i, science special issue 2013

7/30/2019 I, Science Special Issue 2013

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I ,SCIENCEThe Science MagaZine of Imperial Col

He 24


2/28www.isciencemag.c

THE SCIENCEMAGAZINE OF

IMPERIAL COLLEGE

I Science, Felix Office, Beit Quadrangle,PrinCe Consort Road, London, SW7 2BB

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I,SCIENCEello and welcome to avery special edition oI, Science. For the rsttime we are venturing outo our sae haven o the

Imperial College London campus, bravingthe scary real world, and delivering ourgraphically gorgeous magazine, brimmingwith ascinating science, to schools. Manyo our new readers wont have heard o usbeore, so rst things rst lets explainwhat were about.

I, Science is a magazine and website runby Imperial College students, dedicatedto providing readers with interestingstories rom the world o science. Temagazine comes out once a term andis ull o absorbing stories, thoughtulopinion pieces and insightul interviews.Our website is regularly updated with newcontent including blogs, podcasts andeature articles, and its high standard ocontent was recognised by a nominationor a Guardian Student Media Award in2012.

In this special edition o the magazinewe hope to celebrate science in general,as well provide an insight into the kind oscience journalism you can get involvedin, even as a student.

Science is oten the victim ostereotyping: branded with the image otest tubes, lab coats and geeky scientists.Yet it takes very little to discover thatthis is ar rom the truth. Some might seephysics as the boring subject o invisibleorces, complex equations and dull graphs.

But on page 4 we enter a world o gas gunsand controlled explosions, as Chris Clarkerecounts his experiences o the shockphysics lab here at Imperial College.

Tat might seem like an extreme job ora scientist, but remember that scientists

are no stranger to danger. OnChristopher Yates looks at rewho have thrown caution to the used themselves as guinea pigsown experiments. Where wouwithout these brave (and maybpioneers?

In biology, too, things areexciting. Despite a century o otherwise, were starting tothat our genes arent the only determining hereditary traits. OnKarin Valencia looks at this newepigenetics and what it might meo us.

O course, we cant orget what tmean or science. As new eldsand collaborations occur, the trlabels o biology, chemistry andare becoming increasingly outdpage 18, Sarah Byrne introduceseld o interdisciplinary science,subjects that seem distinct areincreasingly interlinked.

Science is at the heart o ourworld, and this type o new is what will drive us orwaraspects like technology and are sometimes the most clearin everyday lie, science in genbecome more integrated into socever beore.

For those o you hoping to be pnext generation o scientists, we this magazine can provide a avothings you might nd yoursel

on, or even trying to improve, income.

With this celebration o scmind, we give you I, Science you enjoy it.

H

Alex &

I ,SCIENCEeditors-in-chiefConor McKeeverAlex Gwyther

Web EditorsJosh HowgegoTom Bragg

Production ManagerVeronika McQuade

ProductionSilvia Araguas

Picture editorKeeren Flora

Sub-editorsAndy RoastSarah ByrneJulie GouldKatherine PowellVictoria DruceZainab ChachiaBryan WardIigo Martinez de RituertoJames Tull

ProofreadersFiona HartleySusannah MayElise RattiganAlexandra BerditchevskaiaHeather JefferyJames WhiteLoren CameronAashish UpmanyuDaniel SpencerCloudy Carnegie

I, Science2

Cover illustration by Tristan varela


3/28www.isciencemag.co.uk

What is the Higgs? | 11

12 | Top 6 impractical inventions

Self-experimentation | 8

10 | Imperial professor profile

Shock and awe in Physics | 4

6 | Top 6 female scientists

contents

Science behind the photo | 14

16 | Epigenetic enhancements

Interview with a scientist | 17

18 | Bridging the gap between science

Exploring an underwater world | 20

21 | The Milky Way KidDIY toilets | 22

23 | Freezing fauna

The attraction of Materials | 24

Crash course in communication | 26

25 | INSPIRE as a teacher

27| Should we be searching for alien

I, Science

Come see the physics o explosions, high-speed impacts andmassive gas guns.

Scientists who volunteer themselves or their ownexperiments: brave or mad?

For anyone conused by the mania, we explain what all theuss was about.

As i they werent awesome enough already, heres the physicso why bubbles can produce an explosion o rainbow colours.

Proessor Stephen Curry tells us why structural biologists arethe new explorers.

Yes they keep water out o your eyes, but swimming gogglesalso allow you to see underwater because o physics.

Do-it-yoursel science might be exactly what the developingworld needs.

Applying maths, physics and chemistry to challengingproblems in real lie.

PUS or PEST? Why explaining scientifc research to the publicis so important.

Six women who have made huge contributions to scieknowledge.

Proessor Armand Leroi: author, television presenter amusic generator.

We give you six o the most creative (i slightly pointleinventions.

How our classic understanding o genetics was wrong what it means or us.

Biologists, chemists and physicists working together comean great things or scientifc research.

The 15-year-old whose work questions all we know abcreation o galaxies.

Were running out o ideas to conserve endangered speit time or Plan B?

Imperials training scheme is helping postgraduate sciebecome top-class educators.

Its almost certain that lie is out there, but fnding it mbe a good idea.


4/284 I, Science www.isciencemag.c

hock physics is the area o

physics that deals with whathappens ater explosions,impacts, or anything movingat high speeds. Te shock

isnt the reaction o nervous scientists toloud noises, but the shock waves that comerom these events as lots o energy tries tomove quickly rom one place to another.Just as you see ripples in a pond ater youthrow in a stone, such eects might also beseen in a sheet o metal thats been hit bya bullet, or in the air around an explosion.

Te job o the shock physicist is to createthese events and study the resulting shockwaves. Tis means lots o training to useenormous guns, powerul explosives anda whole range o other exciting pieceso equipment. Te aim here is not justcontrolled anarchy, but learning to createand harness shock waves or useulpurposes, as well as minimising the damagethey can cause.

Te popularity o shock physics hassoared in recent years due to its widespreadapplications in both industry and themilitary. One o the biggest departmentsyoull nd studying the topic is the Instituteo Shock Physics (ISP) here at Imperial

College London.I, Science visited the ISP to

meet the responsible academics, the slightlyless responsible students and to look downthe barrel o a very big gun.

The Big Boss

Dr William Proud, or Bill to riendsand student journalists, is the Directoro the ISP. Te Institute has been aroundsince 2008, and its Bills job to ensure thatits various research avenues are beingpursued responsibly and eciently, as wellas keeping the department in close contactwith other shock physics groups around theworld.

Ever since Bill became director in 2011,hes been pushing to make shock physics anarea that is open to all kinds o scientists.Te ISP is a multidisciplinary centre, BilltellsI, Science. I mysel originally trained asa chemist.

Te need or scientists rom all disciplinesis primarily linked to the vast number oapplications o shock physics. In the publicmind theres always a very strong link tothe military, Bill explains. However, thelargest users o explosives are: quarryingand mining, demolition, and petrochemicalextraction. Te military account or about1% and thats even during times o conict.

Much research, thereore, goes intoimproving the eciency o using explosivesin quarrying and mining. However manyother research paths exist, including

The need for scientists from

all disciplines is primarilylinked to the vast number of

applications of shock physics

S

research into injuries sustained rom

and even high-speed photography tshocks as they happen.

The Aspiring Anarchis

Every year the ISP takes on a haaspiring young minds to train in thexplosive investigation.

We smash stu! one o them anncheerully when asked whether been trusted with explosives yet. Buget to do a bit o explosives traininwe go to the Czech Republic. Te sexplain that it is there that they utraining with the plastic explosive S

However, according to the stthe Czech Republic isnt the onlthey visit: We work with groups iuniversities everywhere, like the Uno Moscow Im o to San Diegohave links there too.

