Oxfordshire Science Festival
OSF 2014
Science in Your World, Bonn Square, Oxford, 8 March
Science in Your World was a free science fair open to anyone who wanted to have a go. We had lots of hands-on activities for people to explore from the Microscope Activity Kits.
Wow! How? Museum of Natural History and Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford, 15 March
This free hands-on family science fair filled the museums with exciting activities and experiments. Vistors young and old, were able to make, test, explore and explode. Dr Yan Wong of Bang Goes the Theory was there too!
ATOM! Official closing event of the 2014 Festival, Abingdon Market Square, 20-22 March
ATOM was a celebration of science and technology. Bringing together many of the cutting edge science and technology organisations in the region, with some of the sharpest minds in the country for an extravaganza of science entertainment and intrigue!
There were fascinating talks from Jim Al-Khalili (A life Scientifique, BBC Radio 4,) Robin Ince (Radio 4 Infinite Monkey Cage) and Professors Frank Close and Jocelyn Bell-Burnell.
The RMS took part in the fun hands-on science event in Abingdon Market Square, giving out freebies and encouraging people to explore the hidden world under the microscope!
OSF 2013
The Oxfordshire Science Festival 2013 took place from 9 – 24 March. To continue our mission to promote microscopy in the local area, the Royal Microscopical Society organised a series of activities.
Royal Microscopical Society: Seeing is Believing
Cornerstone Arts Centre, Didcot.
7 March – 7 April
Our series of events kicked off with the opening night of the micrograph exhibition at the elegant Cornerstone Arts Centre in Didcot. The gallery space displayed dozens of handpicked images from artists around the world. At the foot of the gallery enlarged, high-definition slides of the artwork flickered onto the wall intermittently. Both children and adults were in attendance, the former enjoying extended stints on the available microscopes; as well as wandering around to appreciate the vivid images on display.
The micrographs themselves came from both the natural world and the physical world, with a combination of light and electron microscopy on view. One of the images, nestled in the entrance, could be viewed through 3D glasses; further enhancing the spectacle of the exhibition.
Many of the micrographs taken from the physical world provided cryptic, almost psychedelic imagery. From the natural world the pictures of diatoms exploded with primary colours and transformed into surreal, Dali-esque landscapes. Perhaps the micrographs of greatest intrigue were the ones that took on the shape of everyday or familiar objects. At the opening a group of schoolchildren fondly deliberated over Rok Kostanjsek’s “Micro-seal”, the anterior of Walckenaeria cucullata; a money spider from the Linyphiidae family. It does indeed resemble a seal playing with a ball and claimed 2nd prize in the electron microscopy for life sciences award category in the 2012 RMS International Micrograph Competition and was only pipped to 1st by Anne Weston’s magical “Dancing parapodia”, a reef-like depiction of the common ragworm.
The opening night was also attended by many prestigious and long-serving members of the society, as well as regular contributors, experts and special guests invited from the local area, who milled around and discussed the aesthetic merits of the works on display. The exhibition contained submissions as far back as 2006, such as David McCarthy’s remarkable “Fly on sugar” a SEM image of a fly appearing to balance on a stack of sugar cubes, through to last year’s shortlisted micrographs. For this very reason, the exhibition was a wonderful overview for veteran microscopists as well as newcomers to the art.
We were pleased to receive this positive feedback, from visitors young and old:
“Innovative and Intriguing” – Kathy
“Very helpful for my GCSE project, amazing” – Kylie
“Fantastic display. Unusual and eye-opening, a world otherwise unseen except for science” – Joy
“Really helping me for my science” – Dylan
“My 2 year old was very impressed; he thought they were fireworks/the sun. I loved them too!” – Jane
“Very cool. I like the mole nose” – Connor
“Colour enhancement clarifies and makes artistic these amazing natural structures” – P Cooke
CSI: DIDCOT
Cornerstone Arts Centre, Didcot
16 March
The Royal Microscopical Society and the Cornerstone Arts Centre enlisted the help of over 40 children aged 3-15 to become detectives for the day. We needed their help to solve the mystery of who had stolen one of our precious micrographs from the gallery!
