Uni High Students Research Heat Pipes as Part of POETS’ RET Curriculum Development

May 31, 2017


Kate Dahlke, a grad student judge (right), reviews the video a team of Uni High students made as part of their research project.

Although they might not have realized it, during the spring 2017 quarter, students in David Bergandine’s three chemistry classes at University Laboratory High School (Uni High) did research projects about heat pipes that were part materials engineering, part physics, and part chemistry, along with a lot of science. While testing twelve different variables about heat pipes, they not only gained a lot of general knowledge related to heat flow and heat transfer, but gained some very in-depth knowledge about the specific area they researched. Plus, in addition to learning what research is like, his students got to present their research at POETS' 2017 High School Student Research Symposium on May 23rd.


David Bergandine (right) discusses his heat pipes lesson with POETS' Jessica Perez.

Bergandines’s heat pipes research lesson came about as a result of his participation in the NSF-funded POETS’ (Center for Power Optimization of Electro-Thermal System) RET (Research Experience for Teachers) program the summer of 2016.  A key aspect of the RET was that he and three other local teachers were to develop curriculum during the summer which they would then implement during the school year. “Our goal,” Bergandine explains, “was to create some lessons that can be used at the middle school and high school level related to heat flow, heat transfer—heat problems that would perhaps show up in electronic circuitry or mechanical heat exchange.”

Bergandine says his students’ research this spring was a spinoff of his summer focus on models that involved electricity and resistance: “So we were looking at things like how much heat would develop in a circuit depending on the wire size…The idea was to maybe have a lesson involving students modeling some sort of mechanism that they would build and then test to see if there was a heat flow problem somewhere within the circuit or within the mechanism.”

The heat pipe lesson was born when Bergandine and Joe Muskin, POET’s Education Coordinator, visited a professor who showed them a heat pipe being used to cool electronic circuitry, and he thought, “Oh, that’s interesting. Maybe we can try to build one and see if it would work?”

Since later in the summer, he actually built a model heat pipe—and it worked—he decided that heat pipes had enough inherent variables to provide a high school research project. “It turns out there are about a dozen different things that could be varied that students could test,” he says. “So, we settled on that."


A student explains her team's research findings.

So as part of his curriculum development, Bergandine had his chemistry classes research relevant variables when designing a heat pipe, related to: “What are some things that are important to a heat pipe?”

First students developed a list of things they could vary. After observing and researching heat pipes, they came up with about a dozen factors that they could vary to test.

Next, Bergandine grouped his students based on their interests: which of the variables they were most interested in, and which of five skills needed to complete the project they were good at: designing the experiment, conducting the experimentation, explaining their process and results scientifically, making a poster, and making a video.


David Bergandine by some of the equipment students used, along with some of the pipes they tested.

“Then I tried to group people based on their interest in the topic, plus the skill set that they brought,” he explains. “I think we ended up creating fairly effective groups,” he says. There were twelve groups all total, four in each of his three classes.

Next, his students began testing a number of variables regarding heat pipes. These included length; width; diameter; conductivity of the material itself, depending on how much mass was present; whether a solid material would conduct better than a hollow pipe; different metals; different fluids on the inside; and using wicking materials on the inside. Bergandine indicates that his students also tested to see if the volume of liquid mattered, going from no liquid inside to 25%, 50%, 100%, to see if they still got a certain performance. His students also tried water versus ethanol, and then mixtures of water and ethanol.

Regarding the lesson's multidisciplinary nature, Bergandine calls it “really heavy-duty engineering in the sense that you have to build something that works, and that’s not always what a scientist does. But, on the other hand, we were also doing science in the sense that we were just discovering how materials behave."


Jessica Perez (right) awards some students their third-place certificate.

Also key to the lesson was the opportunity for students to present their research. The teams each created a poster and a video about their study, then presented them at an end-of-the-quarter poster session on campus on May 23, 2017. Because POETS is seeking to create short-term research opportunities and competitions for K-12 students, the poster session was also a competition. A group of POETS' graduate students served as judges, watching as each team of students presented their research via posters and videos, then judged the teams' work based on the quality of the research. Teams who won 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place got first pick of the numerous prizes that were available. However, every student received a certificate and got to choose a prize.


Left to right: Joe Muskin and Jessica Perez converse with David Bergandine about his students' research projects.