When probed on the subject o smstu, it becomes apparent that thdevice is something called a Hopkinwo long metal rods ace each othesample o material in between. Onrods is red into the other, deormsample in the process, and the pulseenergy is measured. o give a perspethe rate at which the samples are deA ootball pitch would be comprethe size o a postage stamp in 1/300tblink o an eye.

Putting the SHOCK

back into PhysicsThink o physics and you probably think o springs, ormulas and mediocre diagrams. What happen

to the mad scientists building rockets out o tin cans and blowing up their laboratories? Christophe

Clarke meets the new breed o riendly pyromaniacs the shock physicists.


5/28www.isciencemag.co.uk I, Science

The Weapon of Choice

Although the Hopkinson Bar isimpressive, without a doubt the mostvisually exciting piece o equipment keptat the ISP is the enormous gas gun.

Te gas gun is a very useul tool inshock physics, serving the sole purpose

o ring small objects, called yers, atvery high speeds into preselected targets.Tis is a great way to test the reactionso various materials to high velocityimpacts, including bits o aircrat andeven gammon steaks (when researchingshocks in bodily tissue).

Te gun barrel is 6 metres long andconnected to a large chamber lled withrags to collect debris. A 4 kilogram yercan be propelled down the barrel at up

to 1.2 kilometres per second by highlypressurised gas, hitting a target mountedin the chamber. Te yer is about the sizeo a coee mug and imparts the same orceas a transit van travelling at 90 mph.

Youd have thought this would make anincredibly loud noise, however the entirechamber is kept under vacuum, which

stops sound rom escaping and reducesthe blast to only a dull thud.

Centimetre-thick sheets o steel aretorn like paper at such velocities. Howevereverything is highly controlled including the speed o impact allowingcareul studies to be conducted o thetarget ater shock.

oday the ISP continues its hard work,along with similar departments all overthe world, bringing us eciency andsaety through unconventional routes. So

i you miss the days o the mad scientistand think physics has become boring, trya career in shock physics.

If you think physics has becomeboring, try a career in Shock

Physics

Discovering the worl

most popular explosi

Ammonium nitrate is one oworlds most widely used exploand is commonly ound in ertiliser; however the ull e

o its explosive capabilities wasdiscovered until shortly ater theWorld War.

In 1921, the workers in the town o Oppau in Germany were small charges o dynamite to tryclear solid clumps o ertiliser r4500 tonne silo.

Around 80% o Oppau abrwent missing, leaving 500600 2000 injured and 6500 homeless, explosion that could be heard 30

away.

Gas Gu



6Marie Curie, the Polish chemist and physicist, is perhaps the most amous emale so all time. Risking her lie nearly every working day (although perhaps not aware ogroundbreaking research on radioactivity including discovering the elements and Polonium earned Curie and her husband a Nobel Prize or Physics in 1903. Sbecame the rst emale teacher at the Sorbonne University in Paris and was awardsecond Nobel Prize, this time or Chemistry, in 1911. During the First World War, Cthe radiology services or the Red Cross, setting up Frances rst military radiologyBeyond her personal achievements, Marie Curie or perhaps just the genius o thhousehold might be credited with inspiring her eldest daughter, Irene, who was aher own Chemistry Nobel Prize in 1935.

In 1953, Francis Crick and James Watson became household names ater the pair announced

their discovery o the double-helix structure o DNA. But ew had heard o the emaleresearcher Rosalind Franklin. First at Cambridge University, and later at Kings CollegeLondon, Rosalind became an expert in X-ray crystallography, and it is now thought that it wasFranklins X-ray photographs that revealed the complicated structure to Crick and Watson.She was a passionate and dedicated scientist, still conducting research and publishing papersright up until her death in 1958, our years beore Crick and Watson were awarded the NobelPrize or discovering the structure o DNA.

Wikipedia Commons

Jewish Chronicle Archive/Herita

Marie Curie (1867-1934)

Gave her lie to research radioactivity

Rosalind Franklin (1920-1958)

Helped discover the structure o DNA

influential&inspiringwomen inScience

Women throughout the ages have helped to shape our understanding o the world through science

despite oten having to overcome oppression and lack o recognition.Arianna Sorba investigates ttop six emale scientists.



Born in urin, Italy, to a painter and a mathematician, Rita Levi-Montalcini was deteto study medicine. However, soon ater graduating rom the University o urin, thFascism in Italy orced her into hiding because o subsequent laws barring Jews rom acand proessional careers. But Levi-Montalcini persevered and built a secret laboratorbedroom, using sewing needles and watchmakers tweezers, to investigate cell biologchick embryos. Her later cell research in the US earned Levi-Montalcini a Nobel Medicine in 1986. She continued to be committed to her science, working or hours evuntil her death in 2012, aged 103.

Hypatia was a Greek philosopher, and one o the rst emale scientists in recorded history.Following in her athers ootsteps, she became the worlds leading mathematician andastronomer: building on her athers already detailed star charts, advancing work on geometryand ghting to preserve the Greeks strong scientic heritage in times o passionate religiousconict. It was Hypatias popularity as a teacher o philosophy that made her an enemy osome religious groups and eventually led to her brutal murder by a Christian mob. She hassince become a powerul symbol or intellectual pursuit in the ace o ignorance and prejudice.

Bell Burnell made one o the greatest astrophysical breakthroughs o the 20th century whilestill only a postgraduate student at Cambridge University. Ater analysing miles o printoutso astronomical data, she spotted an unusual signal that she could not explain. Despite BellBurnells supervisors suggesting she ignore the anomaly, she persisted. Te anomaly turnedout to be the rst ever detection o a pulsar a antastically dense and quickly spinning star

made o neutrons. Te discovery led to a Nobel Prize or her two supervisors, but not or BellBurnell. However, reusing to be demoralised, she went on to become a Fellow o the RoyalSociety, a Dame, and the rst emale president o the Institute o Physics.

Born rom a brie marriage between the poet Lord Byron and Annabella M

Lovelace was taken rom her eccentric ather at a young age and encouragedmother to study mathematics an extremely unusual pursuit or women at thHowever, Lovelaces studies revealed her talent or logical subjects , and she is nowas the worlds irst computer programmer, having invented a basic algorithm that much like modern computer codes. Not only that, she also predicted the importapower o such machines in the uture, at a time when her peers assumed the ull por computers was basic algebra.

La Gazzetta

Wikipedia Co

Quadrennial Physics

Quadrennial Physics Congress

Rita Levi-Montalcini (1909-2012)Built a secret laboratory in her bedroom

Hypatia of Alexandria (c.355-415)

One o the rst emale scientists

Jocelyn Bell Burnell (1943-)

Ada Lovelace (1815-1852)

Made the greatest astronomical discovery o the 20th century

The worlds rst computer programmer



self-experimenting

scientistsSome scientists have gone to dramatic lengths to test their theories. Christopher Yates discussesmotivates these scientists to become their own experimental guinea pigs.

hat do HG Wellss InvisibleMan, Spider-Mans oe TeLizard and Sir Isaac Newtonall have in common? Despitesounding like the start

o a bad joke, there is a serious answer sel-experimentation.

Sir Isaac Newton is amous or his workon gravity and mathematics, but he wasalso interested in optics and the workingso the eye. In one o the earliest recordedexamples o sel-experimentation, he tookea bodkin [sewing needle] and put it betwixtmy eye and ye bone as neare to ye backsideo my eye as I could. Its unclear exactlywhat he hoped to achieve with this, but itgoes without saying that this shouldnt betried at home!

