Products
Essential Physics
Essential Physics has been designed from the "ground up" to be an integrated curriculum: textbook; full-featured e-book; hands-on investigations; customized equipment; and educator resources. The e-book contains rich multimedia content, including embedded animations, videos, investigations, and interactive simulations. Investigations are at the core of the curriculum; customized yet affordable laboratory equipment has been designed as an integral part of the curriculum. |
Interactive Simulations
Difficult physical concepts are simulated within the e-book (and other electronic curricular resources) creating powerful interactive tools for education. Students learn about vector addition by drawing vectors with their mouse. They learn about sound, interference, and beats by generating sound waves of different frequencies, amplitudes, and phases. Important historical experiments, such as the Millikan oil drop experiment--requiring expensive equipment beyond the grasp of most high schools--are simulated for students to gain a conceptual understanding of the underlying physics. Under the hood, we use cutting-edge yet flexible tools such as LabVIEW and the HTML5 canvas element to create the interactive simulations. |
ErgoBot
The ErgoBot is an interactive piece of laboratory equipment designed to give students an intuitive understanding of the equations of motion, energy, power, and force. The ErgoBot can be controlled by a computer running custom interactive software under LabVIEW--or by moving it by hand. The motion of the ErgoBot is plotted in real-time on the computer, providing an immediate connection between the physical motion and the concepts of position, speed, and acceleration. The ErgoBot is also suitable for more advanced technology projects in robotics, such as programming it to run a maze. |
ErgoDAQ
The ErgoDAQ is a data acquisition interface between various pieces of laboratory equipment and a laptop computer running LabVIEW. Students plug into the ErgoDAQ a wide range of equipment--the ErgoBot, sensors, ErgOscillator, voltage source, temperature probe, or sound device--and receive the data directly into their laptop. No more installing software drivers, data acquisition software, graphing programs, statistical packages, and the like--all the equipment in the Essential Physics curriculum will work together out-of-the-box. |