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.

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!

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).

Range High School Students annual visit to NMR Centre

On Friday 9th March 15 chemistry A-Level students from Range High School visited the Institute for a workshop 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 gain an insight into what goes on in an academic research environment.  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!). This final part of the day is always the most exciting for the students where there is no hiding that they actually dropped their sample and scraped it off the desk!

PhD student James Torpey along with internship students Daniel Thomas and Raven Chandramohan  helped with the day providing practical and theoretical advice.

Lancashire Science festival

On Thursday 29^th of June, Marie Phelan of the Technology Directorate (NMR Metabolomics) and member of the Biochemical Society helped out the Society at the Lancashire Science Festival held in the Halls of University of Central Lancaster, Preston. The event was attended by primary and secondary schools from Cheshire, Merseyside, Greater Manchester and Lancashire with the aim to engage and inspire the next generation in science technology engineering and mathematics (STEM). The Biochemical Society ran several activities in order to inform and debate genome editing including recent advances such as CRISPR-Cas9 technology with pupils as young as 6 engaging in DNA editing methodology and ethics.

Figures: Some of the Biochemical Society volunteers speaking to local pupils at the Lancashire Science festival. Pupils learn about “Scientific Scissors”. Science Festival Exhibitors Main Hall

Visit to Cannon Sharples Primary School

On Tuesday 16^th of May, Marie Phelan of the Technology Directorate (NMR Metabolomics) and two interns from the Ngee Ann Polytechnic in Singapore visited Cannon Sharples Year 6 pupils. The primary school in Wigan was holding a careers week, so as part of their #raising aspirations initiative Marie was invited to talk about higher education and scientific careers. In addition, interns Shina Teo and Xin Hui Er on their 4-month placement with the University of Liverpool spoke to the pupils about college life in Singapore and their experiences at the University. The 38 pupils in attendance gathered into groups to figure out what specialist skills various careers required and to play the celebrity education quiz.

Marie talking about her career to year 6 pupils at Cannon Sharples Primary School in Wigan.

Pupils pick skills for specific careers

Interns Shina Teo and Xin Hui Er     Pupils pick skills for specific careers

Range High School Students annual visit to NMR Centre

On Wednesday 18th January chemistry A-Level students from Range High School visited the Institute for a workshop in the NMR Centre for Structural Biology organised by Dr Jill Madine. This visit has become an annual event which the students enjoy and say enhance their understanding of how NMR can be applied in a research environment.  The students learnt about the advantages and disadvantages of mass spec and NMR from Dr Mark Wilkinson and Dr Marie Phelan, carried out chromatography and learnt to prepare  and run NMR samples and 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!). 

A range of University of Liverpool postgraduate students and postdocs helped with the day providing practical and theoretical advice, including Dr Hannah Davies, Rudi Grossman, James Torpey and Kieran Hand (pictured above).