In medical sciences, one way o provingthat a disease is caused by a certain virus isto inect an animal with that virus and seei it develops the disease. Alternatively, ithere are no animals available, you coulduse yoursel. At least, that seems to havebeen the mentality o some scientists, suchas the wonderully named Stubbins Frth.He was determined to prove his theorythat yellow ever could not be transmitted

between people. He breathed in umes romthe vomit o inected patients, smearedit into cuts in his skin, poured it into hiseyes and even drank it. Shockingly, despitebeing wrong, he didnt develop yellow ever,

perhaps because the patients were past theinectious stage o the disease.

In 1984, Barry Marshall also went to greatlengths to investigate a disease. Working asa gastroenterologist at Royal Perth Hospital,Australia, Marshall was investigating thecause o stomach ulcers. At the time, mostpeople believed that ulcers were caused bystress or spicy ood, and anti-ulcer drugs,which only treated the symptoms, werea real money-spinner or pharmaceuticalcompanies.

However Marshall and his co-workerRobin Warren believed it was in act abacterium called Helicobacter pylori (H.pylori) that caused these ulcers, as well asgastritis (stomach inammation). Teyextracted H. pylori bacteria rom thestomachs o ulcer suerers and then grewcultures o the bacterium to use in tests.Unortunately, they were unable to inectpiglets with the bacteria to prove theirtheory, so Marshall took the direct approachand swallowed a sample oH. pylori himsel.Within three days, he was nauseous.An examination just eight days ater hisnoxious drink showed he had developedgastritis. Tis discovery was antastic newsas it meant gastritis and ulcers could becured simply using antibiotics.

It isnt just medical doctors who do weirdand wonderul things to themselves in thename o science. In 2002, Kevin Warwick,Proessor o Cybernetics at the University

Wo Reading, had an implant inserta nerve in his arm. Tis implant electronic signals to be sent betweand a computer. When the compuconnected to a robotic arm, he was

control its movement, even when was the other side o the Atlantic In a later experiment, his wie aelectrodes inserted and they were send signals between one another ino non-verbal, electronic communic

Stubbins Ffirth breathedin fumes from the vomit of

infected patients, smeared itinto cuts in his skin, poured

it into his eyes and evendrank it

Kevin Warwichad an impla

inserted into arm making hable to contra robotic ar even when

the arm was tother side of tAtlantic Ocea



perormed on larger groups o because by repeating the experimelarge group o people any dierences alikely to be relevant.

Another problem is due to the peect. When developing a dru

compared to either a sugar-pill por the best current alternative. Sare randomly divided into two and assigned a treatment. I the knows they have not been givdrug, they are less likely to showthan someone given the placebo wknowing. Because o this, experare usually double-blind, with neiexperimenter nor the subject kwho is in each group. I the experiis also the subject, they will knowwhat they are taking. On the othea sel-experiment may help co

people to allow a larger-scale expeto take place.

hroughout history, many schave put their well-being on the the greater good. Even in the mworld, where most experimenhumans are carried out on large there is oten a need or someonirst. Who should that be? I a sisnt willing to put themselves throexperiment, perhaps they shoultwice about asking others to do th

Warwick views these experiments as therst step towards creating cyborgs humanswith electronic improvements. He envisagesimplants allowing communication withcomputers and each other, potentially givinghumans amazing new abilities.

So why do people submit themselves tothese experiments? In his autobiography I, Cyborg Kevin Warwick describes hisemotions going into the experiment as amixture o ear and excitement, but also talksabout his strong desire to be the rst person totake the plunge and become a cyborg. Others,such as Stubbins Frth, have done it to prove apoint, whereas Barry Marshall did it becausehe needed experiments on a human in orderto make people pay attention and ultimatelyhelp develop eective treatments.

Ralph Steinman had a more pressing reasonor experimenting on himsel. In the 1970s, hediscovered dendritic cells, which are involved

In addition to tmany legal and

ethical issues the experiment gowrong, results only one patiencould be down t

chance

in recognition and targeting o inections orattack by the immune system. Because o theimportant role o dendritic cells in aiming theimmune system, experimental vaccines havebeen developed which cause them to targetcancer cells or cells inected with HIV.

In 2007, Steinman was diagnosed withpancreatic cancer. Te survival rate orpancreatic cancer is very low, with just 20%o patients surviving or a year ater diagnosis.However, he was able to use the experimentalvaccines developed by his colleagues andsurvived or a urther our years. Sadly, hedied in September 2011, just three days beorehe was awarded the Nobel Prize.

Although it makes or exciting science, thereare a ew problems with sel-experimentation.In addition to the many legal and ethicalissues i the experiment goes wrong, resultsin only one patient could be down to chance.Tis is why medical experiments are usually

Engineer Kevin Warwick has experimented on himsel, tryingto become the frst cyborg

JD Hancock



kidneys, brains and other organrom just a ew cells? And why do thlike they do? Its when these procewrong that we tend to get the most mutations, so studying mutation caa lot about our developmental proce

But why evolutionary developbiology? Well, studying evolution

us why we are dierent rom all thliving things on Earth. Developmentpart o that dierence. You might exto develop completely dierently ra microscopic worm, but youd beIn act, over millions o years evhas never really reinvented develoInstead, small mutations mean thatgenes, used in a slightly dierent wgive rise to the millions o dierenthat exist today. So in evo-devo, bicompare how dierent organisms to nd out how they (and we) evolve

In 2004, Leroi adapted his booktelevision series calledHuman MutChannel 4. Tis became the rst in o biology documentaries he has precovering subjects like evolutiodiscoverer Charles Darwin, and theGreek philosopher/naturalist Aristo

Lerois most recent media elooked at the evolution o music. Lin Darwins Tunes or BBC Radio suggested that music, along with o our culture, evolves in a way simbiological evolution. He and his coproved this by applying the pronatural selection to computer-gerandom sounds to eventually creatwithout human musicians or produ

oday, Proessor Leroi is workseveral new books and regularly punew research. I you want to nd ouabout him his work, visit his wewww.armandmarieleroi.com.

Eliot Barfordinvestigates how this Imperial College Proessor

been bringing his expertise to the wider world.

A

Professor Profile:

Armand Lero

rmand Leroi is not youraverage Proessor oEvolutionary DevelopmentalBiology. As a scientist, hisexpertise lies in tiny worms

and why they grow to precisely the samesize. But outside the lab he has written abook about human mutants, presentedseveral V shows about biology and done

(serious) research into the evolution o popmusic.

Leroi has been working at ImperialCollege London or over 10 years, but he isno stranger to the wider world. He was bornin New Zealand, grew up in South Aricaand Canada, has a doctorate rom theUSA, and is now a Dutch citizen. In 2003,between doing research and teachingbiology students, he published a bookcalled Mutants: On the Form, Varietiesand Errors of the Human Body. Tebook looks at human variation, romthe everyday to the shocking, andhow it arises.

Mutants won the GuardianFirst Book Award in 2004. It has aremarkable cast o characters, romPetrus Gonsalvus, the hairy-aced

xture o 16th century royal courts,to the Ovitzes, a amily o dwars who

survived Auschwitz thanks to being thesubject o pointless experiments. In hisbook, Leroi wanders through the centuriesand across the globe, providing biologicalexplanations o hair colour, sex, ageing andplenty more. It turns out that we are allmutants to some degree; we just dier inthe way we express it.

Tough accessible, Mutants wasgrounded in Lerois scientic expertisein evolutionary developmental biology,or evo-devo or short. Te eld tries toexplain how our developmental processeswork. For example, how do our arms, eyes,



at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN,where bunches o protons are acceleratedto 99.9999991% o the speed o light,beore colliding up to 600 million times persecond. Te elementary particles (such asgluons) that make up the protons then haveenough energy to interact with each other,and can produce a Higgs boson.