Jessica Perez, POETS’ Associate Director of Education and Inclusivity, explains how Bergandine’s project is related to the RET’s curriculum development goal, calling it, “Research to see what variables are important. And then knowing this information, David is going to figure out ‘How can I develop this into a piece of curriculum?’” She goes on to explain that the project isn’t a formal curriculum, but more like a research project or research prompt. “This is actually a part of the curriculum development,” she says. “The students helped do that because they are trying to figure out, ‘What are the important questions to ask?’ and ‘What things matter and what things don’t?’ 


POETS' Jessica Perez (left) listens as a team of students discuss their research.

POETS’ goal in fostering curriculum development through its RET, according to Perez, is “to give students the opportunity to do project-based learning. So, by them doing these sorts of things, they learn how to run experiments, how to ask the right questions. The hope is that by them engaging in this, maybe they will start getting interested in science and engineering. They’ll gain confidence through going through this process.”

She adds that in addition to the impact on the students themselves, it’s an opportunity to disseminate POETS research: “Additionally, it’s great from a RET perspective because that means that we are training RET teachers to bring POETS-related research into the classroom, and they are actually implementing it. The work that David Bergandine did during the summer is already impacting almost seventy different students. Their work is going to have an effect on even more people once the curriculum develops. So, that’s sort of the impact that we want.”


One of Bergandine's students presents his team's research on wick structures in heat pipes.

Bergandine adds that his students also learned a lot of basic knowledge about thermal properties and materials and heat flow and phase change, plus they became specialists in one of those areas.

"Well, they start off knowing virtually nothing about a topic, and then they end up knowing a lot about their own area, plus they know enough that they can easily interact with any of these other groups and quickly understand what it is that they were doing…As individuals, they become sort of specialists in one area...capable of talking about it, presenting it, and so on."


Gloria Sunderland by the research poster she designed.

One student who learned a lot through the project was Gloria Sunderland, a sophomore at Uni High, who indicates that her group did length of the pipe as their variable. While they had “sort of inconclusive results,”(she said their 10 cm. pipe “didn’t really work at all"), she acknowledges that, "We did see that as they got longer they tended to work more effectively."

She reports that, they “had to do a lot of research like the laws of thermodynamics and just heat pipes in general to see how they worked. Then after we figured that out, then we actually had to make them and actually heat them up with the ethanol in the pipes and then cap them so that there would be pressure."

Sunderland also gained some insights about research through the project: "I learned that you can build a lot of knowledge through research and through testing things in real life. Hands-on experience does help you learn and really internalize the knowledge that you’re working on."


Uni High student Harmen Alleyne (center) explains his findings on the effectiveness of metal heat pipes.

Another student, Harmen Alleyne, a sophomore at Uni High, says his group tested the relative effectiveness of different metals when constructing heat pipes. Their results? Alleyne says copper is the best and stainless steel is the worst in terms of conducting heat.

He also learned a lot about heat pipes through the project.

“When Mr. Bergandine started the project, we had no idea how to construct a heat pipe. He didn't tell us or anything. So, we had to research how to make a heat pipe, research what kind of working fluids we can use and which ones we should use and how the different metals react and why they do that. We had to just research almost everything for this project. So, throughout the entirety of the project, we learned almost all of the workings of a heat pipe."


Harmen Alleyne (just right of the poster) and his team of fellow Uni High student researchers.

Alleyne thought the project was fun and "a nice break because we have finals, and that's just studying, studying, studying. This took an entire quarter of work and spread out over a quarter it didnt feel like it was a pressing thing that we had to do for a final grade...It was just kind of a fun project where you got to be with your friends.”

According to Alleyne, a lot of cross-group collaboration also took place, as people learned vicariously through the research being conducted in other groups. “People were talking across groups about how they did certain things,” he admits. “Like maybe someone would ask, 'What working fluid are you using?' and someone would say, 'Oh, I'm using ethanol, because it has a lower boiling point than water,' and then the other person says, 'Oh, that makes sense. I should probably use that since my heat pipe is not working too well.’ So, things like that. I'm pretty sure everyone completed it. Several people didn't like that their heat pipes weren't working, but they asked around and eventually everyone got their heat pipe to work. If not, at least they figured out how the heat pipe should work.”


Tina Wayne exhibits some of the heat pipes they tested.

