April 2020

LIVE talk | Making healthy babies: Using nanotechnology to create safer medicines for use in pregnancy | 18:30 (UK time), 5 May 2020

LIVE streaming at YouTube 18:30 (UK time), 5 May 2020. Summary Although many babies are born healthy, 5-10% of pregnancies are complicated by conditions such as pre-eclampsia, fetal growth restriction or pre-term birth. This causes some babies to be born too small or too early, and others may die in the womb or just after birth. Currently, there are no medicines available to treat these conditions, mainly because testing new drugs in pregnancy is risky. The pharmaceutical industry fears causing harm to the developing baby, so rarely include pregnant women in their clinical trials and do not invest in this… Read More »LIVE talk | Making healthy babies: Using nanotechnology to create safer medicines for use in pregnancy | 18:30 (UK time), 5 May 2020

Unravelling the complexities of coronavirus: Q+A with Professor Sheena Cruickshank | 27 April 2020

Sheena Cruickshank is a Professor of Immunology in the Division of Infection, Immunity and Respiratory Medicine at the University of Manchester. Whilst the world deals with the effects of the 2019 coronavirus outbreak, we have all experienced disruptions and changes to our daily lives. But how much do we really know about the coronavirus? From the underlying science to the most promising treatment options and possible future impacts, Sheena answers our questions on the novel coronavirus and sheds light on the current global pandemic. What are viruses and how do they differ from bacteria? Viruses are made up of a… Read More »Unravelling the complexities of coronavirus: Q+A with Professor Sheena Cruickshank | 27 April 2020

Sci Bar: How Do You Observe 1.33 Billion Km3 of Ocean? – Live Streaming on Monday 20th April at 18.30!

How Do You Observe 1.33 Billion Km3 of Ocean? This question will be asked by Dr Matt Donnelly, Lead Data Scientist, UK Argo Programme. The oceans play a key role in the climate and provide a habitat for a wide range of marine life, but with an average depth of 3.7km and a surface area of 360 million km2, how on earth do you collect the data to understand its physical properties, how it moves, and how it supports life? Find out about the robotic Argo floats used to sustain our observations of this dynamic underwater world. Monday 20th April @ 18:30.… Read More »Sci Bar: How Do You Observe 1.33 Billion Km3 of Ocean? – Live Streaming on Monday 20th April at 18.30!

‘Fake news’: debunking myths in the media

In a world dominated by the media, we are faced with the task of untangling a web of ‘fake news’ that is presented as fact. Despite a lack of clarity around the prevalence of misinformation in the media, it is prevalent enough for the Cambridge Dictionary to accept ‘fake news’ into its publications[1] and for society to accept it into its own vocabulary. From miracle cures for cancer to false claims about what is in our food, the spread of misinformation about science is dangerous. What types of unreliable information are there? Misinformation is the unintentional spread of inaccurate information,… Read More »‘Fake news’: debunking myths in the media