Unortunately, the Higgs boson is somassive that it immediately turns intoother, lighter particles, meaning we cantjust look or it in the results o the collision.But we can predict what it should decayinto and i we see that same ratio oparticles in the detector, then we may havemade a Higgs boson. In act, lots o otherpathways could go to make those particles,and by chance it could be the same ratio,but i we run enough experiments, andthe same results keep coming up, then wecan be more condent that theres a Higgsboson involved.

And thats what happened: in 2012, ater4 years o running trillions o collisions,CERN announced that they had probablyound a Higgs boson, with only a 1-in-3.5million chance that the results were justdown to chance.

But this is just the beginning ourstandard model o physics doesnt tell uswhere gravity comes rom, so i the Higgs

boson ts the model exactly, we havent gotany new inormation to point us in the rightdirection. I it does something unexpected,it could help us nd the holy grail o physics:a theory that describes all the orces in theuniverse.

Perhaps the Higgs deserves the title GodParticle ater all.

he Higgs boson is, at itssimplest, an elementaryparticle: a particle thatcannot be broken downinto anything smaller. Suchparticles are the building

blocks o the universe, and a number othem are already known: 12 undamentalermions (such as electrons), which makeup matter, and 4 undamental bosons (suchas photons), which give rise to orces.

But we can also think o these particlesin a dierent way. Imagine a weather mapwhere wind speed has been mapped out:each arrow on the map is a point in spacewith a known amount o wind speed,and where that value is not zero, we saythere is wind. We can do the same thingor particles: every point in space can beassigned an amount o electron-ness, andelectrons are present when this is morethan zero. Tis all-present potential orelectron-ness is called an electron eld,and in a similar way, the Higgs boson is anexcitation in the universal Higgs eld.

Despite all the hype about the Higgsboson, its the Higgs eld thats so importantor physicists because its how particles gettheir mass. Particles that interact stronglywith the Higgs eld gain a lot o energyrom it; energy that we interpret as mass,thanks to Albert Einsteins E=mc2 equation.

Without this process, the equationsdescribing particle behaviour cannotexplain why most elementary particles havemass.

So why are we chasing the Higgs boson?Because we cant measure the Higgs elddirectly: we need to nd the Higgs boson toprove the eld exists. Tis search happens

For something so hard to nd, the Higgs boson has been absolutely

everywhere or the last ew years. But despite trending on Twitter,and even having its own iPhone app, most people still ask, What

exactly is it?Conor McKeeveris here to clariy and describe its

signicance in explaining the orces that govern the universe.

T

The What Particle?



Top 6 creative DIY inventions

Theres no doubting the creative ingenuity and innovative resourceulness that goes into Do-It-

Yoursel science projects. However, while many o the home-built technologies are designed with

practical applications in mind, there are some innovators who preer to let their creative sides run

wild. Here are six o some o the more adventurous designs, crated by individuals who reuse to b

held back by such boring norms as unctionality or practicality. ByAlex Gwytherand Tom Br

Teslagun

By using mainly scavenged parts, Robert Flickengermanagedtoconstructhisownfully-functional20,000-volteslacoilgun foronly500.Hecreated thebodyof the gun by melting down aluminium scrap metalandpouring it intoamouldof aplasticNerf toy gun.Te current, provided by a lithium ion battery froman electric screwdriver, is repeatedly doubled insidethegunusinga transformerfromanoldtelevision andadditionalcircuitry,whilea fan fromanoldcomputerserverhelps tocoolthesparkgap. He proudlydebutedthe lightning-blastinggunathisweddingreception.

Thecheese-controlled

car

Conor ONeill, aparticularly resour

ceul ather, was

determinedto givehis children a mem

orable Christmas

present. Startingwith an i-Racer a B

luetooth-equipped

toycarthatcanbecontrolledbyanAndro

idphoneONeill

toiledthroughsometrickycodingtolink

uphisRaspberryPi

computerasacontroller.Notstoppingth

ere,thedetermined

dadincorporatedaMaKeyMaKey inve

ntionkit:asystem

thatallowstheusertoconverteveryday

objectsintoinputs

oracomputingdevice.Tusthecheese

-controlledcarwas

born:fvepiecesocheeseactingasbut

tons,connectedto

aRaspberryPi,controllingacaroverB

luetooth.Andasi

cheesewasntenough,ON

eillwasalsoabletousegrapes

andaBarbiedollascontrollingmechanisms.


13/28www.isciencemag.co.uk I, ScienceI, Sciencewww.isciencemag.co.uk

Levitatingbed

Reddit user mememetatatabuilt himsel an incredible

foatingbedrom asimplewoodenrame,hockeypuck-

sized neodymiumsupermagnetsand steelcables tohold

thebed inplace.Neodymium is a rare earthmetal and

thestrongestpermanentmagnetknown; apparently, the

hardestparto thebuildwaspryingapart twomagnets

thathadbecomestuck togetherduring shipping.Although

this is a ully unctioningbed, it ismade imp

ractical by

itsmaximumweighto 110kg (soonly enough orone

person)anditsobviousexclusivitytousersdevoidoany

piercings.

Machete-shootingslingshot

JrgSpraveisaslingshotenthusiastlikenoother,creatingsomeothedeadliest-lookingcontraptionsyounevercouldhave dreamed o. His masterpiece: a slingshot that resmachetes.Custommade intheshapeoarife, itsportsatrigger or ring theweapon, and an exceptionally strongrubber band to hold the modied machetes in place.Although this mega-weapon does indeed work drivingthemacheteuptoitshiltinthetargetshortoazombie-apocalypse there isnt much practical use or it. Not tomention its unwieldy ammunition makes it both slow toreloadandveryexpensive.Unlessyouplanonretrievingalotomachetesoutozombiecorpses.

SetPhasertoStun

Yet another weapon makes our list. Tis time

a handheld Star Trek phaser gun that shoots a

continuousblue laserbeam rom thebarrel, and

even imitates the oscillating, uturistic noise

when red. obuild it, the inventor picked up a

PlayStation3 laserassemblyandwired itintoaStar

Trek plastic phaser toy. He had to exchange the

AAbatteryholderwith a 9-volt holder to deliver

maximum charge to the Blu-ray diode.Although

the sound comes rom the in-built speakers o

the original toy, the newbeam canblast through

thetoughmembraneoan infatedballoonatth

distance oagaragelength.Cardassiansbeware!

PowerPram

Father-to-beColinFurze turnedhisattention tobabytransportation as soon as he discovered his girlriendwaspregnant.Teresultwas apetrol-powered, twin-exhaust baby carriage that reached 53mph at a localracetrack:thefrstworldrecordoitskind.Builtarounda125ccmotorbikeengine,thepramcomeswithabuilt-in wheeled platorm and handlebar controls or theparent, and a steel roll cage cot or the child. But itsonlyhousedplasticdollssoar:Furzesayshisnew-bornsonJakewontbeincludedinanyrecord-b

reakingbaby

rallyingjustyet.



Framed against the Dubai skyline, its the physical procreraction, reection and constructive intererence that creexplosion o colour in this giant bubble.

Scientists once believed that we emit light beams rom o

allowing us to see. However, in the 11th Century, the ArabianAbu Ali al-Hassan Ibn Al-Haytham used experiments to dispremission theory and show that light rays actually enter our emany experiments on light oten involved reraction and ree

Similar to how we see the colours in rainbows, we perceivon the surace o bubbles through the reection and reraclight waves. White light is made up o a spectrum o coloeach have a dierent wavelength. Just like ocean waves, lighhave peaks and valleys (crests and troughs). Red light has thewavelength and so the largest distance between each constrough. A bubble consists o an inner bubble wall and an outerwall that are a ew micrometers apart. When a light ray hits thsurace some light is reected, while the rest is transmittedbottom layer where it is then also reected.