Another student, sophomore Tina Wayne, says she learned about heat pipes and how they conduct energy. She also learned how metals' ability to conduct heat is related to their molecular structure. “I learned how metals' valence electrons impact how they conduct heat. I learned why we use the things that we do within our house.” For example, she learned that copper pipes are used for the most part in houses and in electronics because they have the highest thermal conductivity, and that aluminum pipes are a close second, as are pure metals. “Pure metals should perform better due to having more free valence electrons versus alloys."

Wayne says that during the project, she learned about materials engineering, but some economics too: “My part was explaining why the heat pipe performed as it did. So, I went through a lot of different sites that both sold the different types of metals, and I went through research at different universities. So, I got to see the different type of academic standpoints versus economic standpoints and the viability of both."

Regarding copper being a good heat conductor, Wayne, agrees, but, based on the cost, suggests, “Or aluminum, which is a more affordable type of metal. But, the copper and aluminum were the best and steel and brass should not be used. Steel should definitely not be used as a heat pipe due to it being an alloy and having a low thermal conductivity.”

Wayne admits that she enjoyed the research. “I like doing research, she admits. “I had many questions going into the project, and through doing the research, I was able to answer my own questions and explain it in my own terms so that I could explain it to another person."


A Uni High student presents his team's research to Kate Dahlkem one of the POETS grad student judges.

The students weren’t the only ones who learned some things; Bergandine did too: “I learned that kids are fairly adaptable, and they’re naturally curious. If you give them objects that they can truly experiment with, they really will.” Something else he learned? “You can do some pretty significant scientific research with things that you could walk to the hardware store and buy.”

Grateful for the support and the impetus POETS provided, Bergandine says POETS helped “supply us with some materials and really get us started, because that’s a sort of barrier that many schools might have. You just need some of those materials and maybe a little bit of insight just to get you started on a project.”

He also hopes to “continue working with organizations like POETS and other groups on campus that would like to collaborate with us and give our students authentic research opportunities in the classroom, but also use those research opportunities to ensure that students are doing real science and learning what science is all about and not just learning about science."


Story & photographs by Elizabeth Innes, Communications Specialist.

For additional articles about POETS, see:

More: POETS, University Laboratory High School, 2017

Leon Dean, one of the grad student judges (center), discusses a team of students' research project with them.




SOLIDarity EXperiences (SOLIDEX) through the Eyes of Children

What do children aged 11-13 in two countries think about solidarity?
Full Story

Students launch ASL STEM Vocabulary App Company

Students launch ASL STEM Vocabulary App Company
Full Story

Innovation, Inspiration on display at the Undergraduate Research Symposium

Undergraduate Research Week took place April 23-29, 2023, and culminated Thursday, April 27, 2023
Full Story

What would you like to see – 3D printers? Magnets? Solar-powered racing cars? Robobrawl?

March 28, 2023
EOH occurs Friday, March 31, and Saturday, April 1, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily.
Full Story

Tour of Illinois’ Materials Research Lab through I-MRSEC sparks Franklin students’ interest in Materials Science

March 1, 2023
Students from the Champaign middle school had a tour of the Material Research Laboratory (MRL) in early February.
Full Story

Nobel Project’s End-of-Year Zoom Bash Recaps Learning

February 1, 2022
The STEM Illinois Nobel Project held a special, end-of-the-year Zoom event celebrating its participating students’ achievements.
Full Story

It’s not magic, it’s physics

January 26, 2022
In Franklin STEAM Academy, Musical Magnetism program makes STEM fun, approachable.
Full Story

Program prepares STEM educators to teach all students

November 30, 2021
This summer, a group of educators gathered to learn about engaging STEM activities they can do with their students.
Full Story

Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) program

November 11, 2021
Undergrads get a taste of research through I-MRSEC’s REU program.
Full Story

Goldstein’s Renaissance Engineering Summer Camp

November 1, 2021
Goldstein’s Renaissance Engineering Summer Camp Incorporates Art, Design, Mechatronics, and Mentoring
Full Story

TechTogether Chicago to Redefine the Hacker Stereotype

July 10, 2021
New workshops that can help inspire students to pursue careers in technology..
Full Story

Aerospace Engineering Launches Virtual Summer Camps to Pique Students’ Interest in Aero.