The workshop asked children and their parents to examine fingerprints, pieces of ribbon and paint samples to piece together all the parts of the puzzle and decide on a culprit.
With three sessions running throughout the day, all the young detectives were incredibly keen and enthusiastic - fascinated by what they could see under the microscope. They got especially excited at the chance to collect their own samples from the footprint found in the gallery.
We received some great feedback and the event has definitely inspired several future microscopists and forensic scientists!
Cafe Scientifique
Cornerstone Arts Centre, Didcot
19 March
To accompany our micrograph exhibition, the Royal Microscopical Society took over the Cornerstone Arts Centre’s resident science evening Café Scientifique with a talk entitled ‘Seeing is Believing: The Science behind the Art’ by Dr Louise Hughes from Oxford Brookes University.
The evening attracted around 60 visitors and was a resounding success covering the various different techniques used in microscopy and even how some of the images featured in our exhibition were obtained. There were several pairs of 3D glasses on hand for people to explore some of the images in even more depth.
Visitors also took the opportunity to browse our micrograph exhibition in the interval which led to a number of interesting questions in the following Q&A session.
Microscopes and Mountains
Dept of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford
23 March
Following the success of last year’s event ‘Volcanoes: the Magical Microscopic World of Magma’, with the help of Owen Green we again ran an event at the Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford. This year the topic was ‘Microscopes and Mountains’. Combining a public lecture from Dr Dave Water (Curator of the Mineralogy and Petrology Collections, Oxford University Museum of Natural History & Lecturer in Metamorphic Petrology) with a number of hands-on activities, the aim was to get visitors of all ages excited and enthusiastic about microscopy.
Although the weather was very much against us – snow and freezing temperatures which would have discouraged even the hardiest individuals – the event was surprisingly well attended. After Dr Dave Water’s lecture all the visitors explored our range of microscopes games and activities, kindly supplied by Noel Fuller from Microscope Services Ltd.
So interesting were these that we struggled to persuade everyone to leave when our time was up at 2pm.
OSF 2012
As part of the Oxfordshire Science Festival 2012, the RMS organised a public event entitled "Volcanoes: The Magical Microscopic World of Magma" at the Dept of Earth Sciences at Oxford University. This event enabled over 50 members of the public to meet with Earth Scientists who specialise in and study the products and effects of volcanic activity throughout the world, with particular emphasis on the use of microscopy in the study of volcanic products such as lava and ash that compose the new sediments. The highlight of the session was a lecture delivered by leading world expert Volcanologist Professor David Pyle of the Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford, whose talk illustrated and clearly explained the difference types of volcanoes. Spectacular images of volcanoes from Santorini, off the coast of Greece, Chile and the Afar Valley of Ethiopia, studied by Professor Pyle, his co-workers and students provided the audience with an excellent insight into the hazards of sampling and working in these volatile areas.
Posters and 'hands-on' displays in the Atrium and Teaching Laboratory areas illustrated many aspects of volcanology, including how to distinguish the commonly occuring minerals found in volcanic rocks using the polarizing microscope.
An interactive "Disaster Zone" exhibition and activity centre provided competitions and games, a chance to create your own earthquake on a computer, see volcanoe's 'erupting' and arguably the highlight of the day; the chance to dress in the volcanologist's protective heat-resistant silver suit and be photographed in front of a volcanic poster.
Special thanks must be given to Noel Fuller and Alan Todd from Microscope Services Ltd for providing refreshments, a free raffle and a display of a range of Leica microscopes with cameras for visitors to use to examine specimens and capture images, and the equipment for recording the lecture, and relaying live to a screen in the Atrium. Also to Jeannie Scott and her colleagues for running the Disaster Zone which was a big hit with the visitors, and of course to Owen Green on our Outreach and Education Committee for helping to organise such a brilliant event.
OSF 2011
As part of the 2011 Oxfordshire Science Festival, the outdoor exhibition in the grounds of Oxford Castle, entitled “Seeing is Believing: Worlds Under the Microscope”, featured light and electron micrographs from the 2004, 2006, 2008 and 2010 RMS Scientific Imaging Competitions.
Visitors experienced hidden detail from the biological and materials worlds, a fascinating world of minutiae detail ordinarily hidden from the naked eye was revealed.