Te light rays that are transmitted through the bubble are reslightly. Although light rays travel in straight lines, when tha denser medium, in this case the soapy bubble lm, theislows down and so they change direction. Tis, in combinaticonstructive intererence produces the intensied colours wthe photograph.

It was in the early 19th century that the English polymath Young rst established the role o intererence. Light reectthe inner surace o the bubble will have travelled a ew micrurther than light reected at the outer surace, and thus tseparate reections will be out o step. Tese two reectiointerere with each other. I the light waves meet crest-to-trocolours will cancel each other out and we will see no colour as destructive intererence. However, i the troughs o each rwave coincide they combine to cause an intensied colour known as constructive intererence.

Te bubbles structural ormation creates the perect medthe processes o constructive intererence, reection and reto interact and produce such vivid colours. Ibn al-Haythamwork on the theories o reraction and reection and Youngs explanation o intererence were both paramountunderstanding o how colours orm in bubbles.

Photo and text by Tasch

SCIENCBEHIN

THPHOT



re the antasies osuperheroes so ar-etched,or might it be possible tochange our bodies to acquiresuperhuman abilities?

Epigenetics, one o the most recent andimportant discoveries in the science oheredity since the gene, might hold theanswer.

Biology students have traditionallybeen taught: 1. Te genome contains

all the instructions necessary to makeup an organism; and 2. Genes are passedon unchanged rom parent to child, andto subsequent generations: any geneticchanges brought about by liestyle cannotbe inherited. Tese ideas now appear tobe outdated (although it might be worthremembering them or your biology exams).

It turns out that there is another set oinstructions, known as the epigenome.Tese instructions are additional to thegenome: interacting with and modulatingour DNA. By switching certain genes on oro, the epigenome determines which genesget expressed into traits. But this is not theend o the story. Epigenetics happen as aresponse to a signal rom our environment,meaning that changes brought about bynurture can indeed be inherited. In otherwords, once made, epigenetic changes canbe very long-lived, lasting greater than oneor two lie-times.

The eld o epigenetics is eroding scientists belie that genes are the only inherited inormation. By

turning certain genes on and o, Karin Valencia wonders i, one day, we might be able to create su

humans.

A

The Exciting World of Epigenetic

So the word epigenetics means boththe development o an organism throughthe regulation o how genes are expressedand also, orms o inheritance o thesemodications o DNA sequences.

But, what exactly is the power oepigenetics? One o the most clear-cutexamples o the inuence o the epigenomecan be seen in identical twins. Since theycome rom a single embryo, they share thesame genome, and, being twins, they shareda very similar environment in the womb.But as the twins get older, their socialinteractions, diets, dierences in physicalactivities, and exposure to toxins such ascigarettes, dier. Tese environmentalactors create dierent needs and signalsin their bodies; the epigenome respondsby activating and silencing dierent genesin order to cope with the varying demands.Since the environment o the twins isdierent, their epigenome respondsdierently. Te genomes o the twins areunaected, but their epigenomes change,leading to dierent patterns o genes.

Te exciting discovery o epigenetics hasled some to question whether we can usethis newound knowledge to enhance ourphysical condition. And like Peter Parker

ater being bitten by a genetically mspider to become Spiderman, we woto go through the trouble o replacwhole genome; we just need to mSo now we know that the correct qisnt: what gene can I delete or acorder to become stronger? Insteshould ask: can I epigenetically regugenes I already have to make my mgrow larger and stronger?

I its endurance you want to imprgenes responsible or generating recells could be tweaked so that abnhigh levels are created and your mussupplied with oxygen aster than Youd be able to do physical activhours, while experiencing less atyou want to acquire Sherlock Habilities o deduction, it might betrickier to tackle, but increasing thedevelopment in our brains would he

Exactly how to upscale or dothe expression o genes is currenwell understood, and is under ininvestigation, so superhero-like may not be possible or someHowever, epigenetics will clearly havimportant applications in the umedicine.

ether

Although twins sharethe same genome at birth,

their social interactions,diets and exposure to

toxins lead to differentepigenomes


17/28



t school, science usuallycomes neatly packaged intoindividual subjects. Maths,chemistry, biology, physics all taught by dierent

teachers and without much thought orhow they t together. You might be orgivenor thinking they dont have much to dowith each other.

However, at the cutting edge o scienticresearch, the boundaries between

these subjects are becomingi n c r e a s i n g l y

act in isolation, but instead in syshundreds which can switch each oand o, and regulate each others Understanding what happens whmodiy a gene, then, is not straightTe only practical way is to monetwork mathematically, using a sydierential equations.

Tere were many more biquestions that could not be anwith traditional methods. Te olding problem how and why anacid chain olds into the complexdimensional protein structure is solved, but great progress has beeusing computer algorithms, and improcessing power, to simulate the process. Tese algorithms are eatomic-level data rom physical chand even quantum physics, in osimulate the complex and random mo atoms.

Sarah Byrne relects on the growing interdisciplinarity between scientic disciplines and the

opportunities it brings, both in scientic research and academic study.

A

Keeping your options ope

how the traditional subject boundarie

in science are disappearing

blurred. Tis approach, calledinterdisciplinarity, brings togetherscientists rom dierent backgrounds towork on a project or solve a problem. Tisis not an entirely new concept, but it is onethat has gained popularity in recent years,mostly due to the increasing complexity omodern biology.

Around 2000, an obscure eld calledsystems biology started to gain recognition.It suggested that studying individualcomponents o, say, a cell could only getus so ar, since things were increasinglyound to be connected together in complexnetworks or systems. An example is generegulation networks: most genes do not



Ten there is the question o data: theHuman Genome Project churned out vastquantities o results, and an estimated10 terabytes a day are generated by genesequencing projects at one institute alone.Clearly processing this amount o datarequires expertise in database management,data mining and inormation science.

o address the demand orinterdisciplinary scientists, severaluniversities have set up doctoral trainingcentres (DCs), unded by the UK researchcouncils, with the specic mission otraining postgraduate students to work atthe interace between disciplines.

Tese include Warwick UniversitysSystems Biology DC; the CoMPLEXprogramme at UCL, which trainsmathematicians and engineers to work oncomplex interdisciplinary problems; andImperial Colleges own Institute o ChemicalBiology (ICB). Te ocus o the ICB isusing techniques rom chemistry to studymolecular interactions in cells. Tis haswide-ranging applications rom biomedical(drug discovery or cancer and other

diseases, developing medical imagingtechniques) to agricultural (improvingthe eciency o photosynthesis,strategies to overcome pesticide

resistance). Students on the Mastersand doctoral programs work togetherwith supervisors rom both biology andphysical sciences departments, gainingunique experience and real expertise inboth disciplines.

Interdisciplinary subjects areappearing at undergraduate level as well,

with many universities oering degrees insubjects such as biophysics, bioengineeringand bioinormatics.

But this isnt really such a novel approach.In act, interdisciplinarity was the originalway o doing science. Te ancient studyo natural philosophy encompassed whatwe would now call physics, astronomy,mathematics and lie sciences. Science wassimply knowledge, a quest to understandand explain the world around us. Westill see the vestiges o this in the ancientuniversities such as Cambridge, UCL andDurham, with their broad Natural Sciencesdegrees. rends and ashions change inacademia, as in every other walk o lie, andsometimes things come ull-circle.

You may have noticed a pattern inthe examples mentioned so ar: morepeople go rom the physical sciences andmathematics/engineering/computing intobiology, rather than the other way round.

Partly this comes rom the way thesecollaborations rst developed. It was thebiologists who had the problems thatneeded solving, and it would have beeneasier to hire people who already had theskills and tools required, rather than havingto gain that expertise themselves. Te

mathematicians and chemists might havehad to pick up some biology in order tohelp, but they werent required to becomeexperts.