July 2, 2021
Design an aircraft then watch it soar after launching it with a huge rubber band. Build a Mars lander to safely transport a real egg, then test the contraption by dropping it from a second story window.
Full Story

Undergrads Experience Materials Science Research Courtesy of the I-MRSEC REU

June 16, 2021
Ten undergraduate students are spending the summer of 2021 discovering what research is like.
Full Story

MatSE Afterschool Academy

MatSE Afterschool Academy

June 14, 2021
MatSE Afterschool Academy to Introduce Students to Materials Science and Beyond.
Full Story

Taylor Tucker Embraces Multidisciplinary Interest

Taylor Tucker Embraces Multidisciplinary Interest

June 14, 2021
Taylor Tucker Embraces Multidisciplinary Interest While Researching Task Collaboration.
Full Story

Exposes Franklin Middle Schoolers to Science, CS

What Studying Engineering at Illinois is Like?

May 25, 2021
NSBE’s Michaela Horn Exposes Franklin Middle Schoolers to Science, CS, and What Studying Engineering at Illinois is Like.
Full Story

Jenny Saves a Convertible.

Children’s-Book-Writing Duo/

May 19, 2021
Convertibles and Thunderstorms—Children’s-Book-Writing Duo on Their Way Thanks to Illinois Training and Encouragement from Mentors.
Full Story

Improve Learning in Engineering

Improve Learning in Engineering

May 17, 2021
Liebenberg Espouses Mini-Projects to Engage Students Emotionally, Improve Learning in Engineering.
Full Story

Joshua Whitely makes an adjustment to the 3D Bioprinter during the demo.

BIOE435 Capstone Projects

May 12, 2021
BIOE435 Capstone Projects - BIOE Seniors Use Knowledge/Skills to Problem Solve.
Full Story

Elani and Gonzalo shine a UV light on a rose that has absorbed a solution that has made it fluorescent.

Illinois Scientists Shine a (UV) Light on Fluorescence

May 7, 2021
What is fluorescence? What causes it?
Full Story

Joshua Whitely makes an adjustment to the 3D Bioprinter during the demo.

HackIllinois 2021 “Rekindled Connections” With The Tech Community

May 5, 2021
Annual student hackathon HackIllinois with the aim of developing projects on current problems facing society.
Full Story

A Shane Mayer-Gawlik image of the Bridger Aurora, part of his Night Skies photography collection exhibited at the Art-Science Festival.

The Art-Science Festival

April 26, 2021
Illinois Art-Science Festival: Illuminating the Universe...from the Quantum World to the Cosmos.
Full Story

Joshua Whitely makes an adjustment to the 3D Bioprinter during the demo.

Illinois Engineering Seniors Prepared to Change the World

April 22, 2021
Ready. Set. Go! Illinois Engineering Seniors Prepared to Change the World.
Full Story

HML 2021 Virtual Health

HML 2021 Virtual Health

April 19, 2021
Make-a-Thon Gives Citizen Scientists a Shot at Making Their Health-Related Innovations a Reality.
Full Story

I-MRSEC’s Music Video

I-MRSEC’s Music Video

April 7, 2021
I-MRSEC’s Music Video for EOH ’21 Plugs Graphene, 2D Materials
Full Story

Health Make-a-Thon Orientation

HML 2021 Health Orientation

March 30, 2021
HML 2021 Health Make-a-Thon Orientation Prepares Finalists for Competition.
Full Story

Andrea Perry shows Franklin students how to take apart the magnetic drawing board they received in their kit

Musical Magnetism

March 25, 2021
Musical Magnetism: Encouraging Franklin Middle Schoolers to Express Science Via the Arts.
Full Story

Carmen Paquette street performing.

Love of Science

March 9, 2021
Paquette Conveys Her Love of Science, Dance to Franklin STEAM Students Via Musical Magnetism.
Full Stroy

An Engineering Exploration participant exhibits the tower they built as part of the engineering challenge related to Civil Engineering

Engineering Exploration

March 2, 2021
SWE’s Engineering Exploration Outreach Lives Up to Its Name.

ChiS&E’s Family STEM Day

ChiS&E’s Family STEM Day

February 23, 2021
Helps Chicago Youngsters Progress Along the STEM Pipeline Toward Engineering.

Kathny Walsh

Kathy Walsh

February 17, 2021
On Her First Foray into STEAM, Kathy Walsh Acquaints Franklin Students with Microscopy, Haiku.

ChiS&E student

ChiS&E CPS Students

January 19, 2021
Illinois Undergrads Encourage ChiS&E CPS Students Toward Possible Careers in Engineering.

I-MRSEC’s Music Video

CISTEME365 Provides Year-Round PD/Community

January 4, 2021
to Illinois Teachers in Support of Informal STEM Education Efforts to Underserved Students.