Cogs: Connecting a Generation to Science for NASA's Virtual Lab

The Cogs Website supports the integration of NASA's Virtual Lab into middle and high school science classrooms.

You can help to connect a generation of students to science now.

Cogs: Connecting a Generation to Science

is an online resource center supporting teaching and learning with NASA's Virtual Lab. The Virtual Lab is a free software download, developed by scientists at the Beckman Institute, providing access to a variety of advanced microscopes and specimens requested by teachers. Read below for more details and access to animations and videos, before you install.

Install the Virtual Lab

Teach Students with the Virtual Lab

Share the Virtual Lab with other Teachers

Learn More About the Virtual Lab

The Virtual Lab is a suite of microscopes and multi-dimensional, high-resolution image datasets. Available here without cost for science classrooms, teachers, and students, Virtual Lab includes:

The Fluorescence (Light) Microscope (LM)

Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM)

Atomic Force Microscope (AFM)

Energy Dispersive Spectrometer (EDS)

The software allows you to access, select, and download from a range of specimens requested by science reachers. There are also tools that allow you and your students to annotate, measure and save images. The Virtual Lab can be used on computers without the purchase of any additional equipment or access to the Internet. The videos and animations that follow show you more...

Introduction to NASA's Virtual Lab

Look at the Specimens Available

Learn to Annotate Specimens

Use the Analysis Tool in the
Energy Dispersive Spectrometer (EDS)

These links take you to movies that may need some time to load. Once loaded you will have a firsthand view of the narrator walking you through how the tools work. Each file above has been made to be viewed in QuickTime version 7 or higher. If you want to use these in the classroom, load and play them once before the class to save time (they should load more quickly).