Some might suggest its because somesubjects are harder than others. Tat itseasier or a harder scientist to learn asoter subject than the other way round.

And this attitude is ound on boto the divide; it isnt just physicimathematicians disparaging their colleagues.

As an interdisciplinary scientist, amiliar scenario: you stand up to your research at a conerence o bioand see the look o panic on peoplewhen they realise youre going to talmaths. Tat there are going to be eq

Soyoure the mathematicianasked me tentatively at a recent symlooking at my poster as thouequations might jump out and bite scary stu, apparently.

In act, one well-respected Dproessor condently inormed mewould be impossible or a biologistthe math skills I use in my research.like to tell him that actually, my rswas in guess what biology. Oits not impossible. Very ew things a

So yes, make sensible and sdecisions about what you study, weye on the potential career paths yotake. But never eel that your subjectnow have closed o opportunitiesuture to work on the scientic p

that interest you. Increasingly, therethan one way to get there.

And above all, its old advice ano a platitude, but true all the samsomething that interests you, somthat inspires and motivates you. Tyoure likely to do your best work, ana success o it whatever the subje

At the cutting edscientific resea

the boundarie

between subjecare becoming

increasingly bluYakissoba; flickr


20/2820 I, Science www.isciencemag.c20 I, Science

Goggle visionOur inability to see underwater has hidden a world just below the waves.Julie Gouldexplains howworld came into ocus with the invention o the humble swimming goggles.

umans might be the dominantspecies on land, but weveared less well underwater,partly due to our inabilityto see clearly. Tis meant a

world o adventure was inaccessible to usuntil the invention o the humble swimminggoggles. When this happened is unclear, but16th century paintings show Venetian coraldivers using rudimentary goggles madewith wood and polished glass. Weve comea long way since then: now goggles aredesigned by computers and made out o themost advanced materials. But why do weneed them in the rst place?

When light travels rom one medium (e.g.air) to another (e.g. water) its path is bent,a phenomenon known as reraction. Tisbending is because light travels at dierent

speeds in dierent materials. Te reractiveindex o a material is a measure o howquickly the light moves through it, comparedwith the speed o light in a vacuum. As thedensity o the material increases, so too doesits reractive index.

Te reractive index o air, or example,is roughly 1, as there is very little that willslow it down. However, when light movesthrough water, which is much denser than air,it is slowed down to about 75% o its speedin a vacuum, and so waters reractive indexis about 1.33. Te bigger the dierence inreractive index between two substances, themore the light will bend as it moves rom oneto the other. Tis is why a straw in a glass owater looks like it has bent at the surace. Itwould appear to bend even more i you put itinto a diamond (reractive index: 2.4).

o exploit this, our eyes have bulging,rounded corneas and a layer o liquid in ronto the pupil. Tese bend and pre-ocus thelight, enhancing the eyes optical power itsability to ocus beore the light reaches thelens. In humans, the cornea accounts or two-thirds o the reracting (optical) power: thelens only accounts or the remaining third.

HOur eyes are poorly adapted to s

water because the reractive indices oand our cornea are so similar. Tis mlight is hardly bent at all beore it realens. Te lens is then the wrong shapethe light properly onto our retina at. Instead, the image is ocussed sombehind our retina. Te eect is simprojector being too close to the screen

We use goggles to correct or oubeing too at to see underwater. place a bubble o air in ront o our allowing our eyes to bend and ocus tthe right amount so that we can see c

Humans have the ingenuity and indrive to create objects to help us ovedebilitating problem underwater. Evecannot become the dominant specieseas, we can still explore and observhearts content.

The cornea accounts fortwo-thirds of the optical

power of the eye: the lensonly accounts for theremaining third

Goggles place a bubbleair in front of our corallowing us to see clea

As



arly 2013 played host to astory that proves its never tooearly to get involved in seriousscientic research. Followingan above-average work

experience, Neil Ibata, a 15-year-old Frenchschoolboy, co-authored an astrophysicalpaper that might debunk the ideas o Einsteinand challenge most o the established theories

about how galaxies are created. Not only that,the study ended up being published on theront page oNature, making the 15-year-old the youngest ever contributor to theprestigious scientic journal.

Neil had been undertaking a workexperience at the ObservatoireAstronomique de Strasbourg, where hisather, Rodrigo Ibata, is a senior researcher.Rodrigo had asked his son to learn theprogramming language Python, so thathe might help him study the evolution ogalaxies around Andromeda, the closestmajor galaxy to our own Milky Way. Butin analysing the latest observations o thegalaxy provided by the Pan-AndromedaArchaeological Survey and collected, rom2008 to 2011, using the Canada-France-Hawaii elescope Neil turned up somesurprising results.

I asked my son to program a model o [the] dwar galaxies movements, and,within the weekend, he discovered thatthe dwar galaxies ormed a rotating disk!explained the proud ather. Astronomershave long been aware o the presence odwar galaxies around bigger galaxies likeAndromeda or the Milky Way, but Neils

contribution revealed that most o thegalaxies around Andromeda are organisedin a huge rotating at structure as opposedto moving randomly, as previously thought.

One reason this discovery is soimpressive is that it questions the veryoundation o astrophysics. According tothe standard theory on the ormation ogalaxies, based on Einsteins Teory oGeneral Relativity, dark matter is ormedby disorganized cosmic laments. I weollow those principles, the observed linearorganization o galaxies seems impossible.So, is it time to reject Einsteins oundationo relativity? Proessor Franoise Combes,an astrophysicist at the Observatoire de

Paris, warned that might be preMany more identical observationecessary to prove that the standardcant produce this kind o linear beh

Tanks to his observations, Neknown as the Milky Way Kid) wasco-author the study in Nature alohis ather and 14 other scientist

Europe, Australia, Canada and theStates. Although Neil is one o the ycontributors toNature, the youngesever to have research published inreviewed medical journal was an Amcalled Emily Rosa. She was only 1old when her study into therapeuticwhich she both conceived and perwas published in theJournal of the AMedical Association in 1998.

As well as incredibly impressivstories, more than anything, demothat with a keen interest in sciencenever too young to get involved in scientic research.

Schoolboys

Astronomical LeapMargaux Calon explains how a schoolboy, at only 15-years-old, made a discovery that could shakevery oundations o astrophysics.

E

An astrophysical paper thatmight debunk the ideas of

Einstein

If we follow those principles,the observed linear

organization of the galaxiesseems impossible

Niell Ibata, L



odern science is usuallyassociated with prestigiousacademic institutions orindustrial laboratories.And with these advanced

orms o scientic research comes the

requirement or prohibitively expensive andhighly specialised equipment, a problemurthered by the increasing complexity otodays specialised research. Perhaps as aresult o such restrictive complications,there has been a growing trend in DIY(Do-It-Yoursel) science: a orm o sciencewhich utilises easy-to-nd resources andlow-expense ingenuity to create home-builttechnologies. DIY scientists are undertakingall sorts o projects, such as spottingsupernovas rom their back gardens orsetting up molecular biology labs in theirgarages. But being cheap and easy meansthat DIY science is also the perect way ordeveloping countries to benet rom newinnovations. One idea that could vastlyimprove the quality o lie o thousands opeople is a special type o toilet.

Leaving behind the expensive equipment and industrial

laboratories,Alice Hazelton reports on how its Do-It-Yoursel

Science that might most help developing nations.

DIY Science for the

Developing World

According to the World HealthOrganization (WHO), nearly two billionpeople still live without appropriatesanitation acilities. Tis means thatbacteria and viruses rom human wastecan end up in the water supply, leading to

diseases such as dysentery, typhoid andcholera. Te WHO reports that two millionpeople, most o whom are children, dierom such diseases every year.

