Spooky Science Take 2!

Nearly 300 primary school pupils from across Merseyside visited campus on Wednesday 23rd October 2019 to take part in some ‘spooky science’ activities led by Institute of Integrative Biology and School of Life Sciences in collaboration with World Museum Liverpool, the event used the Halloween theme to capture the imagination of the pupils and introduce them to some different areas of life sciences research.

During the workshops, pupils learnt about how animals adapt to their environment, communicate with each other and protect themselves from prey. Activities included exploring the anatomy of creepy-crawlies under microscopes, examining animal skulls from different species, discovering how bats see in the dark and understanding how the human body reacts to fear.

Zoology staff from the World Museum also brought along some taxidermy specimens, including a raven, for the pupils to interact with.

It was amazing to hear the enthusiasm from the pupils from the minute they entered the lab exclaiming wow this is what a real science lab is like! Followed by comments like science is great, I now want to be a scientist when I grow up.

The primary schools that took part were Banks Road, Litherland Moss, Pleasant Street, St Cuthbert’s, St Sebastian’s, Croxteth, St Nicholas and St Anne’s. Academic staff, PDRAs, PhD, masters and undergraduate students helped with running activities throughout the day.

Biochemists inspiring School of Medicine A-level Students at West Lancashire College

A-level students at the School of Medicine at West Lancashire College were inspired by talks from three biochemists Dr Jill Madine, Dr Nigel Jones and Professor Sonia Rocha during November and December 2019. Students learnt about the research carried out within our research groups relating to diseases and their underpinning mechanisms and the career paths each of us followed to reach our current positions. The students were some of the most attentive audience members we have ever spoken to asking questions that wouldn’t be out of place at large International Scientific Conferences. We hope to welcome some of the students for summer work experience placements in IIB.

Shrewsbury School Visit

46 year 12 pupils and 4 teachers from Shrewsbury School visited IIB on Wednesday 8^th January to discover the amazing technology and facilities we have within the institute. The day organised by Dr Jill Madine began with an unmissable opportunity to promote UG courses at Liverpool from Dr Andy Bates, School of Life Sciences. The pupils then learnt about a wide range of applications using the available technologies from Dr Marie Phelan, Dr Linda D’Amore, Dr Gareth Wright and Professor Pat Eyers. In the afternoon the students got to see the facilities up close and ask questions during tours of Barkla X-Ray laboratory of Biophysics, NMR Centre for Structural Biology and Centre for Genomic Research from PhD students Liam McCormick and Kangsa Amporndanai.

Healthy Heart=Healthy Brain at Museum of Science and Industry

On Thursday 24^th October Hannah Davies and Jill Madine represented University of Liverpool alongside Salford Institute for Dementia and Manchester University at Museum of Science and Industry to promote the work funded by Alzheimer’s Research UK in the North West and enhance public understanding of dementia. The theme for the day was healthy heart=healthy brain and involved a range of activities to promote ways that people can keep their heart and brain healthy alongside demonstrations of some of the research that is ongoing to try and fight dementia in our local area. Participants included children and their families, carers, people with dementia and their relatives with nearly 1,000 people thought to have attended the event.

Empowering girls from Holly Lodge Girls’ College and inspiring them to pursue scientific careers – 19th June 2019

As part of the volunteering undertaken by Dr Eva Caamano-Gutierrez with the charity The Girls’ Network we hosted a group of girls from Holly Lodge College and showed them how the real life of scientists looks like.

Our aim was to showcase the multidisciplinary and collaborative research that is undertaken in the institute while trying to encourage all the girls to pursue further education, especially in scientific fields.

Arriving just after 16:00 the groups of 19 girls and a few curious mentors arrived to the IIB and were greeted by Dr Jill Madine, Dr Marie Phelan and Dr Eva Caamano. They took all the girls to visit the Biochemistry labs, the NMR Centre for Metabolomics and the Bioinformatics office where both the CBF and the CGR are hosted. Our message was clear: we work on very cool projects, we only succeed working together as a team, our jobs are hard but flexible and overall science is really exciting!

The cherry on the cake was put on by our software developer Dr Tony McCabe who showcased a number of software solutions applied to life sciences that really brought the ‘wow’ factor into the conversation.

