Fremont Sisters to Show Off Invention at Bill Nye's 'Lab Dash'

Courtesy of Chabot Space and Science Center

Oakland CA — Chabot Space & Science Center will open Bill Nye’s Climate Lab II: Lab Dash! to the public on Saturday, November 17 with new games and activities, new avatars and new ways to earn points.

Opening Day visitors will be among the first to test the game LabDash!, and submit inventions in the Green Machine Design Challenge.

Showcasing the new LabDash! game, the Center will hold an all-day “Dash to the Lab” starting at 10 a.m., continuing throughout the day until 4 p.m. Dash to the Lab celebrates imagination and inventions as visitors don their Climate Agent lab coats and collect codes to unlock the Mission Briefcase and receive a prize, along with blueprints for additional activities and entry into a raffle.

The most participatory feature of the Lab is the Green Machine Design Challenge, which invites visitors to invent their own apparatuses designed to reduce carbon in the atmosphere.

Visitors of all ages can sketch their ideas at the Green Machine Invention Station and submit them for consideration by the Climate Lab Green Machine Design Team which will select winning designs to display.

A select number of drawings will be fabricated as 3D models by artisans and metal fabricators. These winning designs will be added to the exhibit in an ongoing rotating display over the lifetime of the exhibit.

Visitors can also mail their drawings to the Center for consideration.

High school student inventors, Jun Jie “Jack” Li, a sophomore at Oakland Tech High School, and sisters Katie and Cynthia Wu, from Fremont’s American High School, will be on hand at the Saturday Opening from 1:15 p.m. – 1:45 p.m. to present their Green Machines along with the fabricators of their machines.

In 2011, Chabot Space & Science Center was awarded Association of Science-Technology Centers (ASTC) Roy L. Shafer Leading Edge Award for Visitor Experience for Bill Nye’s Climate Lab, recognizing the extraordinary accomplishment in an exhibit.

With major funding from The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Chabot has developed the next phase, Bill Nye’s Climate Lab II: LabDash!, enhancing the innovative, hands-on exhibition that educates visitors about the science of climate change, cultivating positive, workable solutions to the challenge of energy production on the planet.

According to Alexander Zwisser, Chabot’s Executive Director and CEO, "When it opened in 2010, Bill Nye's Climate Lab was quickly recognized by our community and by our peers in the science center and climate science fields as a groundbreaking exhibition focused on the planet's most urgent scientific challenge.

This Climate Lab II will continue to engage visitors in extraordinary ways, and by including the Green Machine Design Challenge, we are finding even more intensive ways for visitors to participate in a clean energy and sustainable future.”

Entrance to Bill Nye’s Climate Lab II is included with general admission, adult $15.95, youth (ages 3 - 12) $11.95. Admission also includes tickets for the planetarium shows. Visitors are encouraged to purchase admission in advance at the box office (510) 336-7373 or online at www.chabotspace.org.