Making science "K'nex"tions

Photo: Diana Rogers, SLAC

Making science "K'nex"tions
Stanford Linear Accelerator Center librarian Lesley Wolf needed a creative idea for the next library display. Ten-year-old Connor Reed had lots of free time this summer and an extensive set of K'nex, the flexible equivalent of Lego.

The results of their collaboration are now on display in the library: a lime-green, blue, and orange model of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), complete with a rubber-band-powered injector that accelerates a smiley-faced ball dubbed "the happy electron."

A flag reading "Pief's portion" flies above the linear accelerator part of the model, "because he knows Pief built the linac," says Connor's mom, Ellie Lwin. She works for lab founder Wolfgang K. H. "Pief" Panofsky.

"This is how it shoots particles," Connor says, pulling back on the pinball-like handle and releasing it. He's used this rubber band technology before to make a pinball machine out of K'nex. The lime-green waves are the undulators, the magnets that force the electrons to make X-rays.

"I built it. I got a little help from my mom and Lesley," he says.

Lwin says her son was happy to delegate construction of the more monotonous parts while he napped.

After spending months in the hospital last school year, Connor liked learning that LCLS will look at the proteins in cell membranes to find ways to keep viruses out of our cells and let medicines in. His version has a virus getting through the cell membrane and bright green medicine perched on top, ready "to take away the virus."

Lwin said it took six or seven hours of trial and error to build the entire model and get the injector to roll the happy electron to the end of the machine. But Connor didn't get frustrated; he delved into solving the challenges, just like his mentor, Pief Panofsky. 

Heather Rock Woods