The girls were interested in multiple aspects discussed during the visit ranging from specifics of an academic career, including what is a PhD? Or do you get paid while doing one? To being surprised about the fact that Charities such as the British Heart Foundation fund many different research projects.

Following this visit we had our last mentoring session for the academic year. When the girls were asked what they think they can they achieve in their lives they all answer unison “Anything”.

We are doing something good here. Let’s keep them coming in future years!

Meet The Scientists: Engaging the next generation of researchers

‘Meet The Scientists’ celebrates the inter-disciplinary and collaborative approach that the IIB takes in conducting their research activities. The annual event showcases a selection of projects being undertaken across departments, and transforms complex subjects into interactive and engaging tasks for children. More than 1000 children and their parents from across Liverpool attended the event at World Museum on Saturday 27th April.

“As a vet, and PhD student examining Histoplasmosis at the human-animal interface, my interests in infectious disease and global health, influenced the subject of my stand. Different disease scenarios based on IIB research activities were presented to my audience. Children then decided which team of scientists, clinicians and community members were needed to stop the spread of disease (in the more engaging form of a puzzle). This activity highlighted the importance of inter-disciplinary teamwork to obtain a complete picture of infectious disease transmission dynamics, and the impacts of disease on affected communities worldwide. Children were particularly engaged when understanding their role in the global health picture, as students and as the future generation of scientists.

This was a fantastic opportunity for public engagement with an energetic and enthusiastic audience! Thank you to the organisers of this event and for the scientists who gave me permission to showcase their research.”

Tessa Cornell (Functional and Comparative Genomics)

“Despite being incredibly messy, making hundreds of pine cone bird feeders with the families was a lot of fun! At ‘Making a Home for Nature’, families could create bird feeders, bee houses and do some colouring. They could also take home various handouts, for other wildlife-friendly activities or to tick off which birds come to their feeders. I really enjoyed talking to lots of different people, ranging from young children to grandparents. I hope many have continued to enjoy the activity through watching the wildlife attracted to their gardens and the things they made.”

Emma Cartledge (Mammalian Behaviour & Evolution Group)

“It was so much fun to interact with children with all that enthusiasm and curiosity about learning and getting involved in what we did! They have all got very creative while making their viruses by putting a smiley face and a couple of googly eyes to make them less harmful than they are. At the end of the day, they brought their creation of a happy virus home with a little more awareness on what viruses are and what they may cause into.”

Dilem Shakir (Biochemistry)

“What a day! It was raining buckets outside and this seemed to drive a sheer endless stream of visitors to our ‘Skull Detective’ stand at the Liverpool World Museum, which felt a bit like Noah’s ark at times and kept me and volunteer helpers Kelly Ross and Dan busy for hours on end, with hardly time to catch our breath. Our hope was to inspire the current and next generation among the public to understand the needs of, and ultimately help preserve, the local wildlife around us in a friendly and fun environment. So it was encouraging and satisfying to experience the great curiosity and enthusiasm of children and adults alike about some of the wonders of the animal world. Our display of tracks and remains of common mammalian wildlife in Britain was greatly enhanced by exhibits provided by the friendly staff of the World Museum, including an enormous lower jaw of a juvenile sperm whale that attracted great attention. So would we do it again? I think so!”

Michael Berenbrink (Evolution, Ecology and Behaviour)

“It was a great experience participating in this year’s Meet the Scientist event. I enjoyed engaging with children about how bacteria can become superbugs by acquiring antimicrobial resistance genes from the environment. It was really rewarding to see how engaged both the children and their parents were to learn about the rising problem of antimicrobial resistant due to over use of antibiotics.”

Rebecca Bengtsson (Functional and Comparative Genomics)

We had a fantastic day at the museum. As always, it was great to see so many enthusiastic young people and their families enjoying science! The ball pit ‘discovery tank’ was hugely popular with young and old and really helped explain the challenges of drug discovery! It was challenging seeing so many people and explaining the concept properly, but I think everyone enjoyed it! A great team effort on a very busy Saturday!

Hannah Davies, James Torpey, Alana Maerivoet (Biochemistry)

Thanks also to Laura Winters for organising the event and undergraduate and visiting students for their help on the day.

