l1se Speaker grich speaks Im Beach eon. C7

iii The St art News Metro desk: (PSL) 337-5820, (Stuart) 221-4234 Circulation: (PSL) 930-5800, (Stuart) 221-4160

Saturday May 24, 1997

Obituaries Page 4 Television Page 8

Comics Page 9

Teen's· laser roject shines at fair l'\I M Cl I Y At 16, Martin County l ligh

Sd1ool sopl11111101e Christopher Cook thi11ks about thL th111 •s 11111st ll'L'llilgLrs think about:

< ·,11 s, rnlk·gl', 111mlilied laser interfernrnclns to de­lL'ct 1Jav1ly v,avL's < >h. and a budding computer busi­llL'ss

I h. 11sual. I h:1vc a 1101111:d l1k, I guess you could say,"

( '011 ~ said Sn 11111111,il he pl,1cul l11mth in the world in illl in­

lt.:111:111011:il science l:1i1 L·1111q1L·tition recently i11 I .ouis­villc, l ' v .. carni11g $I .::;oo .ind :111 invitation to com­pete 111 :111othcr i11tc111al11111:d L'11111pctitio11 in Taiv~,t11.

Cook's pro1c t 1s a laser interferometer. which is intended to det ct the presence of gravity waves: dis­turbances in th l.ibric of the universe caused by mas­sive events like L' plodrng stars. The waves are pre­dicted in Finst in\ theory of relativity but haven't been obscrvi:d.

Cook. who tion last year word vcrsio this vear.

rndc it to the international competi­ith a simpler if you can use the of I he project, refined his experiment

A11 intc1 l'crt 11cle1 is basically two perpendicula1 tubes th:1t e111i 1111crsecti11g lasers. If the point of' 111 tersect1011 1110 l's. that means something has dis­turbed till' lig t beams . If a11y other cause c.111 be

Please see FAIR on C4

r.:r.::1C11r--.-,.-.;-:---,~--,r-:":'.._,-- ............ ~~ Ch ri stop her Cook, 16, listens Friday as his for­mer teacher and

--- ..... assistant princi­pal at Hidden Oaks Middle School, Pat Schmoyer. de­scribes how proud she is of him . Photographer

JIM Ul11CK

AIR • CONTINUED FROM C1

ruled out. the disturbance could have been caused by a gravity wave.

Becau-e interferometers are sus­ceptible to local disturbances such

sound ,aw·. he used two, one in hi Palm Cit\ home, the other at hi· grandparents· house in Mel­bourne. That would make it Jess :ikel) that di~turbances registered on both device were caused b, lo-c;il condition. ·

Cook said h1: project is a small ,er ion of an installation being built bv the federal governmer1t, but with a twist. He added a third, " rtical tube with another laser p,)inting down through the other two beams. That, he said. would

ke into account fluctuations caused by the Earth's rotation.

'That's never been applied as far as I kno\\ ... Cook said. "It just ~ccmed to make sense to me ...

It doesn't to many others. One of the drawbacks to studying rarefied fields of physics is there •u. t aren't that many people around to talk shop with.

·· _ ·obodv at school I know un­ders tands ·my project,.. he said.

11 _people I get to talk to <tbout it is throu h e-mail. It 's really kind of frustrating to work that Wtl\ ...

Which brings up one of the ben­eltts of competitions such as the mternational science fair. Besides the chance of winning money or international travel , the fairs give students an opportunity to meet -;ome of the top scholars in their field, some Nobel Prize laureates, who judge th_e competition.

These guys that would judge ( ( ook) in his area were specialists in physics," said Pat Schmoyer, assistant princifal at Hidden Oaks Middle Schoo who coordinates the Martin County fair students. '·T hey just grill those kids inside ou t. ... They didn't hesitate to tear apart those projects."

Cook has more practical, and profitable, interests than applied theories of physics. A computer junkie since sixth grade, he's started a business installing com­puter networks, and consulting companies and individuals on their use.

His biggest project so far has been a 25-computer network at Redeemer Lutheran School, where his brother 1s in third grade.

·'It's probably the fastest net­work in Martin County," he said. 'T d have to say it's gone pretty well."

And it beats flipping burgers. "I can really charge much less,

but it's better than anything a teenager could do to get a job as far as economically," Cook said.

But it's still not enough for tui­tion at the schools he's dreaming of. Massachusetts Institute of Technology or California Institute of Technology. Money from com­petitions isn't enough either.

"The awards are phenomenal," he said. "But to get into the school I want to go to, I have to have a

~~~ sc=·h~o~lar~sl6l.l,·~·-' ~~~------~~-