we all have in our kitchen, right?

Yep.

Then over here, we have isopropyl alcohol, or rubbing alcohol.

Again, something very easy to get at the store.

And turmeric, a spice.

A spy spice.

A spy spice.

I love that.

Now, what color is this?

It's kind of a yellow orange.

It is.

But it's actually what's called a base indicator, or an acid base indicator.

So what happens is, when this comes in contact with the base, like our baking soda, it's gonna change colors.

Let's move our paper here, and our solution here, our acid base indicator.

Don't want it really soppy wet, but let's see if anything shows up.

Okay.

[Aimee] There you go.

And and wipe it all the way over.

Do you notice anything yet?

[London] It says DIY Science Time!

That's right.

It's just like you said.

It's spy spice.

Thank you so much for having me, and teaching us all about the science of spying.

You are so welcome.

We appreciate you coming and visiting us at the Berman Museum, and we hope you come and visit us soon too.

We've learned so much today.

We need to get back to the show, and put this information in our science notebook.

Let's uncover some additional ways that we can send secret messages to our science crew anywhere they might be.

For this next one, I was doing some research, and I learned that lemon juice and heat can create an amazing secret message.

How does it work?

We'll talk about that in a second.

But first, let's actually do the writing.

So, you're gonna pour out a little bit of lemon juice into a container.

(mellow upbeat music) Or a lot of lemon juice.

(Mister C laughs) And then you're gonna grab yourself a cotton applicator.

You can use this, or a paintbrush.

Whatever you have available, that'll work.

You're gonna dip it into the lemon juice... And then you're gonna write your message.

I'm just gonna write the word "lemon", so that I remember that we used lemon for this experiment.

And I'm going over it a couple of times, so that it is saturated into the paper.

And then just for fun, I'm going to make a little squiggly down here.

(mellow upbeat music) There we go.

(cotton swab rubbing) (Mister C laughs) That sound is amazing.

But here's my message.

"Lemon."

Lemon!

Now this message is eventually going to disappear.

Hopefully, we can't see it at all, but what's going to happen is, we're gonna let it dry for 10 to 15 minutes, and then we're going to apply heat.

Whew!

That was a long 15 minutes holding this paper like this.

But as you can see, the lemon juice has dried, and our message is invisible.

So, how do we bring it back to life, and how do we see it?

It's simple.

We apply heat.

And we're gonna do that by using an iron.

Now, this is where you're going to need an adult helper with you, because the iron is hot.

And I want you to be careful at home, working with you and your science crew.

So, here's the thing.

We're going to take the iron, and we're going to rub it across our message right now.

And then we're gonna see if something happens.

Are you ready?

Here we go.

(mellow upbeat music) Just gonna move gently across it the whole time, to see if something gets revealed.

(mellow upbeat music) Ooh!

I think I see something happening.

(mellow upbeat music) That is amazing!

The message literally has... (Mister C laughs) Look at that, that's so cool!

Look at that.

(message beeps) "Lemon."

Now, you wanna let your paper cool, 'cause it is rather warm.

But you can see here that the lemon is now visible on the paper.

See, lemon juice, it's an organic compound.

And it's made of carbon compounds as well.

When we apply the heat, the carbon compounds release, and then they oxidate with the oxygen in the air.

That's what creates this brown color.

Pretty cool, right?

That's awesome!

Hmm.

Now, you're probably wondering, what's this piece of paper over here?

Well, this paper here is actually a different type of paper.

This is regular printer paper, this is watercolor paper.

And I just wanted to see what it might do on this paper.

So we're changing the variable, from regular paper to watercolor paper.

Let's give it a try.

(mellow upbeat music) It's actually...

Looking at it, I think it's harder to actually see that there's anything on this paper too.

(mellow upbeat music) Oh, wow.

(mellow upbeat music) Whoa!

That is really cool.

I'm glad I did it a second time.

Not just on this paper, but also because I was taking, and I was ironing the paper a lot longer.