Inspiring the next generation of NMR scientists during British Science Week

On Friday 15th March 10 chemistry A-Level students from Range High School visited the Institute for the annual Analytics Day held in the NMR Centre for Structural Biology organised by Dr Jill Madine and Dr Marie Phelan. This visit has been an annual event for the past several years which the students look forward to in order to gain enhanced understanding of NMR to help with their A-level courses and also provide an opportunity to chat with PhD students about what is involved in University life and academic research.  The students were given lectures on the basic applications of mass spectrometry and NMR from Stephen Moss (School of Physical Sciences) and Dr Marie Phelan. This was the followed by practical workshops where the students carried out chromatography and learnt to prepare and run NMR samples along with how to interpret the data.  Prior to their visit, as part of a school practical, they have made salicylic acid – a precursor for aspirin. We obtained these samples and collected NMR spectra of their products ready for analysis on the day.  This enabled them to establish how successful their synthesis had been and compare their results across the class, with previous years’ students (and to the teacher!). The pupils response at the end of the day was that they had learnt a lot and they can now ‘do’ NMR. Watch out for future budding NMR Nobel Prize Winners inspired during British Science Week in IIB!

Pupils were assisted on the day by Michelle Tan, Adika Sen (visiting interns in the NMR Centre), Zain Ghanameh (IACD), Jeremy Chazot (IACD) and James Torpey (IIB).

Halloween Science at the Institute of Integrative Biology

Post by Dr Jill Madine

On Wednesday 31^st October 2018 IIB and SoLS held the first Institute-wide School Engagement event within the Life Sciences Building. 82 children from Banks Road, Litherland Moss Primary Schools and home-schooled pupils from the local area attended the morning session with 128 Secondary school children from Notre Dame Catholic College, Prescot School, Kings Leadership Academy Hawthornes, Academy of St Nicholas, Archbishop Blanch and St Michaels High attending the afternoon session.

What an amazing day for Year 3 today at
@livuniIIB
From taxidermy to looking at mysteries under the microscopes. We can’t wait to hear about their next event! #HalloweenScience pic.twitter.com/zkP2Mxgt52

— Banks Road Primary (@BanksRoadSch) October 31, 2018

Pupils took part in a range of fun spooky science activities:

• exploring relationships between skulls and other features of animals (e.g. diet and faeces!) with Michael Berenbrink and PhD student Kelly Ross
• finding out about blood flow and gravity, how holding your breath slows your heart and which animals that make your heart race with SoLS Terry Gleave and Rachel Floyd
• making zombie proteins out of magnetic beads with Luning Liu and Fang Huang, assisted by many students
• looking at model organisms under the microscope with the Centre for Cell Imaging (CCI – Violaine See, Dave Mason, Jen Adcott, Daimark Bennett, Anne Herrmann, Marco Marcello and PhD students Kit Sampat, Hammed Badmos, Rebecca Kelly)
• finding out how much protein is in the foods we eat including fishing in cauldrons for the answers from the Centre for Proteome Research (CPR – Kimberley Burrow, Jos Harris, Victoria Harman and PhD students Max Harris, Rosie Maher, Iris Wagner, Natalie Koch)
• pupils could also get up close and find out more about a range of animals kindly provided by staff from World Museum and from within SoLS with Carl Larsen

https://twitter.com/luningliu/status/1057892900674170880

Additional student and staff helpers including Alice Clubbs Coldron, Lauren Tomlinson, members of Jill Madine group (Hannah Davies, James Torpey and Alana Maerivoet), Louise Colley and Laura Winters were invaluable in organising the day and logistic arrangements on the day.

Just a few more pictures from yesterdays #HalloweenScience, well done to the fab CPR team and IIB for a great day! @livuniIIB @astacus @ClaireEEyers pic.twitter.com/OcUOrAWc1c

— CPR Liverpool (@c4pr_liv) November 1, 2018

Dementia Public Engagement Day

On Wednesday 23^rd May, scientists from Team Madine and Team Turnbull went on a mission to educate the public about dementia research as part of dementia awareness week, at the Alzheimer’s Research UK North West public engagement event hosted at the Institute for Dementia (University of Salford). The event was a hive of activity and a cornucopia of fun! Through the media of Lego®, giant KerPlunk!, cells and real brains members of the public were introduced to all things dementia, including how diet can affect your dementia risk, the development of novel inhibitors of dementia-associated proteins and the links between dementia and other diseases.