In the western world, weve managedto eradicate these deadly diseases due tomodern sanitation technologies such asthe ushing toilet. Although now part oour everyday lives, devices like this remainunviable or many developing countries dueto the large amount o water and complexsewage systems required. Tis is where DIYscience can help: to develop less costly andeasier-to-make alternatives that are suitableor the developing world.

Marc Deschusses and David Schaad,environmental engineers rom DukeUniversity in the US, have designed acomposting toilet that can be made romreadily available and inexpensive materials.Te concept involves a bioreactor systemthat will convert waste to biogas a gasproduced by the breakdown o organicmaterial which can then be burnedto sterilise the aeces. A sealed PVCchamber receives the solid waste and, inthis oxygen-ree environment, anaerobicbacteria break down the waste, producingmethane gas. Instead o releasing the gasinto the environment, the system burnsit, killing the bacteria and viruses withinthe waste. By harnessing the methanegenerated by the anaerobic bacteria, ratherthan releasing it into the atmosphere, thesystem is not only ecient but is also betteror the environment, because methane is a

greenhouse gas 25 times more potecarbon dioxide.

We believe the proposed could represent a major advaenvironmental and health protectdeveloping countries, said DescTe Bill and Melinda Gates Foundan organisation which supports inin education, world health and allpoverty has already granted the $100,000. Deschusses says the mobe used to test the system in the labbeore producing a prototype to teseld.

Tis is just one example o hoscience could dramatically improquality o lie or people in devcountries. Other innovative technthat have evolved rom DIY sciencererigerators made rom clay, solar and bicycle-charged mobile phone c

Tese DIY science solutions rean alternative solution to the sapproach o afuent nations donating money. Instead, these coshould share their knowledge and exwith the developing world so thainexpensive resources can be uengineer lie-changing technologies

Bill and Melinda Gate

M

DIY scientists arespotting supernovas

from their back

gardens, or settingup molecular

biology labs in theirgarages



espite conservation eorts,approximately 30% o allmarine, resh-water andland animals will becomeextinct in the next 50

years. In desperation, conservationists areturning towards the Plan B approach oconserving animals outside o their naturalhabitat. But some o these methods area bit more ambitious than a simple zoo:namely, the cryopreservation and cloningo endangered species.

Using cryopreservation, tissue samplesrom animals can be stored in liquidnitrogen (at 196 C) or potentiallyhundreds o years, later to be thawed outand re-grown. Normal body cells can bestored saely and one day used to reproducethe animal via cloning. Several projectshave already been established to startcollecting samples o living animals beorethey become extinct. For example, theUniversity o Nottingham, the ZoologicalSociety o London and the Natural HistoryMuseum have been running their FrozenArk Project since 1996.

Animal cloning uses a method calledsomatic cell nuclear transer. A nucleusis extracted rom a normal body cell (asomatic cell) and transerred to an emptyegg cell that has had its own nucleusremoved. An electric current is thenapplied to make the nucleus and egg celluse together. I it is successul, and theegg begins to divide normally, the resultingembryo is then implanted into the uterus oa surrogate mother to continue developing.

As cloning only requires a body cell rom

the animal to be cloned, it is particularlyuseul when the egg or sperm cells o theanimal are dicult to acquire. Just lookat the movie Jurassic Park: scientists usedblood cells to resurrect dinosaurs. So,by using cryopreservation and cloning,could we preserve cells rom currentlyendangered animals and one day resurrectthem even ater theyve gone extinct?

Jurassic Park or Noahs Ark

It has, in act, already been done. InJanuary 2009, a Pyrenean ibex was clonedrom the preserved DNA o a skin sampletaken beore the last animal died in 2000.However this individual, the rst animal toever become un-extinct, only survived orseven minutes beore dying o lung deects.

A major problem with the cloningapproach is its dismally low success rate oonly 6%. Tere can be many complications,such as early stage incompatibility o thenucleus and egg cell, complications inpregnancy or a long list o abnormalities inthe clone due to incorrect gene expression.

But cloning technology is ast improving.

In November o 2012, Brazilian scientistsannounced they were preparing to cloneeight endangered species, including blacklion tamarin monkeys, collared anteatersand jaguars. And in December 2011 aresearch team declared they were hopingto clone a woolly mammoth within veyears, using a well-preserved sample obone marrow and an Arican elephant as asurrogate mother.

However, many conservationists dislikethe idea o relying on cloning to saveendangered species, and insist that alleorts must primarily be ocused on habitatconservation: ater all, what use is beingable to clone an animal i its natural habitatis gone? Tese cloned animals will not beadapted to live in the new environment. Inaddition, a population o clones originatingrom only a ew individuals would be

genetically weak, and with no parents toteach them their natural behaviour theymight not survive at all. So while it may bepossible, cloned animals would only reallyhold aesthetic value. Surviving in zoos asnothing more than exhibits, rather thanrepopulate the planet, they would simplyremind us o the awul job we had done atsustaining the biodiversity o our planet.

epsos.de

D

Alex Gwytherdiscusses how conservation

has started to turn to more drastic measures

in order to preserve endangered species.



s a member o theDepartment o Materials,my research is based inthe Centre or NuclearEngineering, where I am

preparing and characterising UO2-based

materials, to simulate those materials oundin spent nuclear uel.

By studying in the Department oMaterials, you are given the opportunityto attend conerences, travel and workabroad, and meet people rom industry inorder to build up good relationships andhopeully help you with your uture career.Indeed, researchers at the Departmento Materials work closely with industrialpartners to make production moreeective and to create better products. Temajority o our research applies to sectorssuch as transport, energy conversion,environmental protection, healthcare andelectronics.

Tere are hundreds o projects withinthese groups, allowing anyone who isinterested in materials science to nd atheme that suits their interests. Our sixcore research themes are: advanced alloys;unctional materials; biomaterials andtissue engineering; nanotechnology andnanoscale characterisation; ceramics andglasses; as well as theory and simulation omaterials.

It is also an interdisciplinary researchgroup, bringing together researchersrom many dierent elds. Within theresearch group there are material scientists,engineers and physicists. Personally, I ama chemist with an extensive backgroundin radiochemistry. Furthermore, some ous are experimentalists, while others aredoing calculations and modelling systemson computer.

I this kind o work sounds inteand you want to join the DepartmMaterials, you really need to be sat least one o maths, physics or chat school. Although additional knowledge is also welcome or research projects.

So i the idea o inventively ascience to solve the challenging pro real industry and engineering to you, why not consider studyingDepartment o Materials? We bringto every day lie.

Illuminating Materials Scienc

A

Deciding on what to study at university can be hard, especially when some subjects have names tha

you might not have heard at school, such as biomedical engineering or geophysics. To help shed ligh

one such subject,Zoltan Hiezl, an Imperial College PhD student, describes his experiences in mate

science.

jacquelinetinn



he Postgraduate Certicatein Education (PGCE) is ashort-term course that helpstrain postgraduate studentsto become teachers.

Imperial College London, in conjunctionwith Canterbury Christ Church University(CCCU), has been running a bespoke PGCEtraining scheme since 2007 and since thenover 40 postgraduate students have gone onto become physics or chemistry teachers atschools across the Greater London area.

What makes INSPIRE (the InnovativeScheme or Postgraduates In Research andEducation) stand out rom other courses isthat the PGCE students are either at PhDor Masters-level in physics or chemistry,and that they can bring a range o extra-curricular Inspire Activities to the schoolsenrolled on the scheme. Many o theschools have been a part o INSPIRE sincethe beginning, having seen rst-hand howtheir pupils become engaged and excited bythese notoriously dicult science subjects.

