The goal of my project is to understand the overall architecture of a bird nest and to see how the architecture of the nest influences the strength. More specifically, I am looking into material orientation, or the inclination of materials, the diameter of materials, and the placement of materials within the nest. With this information, I will be able to gain greater insight into the construction process and to see if there are any aspects of the nest that the bird uses for the purpose of making nests stronger. In addition, understanding what makes a nest strong could be applied to man-made structures made of similar materials to help make those structures stronger as well. On the right, you can see my proposal for my project, which includes preliminary testing as well as my research plan. To learn more, look at my Grant proposal on the right. Having trouble viewing the pdf, click here.
Figure 1: The above picture is a picture of some of my nests stored in a box that I made for nest storage.
Figure 2: The above picture is a picture of the Vernier Structures and Materials Tester, which was used to measure nest strength.
Having trouble viewing my notes, click here.