Kiani Jeacock, James Torpey (Madine group) and Scott Guimond (Turnbull group) showcased the fantastic research happening at the University of Liverpool through informative posters and a ‘Draw for Dementia’ activity. People were invited to draw the first thing that came to mind when they heard the word “dementia”, which resulted in some really interesting and thought-provoking work!

On the day, they also met people who had dementia themselves or who had friends or family with dementia. This was an educational experience for the scientists too, as it highlighted the translational aspect of their work and emphasised the importance of research into these poorly-understood conditions.

Overall it was a well-organised and enlightening day, and events like these are fantastic for both researchers and the general public alike.

Thanks to ARUK and the Institute for Dementia for hosting!

 

Meet the Scientists

On Saturday 17^th March IIB led the Meet the Scientists Event at the World Museum. Activities included stands led by the CCI and Madine group from IIB along with other stands from Life Sciences, ITM and IGH.

The CCI had a large team, and all worked together brilliantly on the Seeing is Believing stand! The team included:

Violaine See (CCI staff): Preparation of samples for imaging, and assistance at the event.

Dave Mason (CCI staff): Preparation of samples, imaging of samples, produced posters for the event, and assistance at the event.

Marco Marcello (CCI staff): Organisation of virtual reality tours of microscopy images, with Virtual Arcade

Daimark Bennett (CCI staff): Preparation of samples for imaging, and assistance at the event.

Raphael Levy (CCI staff): Preparation of samples for imaging, and assistance at the event.

Anne Herrmann (Postdoctoral researcher): Imaging of samples, preparation of printed materials for the drawing microscopy station.

Sophie Cowman (PhD student): Filmed and produced a tour of the CCI facility, which was on display during the event.

Rebecca Kelly (PhD student): Preparation of CCI postcards, set up and take down of stand, and assistance at event especially for the match the picture quiz.

Claire Kelly (PhD student): Set up and take down of stand, and assistance at event especially for the virtual reality microscopy tour.

Hammed Badmos (PhD student): Preparation of samples, and assistance at event especially for the microscope demonstrations.

Jen Francis (PhD student): Assistance at event especially for the microscope demonstrations.

Sumaira Ashraf (Postdoctoral researcher): Set up and take down of stand, and assistance at event especially for the microscope demonstrations.

Jen Adcott (CCI Staff): Organisation of the Seeing is Believing stand and co-ordinator of activities, imaging of samples, designed and produced the match the picture quiz and microscopy stickers, and assistance at the event.

Feedback from the CCI stand, seeing is believing:

Violaine See – “It was great, and the activities were all very popular. What I really liked about our exhibit is that it was real science. Well done Jen A for leading this, the result was absolutely awesome. Well done Jen F, Hammed, and Sumaira for guiding the kids with the microscopes with so much patience and enthusiasm. Dave has been an absolute star with the colouring sheets and at explaining what we do with microscopes. Rebecca and Claire have been fantastic with the quiz and virtual reality. An amazing team effort. I feel very fortunate to have you all around, you are amazing.”

Daimark Bennett – “Fantastic effort by everyone and great activities – it was great to see how busy it was even later on. The VR clearly went down a storm and everything from the stickers to the CCI movie looked really professional and well put together. It really is hard to convey the science when it’s so chaotic but I think the exhibit was pitched at the right level. In any case, my daughter, who is not easy to impress, gave the thumbs up 🙂 Well done everyone!”

Jen Adcott – “It’s great to work with such a fantastic team of people! The day was busy, and the CCI stand seeing is believing was hugely popular with many repeat visitors. I am looking forward to meeting more future scientists at the next events.”

The Madine group ran 2 activities ‘How does the heart work?’ and return of the popular ‘A lego treasure hunt for new medicines!’ with the help of PhD students James Torpey and Nathan Cumberbatch, MRes student Kiani Jeacock and undergraduate volunteers.  Visitors enjoyed learning how blood is transported around the body by watching blood cells flow around the giant circulatory system (borrowed from IACD created with a Wellcome Trust Public Engagement award, granted to Dr Valentina Barrera). Children of all ages were keen to take part in the Lego treasure hunt around the museum to find the correct drug that fit the Lego protein molecule, and be rewarded with a Lego Scientist to take home. Thanks to members of the group for their help and enthusiasm when describing the drug development process through the use of Lego.