I think that is bringing out more of the carbon compounds, which is causing them to oxidize more, which is giving us a darker, more bold message.

So, we have these two here on different papers.

Give it a try.

Try using heat and some lemon juice, and give this experiment a go.

Send a secret message to a friend or even a foe.

(Mister C laughs) Remember that secret message Mister C revealed at the beginning of the show?

Let's talk about how it worked.

The white crayon is difficult to see against the white paper.

More importantly, it leaves a waxy residue on the paper fibers.

(catchy upbeat music) When you scribble over the secret message, the wax doesn't absorb the ink, which reveals the secret message you've written.

Give it a try, and share secret messages with your science crew.

(catchy upbeat music) Mister C, let's build our very own spy book.

Grab a used book, some glue, a paintbrush, a utility knife or scissors, and a parent for this activity.

Leave a few blank pages at the beginning.

Determine how big you'll want your hiding spot to be inside your book.

Let's use this as a guide.

Trace the object that will be hidden inside the book.

Be sure to leave a little bit of space around the edges, so that the item can fit easily.

Carefully cut the pages along the outline until your object fits into the hole.

(catchy upbeat music) Glue the inside and outside edges of the cut pages.

(catchy upbeat music) This will keep everything secure.

(catchy upbeat music) (object clatters) (Mister C gasps) Oh!

That is awesome!

Place your top secret gadget into the book, and save this read for a rainy day.

For our next activity, we're going to take our spy science to another level, and build in a little bit of math as we build a decoder.

That's right, we're building a decoder that uses our alphabet to be able to secretly send messages to anyone in the world.

So, how do we do it?

Well, it starts with a protractor.

(crowd gasps) This gadget here is a tool that mathematicians use, and lots of other professions as well, to measure angles.

This protractor allows us to measure angles from zero to 180 degrees.

But if we combine that, and we make two of them together, flip it upside down, and we have 360 degrees, or a circle.

So that's how we're gonna get started.

What we're going to do is, we're actually going to break our circle into 24 parts.

See, the alphabet has 26 letters.

But 26 divided into 360 doesn't give us a nice, pretty, even number.

In fact, it gives us decimals, and that's complicated to work with when we're trying to build a simple decoder.

So for our purposes, we're going to use 24 letters, which divides evenly into 360, which allows every one of our letters to have a space of 15 degrees.

(upbeat music) And 180.

And now, I'm going to connect the inside circle that I wasn't able to do with the protractor, I'm just gonna sketch it in.

Nice.

Perfect.

And I'm gonna grab a ruler, and I'm going to connect each line.

So I'm gonna start with 90 degrees, which is straight up and down.

I'm gonna connect that.

And I'm gonna go through the center.

So I'm gonna connect my dots, and I'm gonna try to hit the center dot as well, because that ensures that all my spaces are going to be even.

And then I'm going to go to the next one, and I'm just gonna make sure I'm over one, over one.

And connect.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) And our last one.

Look at that.

That is a thing of beauty.

A circle divided 24 times, each one of those is 15 degrees, and it gives us a perfect pattern to build our decoder.

Now that we have that, we have to decide how we're going to put our numbers in.

We're gonna put numbers and letters, and that's going to allow us to have our message, our secret message, either go in letters or numbers.

So we'll pick some random numbers, make a message, and then they'll connect to letters.

It's pretty cool.

I'm actually gonna use a green marker to put my numbers and my letters on, just so it has a different color than this.

And what we're going to do on the inside here, on the inside circle, I'm going to put the alphabet.

Now we have 26 letters, we're only gonna use 24.

(upbeat music) So I'm gonna just at the end, my Y and my Z, I'm just going to simply place them wherever I want.

Now, I'm gonna go back to the letter A, and I'm just going to write 1 through 24, so.

(upbeat music) So we need to make this so that it can move and it can spin easily.

So we're gonna cut both of these circles out, and then we're gonna tape them to a piece of card stock, that allows us to move this around really easily.

I'm gonna fold this ever so slightly.

