Team: 20
School: New Mexico Military Institute
Area of Science: Environmental Science
Interim:
Problem Definition: Ozone layer is significant for organism in Earth such as human since it protects them from treacherous ultraviolet (UV) ray coming from the Sun. Ultraviolet ray has both pros and cons of human; however, it heavily affects in negative way because it contains radiation that causes various long-term problems. For example, ozone depletion causes three major health problems on human which are skin cancer, eye problems, and low immune system. Exposure to UV rays can cause aging of the skin that leads to wrinkles and leathery skins, ultimately leading to the skin cancer. In terms of the eye problems, UV ray can impair human eyes’ visions and harm tissues in eyes such as cataracts. Lastly, UV ray can weaken humans' immune system which means vaccines will become less effective, easily catching viruses. To summarize, ultraviolet (UV) ray from ozone depletion brings about numerous harmful health problems to human which is a significant issue in our environment.
Problem Solution: Ozone depletion is caused by halon and CFC. So, it is important to decrease the amount of halon and CFC from being emitted. The correct recycling of fire extinguisher and aerosol products are important, since it directly emits lots of halon or CFC. Check your refrigerators and fix any flaws. It is important to prevent excess amount of CFC being leaked out of the refrigerators. Reduce the purchase of office products especially those contain methyl chloroform. Use lumber that wasn’t treated with methyl bromide. Try not to buy medicines that emits CFCs. Ask companies to correctly label how much CFC is emitted during the production for each product. We will compare the effect of excess amount of CFC and halon on ozone through NetLogo. Then, compare it when it was decreased. It will show how effective the solution was.
Progress to Date: Since this project requires lots of research, we have been focusing on finding useful resources for our project. We have worked together weekly offline (after school) and online (through Zoom and with the MS Word sharing feature) to share all of the information we could find on the effects of ozone depletion. Specifically, our research has been focused on how the depletion of ozone affects humans and animals. We have worked with our mentor and asked for advice on the scope of our project like whether or not we should include both animals and humans by sacrificing more details in our project. By collaborating with all of our teammates we were able to deduce that we are initially going to only include humans in our program and add more living things (animals, plants, etc.) if time allows. After narrowing down our research and resources, we were able to create a report for our project using NetLogo.
Expected Results: Our expected results would be to identify equipment that use CFC and as well as ones that emit massive amounts of halon being emitted into the air. With being able to target certain products that have these, it would slow down and even show results that benefit the people on earth. As well as protecting our Ozone, results of this can show reduce signs of UV radiation, health defects, and prolong our immune system. This will also help animals and the plantation of the earth, increasing the amount of plants, trees, which in return will benefit us. Animals being less of a liability and prolong life which is just as effective for the people on earth. With our anticipating expected results, we are hoping to achieve less radiation and health defects for the people and the environment; hopefully achieve something more effective in the long run.
Works Cited Page
UV effects on human body https://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancer-causes/radiation-exposure/uv-radiation.html
Data of Ozone holes https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/world-of-change/Ozone
What is ozone depletion? https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/ozone-hole-and-global-warming
What is UV radiation? https://www.fda.gov/radiation-emitting-products/tanning/ultraviolet-uv-radiation
How to prevent Ozone Depletion? http://najicherfanfoundation.org/en/component/k2/item/496-how-to-protect-the-ozone-layer
Health effects of UV radiation https://www.epa.gov/sunsafety/health-effects-uv-radiation
Mentor: Kaley Goatcher
Team Members:
Ryan Lee
Yoo Younggun
Jaejoon Lee
Sponsoring Teacher: Mark Stone