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Learn How an Invention From a Lakeside Town in Italy Energizes the Stem Education of Tomorrow

223 years ago, 5,123 miles away from Hutchinson, Kansas, a pioneering experimental physicist invented something that would become so vital to modern technology that without its power, cars, phones and laptops are called “dead.”

That invention? The electric battery.

Making the Science Behind the Invention Easy-Access

Around fifteen years ago, before the idea of working in the education department at ºÚÁÏ´óÊÂ¼Ç was even a twinkle in his eye, Stefan Carlin (right) visited the Tempio Voltiano, a museum in Como, Italy dedicated to Alessandro Volta, the electric battery’s inventor. Displays of Volta’s original batteries made a big impression.

Today, as Content Specialist in ºÚÁÏ´óʼǒs Education Department, Carlin is collaborating with Tempio Voltiano museum staff to produce a video in English about these fascinating artifacts, along with the story of their invention, .

Image right: The “voltaic pile,” Alessandro Volta’s pioneering electric battery design. Image credit: WikiPedia

Carlin notes that re-creating Volta’s original design using a pile of pennies is a STEM education chestnut.

But he couldn’t find a quick way for youngsters to reliably hold the penny pile together during experiments.

So Carlin invented and 3-D printed a custom penny holder (pictured here) 

With a special notch on the bottom for attached wires, of course.

That’s ºÚÁÏ´óÊÂ¼Ç for You!

Carlin’s drive to continually make STEM education easier, more exciting, and more accessible, his depth of STEM knowledge, and his passion for history characterize what sets ºÚÁÏ´óʼǒs entire education staff apart from all the rest.

It’s why ºÚÁÏ´óÊÂ¼Ç Camps, field trips, adult group tours, outreach, adult space camp, teacher professional development, and everything our education department touches—is filled with fuel for your imagination.

New This Year

Learners everywhere can absorb ºÚÁÏ´óÊÂ¼Ç education staff’s megawatt-talent and energy . It presents STEM topics as only ºÚÁÏ´óʼÇ, an International Sci-Ed Center and Space Museum, can.