I don't want to crease.

I'm gonna take my scissors, and I'm just gonna give it a nice pinch.

(upbeat music) (Mister C laughs) If your circle's not perfect, it's okay.

We'll fix it in a second.

(upbeat music) All right, so now we have our two pieces, and we're going to tape them onto this green paper.

You can tape or you can glue, whatever you prefer.

I'm using tape because I'm worried that the glue is going to make my paper get smushy.

(upbeat music) We're gonna cut the big circle out on the outside, and I'm just gonna give a little bit of green on the outside, just for looks, so it has a nice little feel to it.

So like a little border.

You don't have to, but I really enjoy that.

And now I'm gonna do the same thing with our smaller one.

Give it a nice little border.

Because I made it a little bit bigger, it's just gonna sit on top, and it's just gonna spin really nicely.

Now, I have these brads.

I'm gonna take a brad, I'm gonna push it through the center.

And now what I have to do, is I have to also get it lined up perfectly in this.

You can see all my lines are perfect.

So I'm gonna take this, I'm gonna push straight down, where I already popped the hole, and now I have my decoder.

Look at this thing!

It's perfect, it's beautiful.

And I love the green, it matches my shirt.

(Mister C laughs) Yes!

So, I'm gonna put a code onto the screen, and you'll be able to build one of these and decode it.

And don't worry, if you don't have a protractor at home, we have a template we've already made for you, so you can download it, and you can easily make your own decoder to share secret messages with friends and family.

But look, when you spin it, I'm gonna put it here so we can see it up top...

When you spin it, anytime I spin it, it matches up.

So what's really neat about this decoder, is every time you wanna send a message to a friend, if they have the same decoder, you can pick a unique key.

For example, if we just say that the unique key is 1, well, then we line up our letter A with 1.

But if we want the unique key to be 15, we bring our A to 15, and now everything has been shifted.

So for your friends and family to know what you're talking about, you have to give them the key.

So, this is a great and fun way to actually send messages to friends.

Give it a try.

This little decoder is such an easy build.

It also uses math and science to combine, which makes it just the perfect spy tool, right?

Ah, decoders!

No need to file this as top secret.

We had so much fun today.

So much fun, I forgot to take my notes.

(crowd gasps) Oh no!

(Linky laughs) Just kidding.

I used the invisible ink.

Let me reveal everything.

London's top secret visit to the Berman Museum was so fantastic.

The decoder, secret messages in books and rings, and the invisible ink, are all things you could try at home too.

It's so much fun being a spy!

Give it a try.

Try creating your own code, and share messages with your science crew.

What an amazing day learning about spy science.

London took us on an adventure to the Berman Museum in Alabama, where we met Aimee, and she showed us all sorts of cool gadgets that allow people to spy.

And that inspired us to do cool stuff here at the house, like using lemon juice to create messages that are heat activated, or building a decoder that has 24 keys, which will prevent anyone from breaking our secret codes.

And we have this book.

It's a safe.

And inside of the safe, there's a secret compartment where we can hide things.

Oh!

(Mister C laughs) That's where my magnifying glass has been.

I hid my magnifying glass in this book, which makes me think, I need to talk about this book.

It's the "DIY Science Time" notebook.

Hop online and download one.

This is a great place to keep all of your information when you're doing spy science.

What an awesome day.

I want you to keep learning, I want you to keep exploring, I want you to keep having fun, and I need you to remember that science is wherever you are.

Have fun, take care, and keep on spying.

(upbeat theme music) Thank you so much for coming... -You're not coming.

-(Aimee laughs) I think that's because the watercolor paper, well, it's designed not to absorb...

"Absoab."

"Absoab the watuh!"

Wow!

Look at the hidden camera in that handbag.

I messed it up.

But we're going to be using ela... (Mister C chuckles) (Mister C mumbling) Let's build a spy safe.

What's a spy space?

(Mister C laughs) I can't say that... ♪ Join the flow with science, science, science time ♪