Te PGCE students grow in condenceover their nine-and-a-hal-monthprogramme and quickly pick up the teachingreins ater just a ew weeks, much soonerthan on a traditional PGCE programme.Under careul observation rom their schoolmentors and CCCU tutors, their progress ismonitored and the students devote theirnon-teaching time to working on essays and

reective journals. Incorporated into theprogramme are educational trips to KewGardens, the Royal Institution and Centreo the Cell. Tese visits are an engaging andinormative way or the students to developtheir lesson plans, and are also a goodopportunity to get new ideas to enrich thecurriculum.

Te annual INSPIRE cohort is small nomore than 14 students at any one time butthis means that they bond quickly and areextremely supportive o each other. AndrewGuerriero, one o the students rom 2012scohort, explained his views on the course:Te INSPIRE programme is a uniqueteacher training course, characterised by itssmall cohort o students, holding doctoratesor masters rom leading universities. Tetutors rom CCCU oer an exceptionallevel o assistance, guidance, and a tailored,personalised support package.

Te training component is exceptionallyrigorous. Te contribution rom ImperialCollege is via overall project managementand the delivery o un science lessons, so-called Inspire Activities, to all partnershipschools on the programme. My experiencehas been challenging, but very rewarding.I wholeheartedly recommend thisprogramme, because o its uniqueness,over other more conventional PGCEprogrammes. I know that the INSPIREprogramme will continue to translate avery high calibre o research scientist, intodynamic and charismatic teachers.

Te scheme would not be able to runwithout the support and teaching expertiseo Canterbury Christ Church Universityor the input and management o ImperialCollege London. INSPIRE also receivesunding rom the Foyle Foundation to

provide the PGCE students with attractivebursaries, while the Ogden rust supportsINSPIRE in bringing Physics alive in statesecondary schools in particular. INSPIREcontinues to grow in strength and wehope to continue training and producingexceptional physics and chemistry teachersto inspire the next generation o buddingyoung scientists.

The INSPIRE PGCE Programme

T

Thinking about becoming a teacher ater university? Dr Annalisa Alexander, Mentoring and TutProgrammes Manager at the Imperial Outreach Ofce, tells us how the Imperial programme is he

to inspire a uture generation o physicists and chemists.

students growconfidence ovtheir nine-ana-half-mont

programme anquickly pick upteaching reins a

just a few wee



major part o any career inscience, no matter what thediscipline, is carrying outscientic research in a chosenspeciality. Budding youngscientists may conduct their

rst serious scientic study at university,or example, as part o their dissertation.Ater that, they might continue proessional

research at an institution or move to theprivate sector. Whatever course a researchcareer takes, it is now seen as essential toproperly communicate discoveries to theoutside world. Tis is known as PublicEngagement with Science and echnology(PES) and it aects nearly every scienticenterprise today.

However, it was not always so. Roughly50 years ago it had become clear to somethat society was splitting into two dierentcamps. In his contribution to the RedeLectures in 1959, Charles Percy Snow,a chemist and novelist, gave a lecture atCambridge University entitled Te woCultures, in which he described a gaporming between the arts and the sciencesbecause o a breakdown o communicationbetween these two cultures.

Tom Bragg details how public engagement has become a key

eature o 21st century science.

Why communicate

research?

Coverage o science in the media haddwindled and many innovations wentunreported. While disheartening or sciencehoping or publicity, it also meant that mucho the general public lost a connection withmany important scientic advances o thetime. However, it wasnt until the early1980s that this lack o communication andthe growing public distrust o science were

seriously addressed.

In 1985, the Royal Society delivereda report on Te Public Understandingo Science (PUS), also known as TeBodmer Report, to assess the relationshipbetween the general public and modernscience. In the report, there was a call orthe public to receive a better education inscience and that scientists should considerscience communication as integral to theirwork. However, the report later receivedmuch criticism, with many nding aultin its condescending tone and view o theignorant public as an empty vessel waitingto be lled by the teachings o the superiorscience.

During the 1990s, various incidentsand developments suggested that newunderstandings o the relationship betweenscience and society were required, andso the House o Lords delivered a newreport in 2000, which recommendedthat Research Councils and universitiesshould strongly encourage communicationtraining or scientists and, in particular,training in dealing with the media. Insummary, this report suggested that thepublic should be involved in dialogue withscientists such that they might be betterinormed about potential research, as wellas allowing them the potential to have someinput into the uture direction o scienticstudies. Tis seems entirely air as not onlyis it the taxpayers money that usually undsscientic research, but oten members othe public will be aected by its outcome.

Te question o the publics knoo science had moved to a question and the House o Lords report resthe establishment o the Public Engao Science and echnology. As involving the PUS ideals o disresearch at airs and talking to jouabout new discoveries, PES develoconcept o an improved two-way prcommunication, with science partiin public dialogue through means ojuries, ocus groups or deliberative p

Tese dialogues involve a group othat represent the public having a diswith scientists, politicians and peaected industries, about the use oproposed research. Te discussionsthe implications and potential benthe research or wider society. Te inis that these discussions will resultjust scientists, but also the aectedhaving a direct eect on how the presearch proceeds.

RDEC

A

The Bodmer Reportportrayed the public

as an empty vesselwaiting to be filledby the teachings of

superior science



cience ction has conjuredup a plethora o ctional alienspecies, rom the harmlesslikes o E.. to the positivelybarbaric xenomorphs o the

Alien series. Te possibility o lie existingoutside o Earth, especially intelligent lie,has ascinated both scientists and non-scientists or generations. But, should wereally be searching or it?

Whilst theres not yet denite proothat lie exists outside o Earth its almosta mathematical certainty. It has beenestimated that there are more than 170billion galaxies in the observable Universe.Given the millions and billions o stars andplanets contained within each one its morelikely than not that some orm o lie existsin a ar-ung galaxy.

It has been claimed by many, includingtheoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, thatsearching or intelligent lie is a dangerousendeavour. Te argument goes that anyspecies nding us or being alerted to ourpresence would arrive to plunder our planetor resources, be they mineral, organic orhuman. Or maybe theyd pop over just towipe us out, Independence Day style. Butwhy would they bother?

Earth is no longer a goldmine o resources.Humankind is accepting that Earths naturalresources are in decline, and were lookingout to space to meet our needs, throughasteroid strip-mining or example. An alienresource acquisition team would probablymark Earth as spent, especially consideringthe vast number o other, resource-ladenplanets and celestial bodies in the Universe.

SAny species capable o crossing the vastdistances o space and time to nd us wouldhave solved any resource issues they hadlong ago, and would hardly need what Earthhas to oer.

I anything, contacting intelligent lieelsewhere would be a pointless endeavour.We share a common genetic structureand building block (carbon) with all otherEarth-bound organisms, and yet we canonly converse intelligibly with othermembers o our species. Chimpanzees, ourclosest living relatives, share approximately95-99% identical DNA with us; that mere1-5% dierence is enough to split usapart and account or our dierences andaccomplishments. Chimpanzees, to ourknowledge, have not landed on the Moon.

Tis raises a thought-provoking question:i we cannot meaningully communicatewith chimpanzees, organisms whose DNAdiers rom ours by as little as 1%, whatis the likelihood intelligent lie, havingdeveloped on a completely dierentplanet under potentially radically dierentconditions, would be able to relate to usin any way, shape or orm? Te answer isprobably way below 1%.

So where does this leave us? Practically

speaking, alone. Searching or intelligentlie is a waste o time and resources, both owhich could be ar better spent elsewhere.We cant rely on a superior alien species toswoop down and x up all our problems thats our job. I we can do that, maybewell be the ones swooping down on worldsunknown.

Its life, Jim,

but not as we

know itForget your UFO hunting and exoplanet probes, Laurence Pope

gives us his opinion on why we shouldnt be searching or alien lie.


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i, science special issue 2013

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