calendario eventi  :: 

X

3/4/2013

Strictly Science

Imperial College London, London

Strictly Science: keeping one step ahead is an interactive exhibition inviting members of the public to explore past and present medical research, and to speculate on the future.

From 4th-14th April 2013, Imperial College London plays host to a series of installations, each telling different but overlapping stories, revealing the origin of the Medical Research Council 100 years ago. A century-old laboratory introduces the stories of Sir Henry Dale, Almroth Wright and Dame Harriette Chick, whose pioneering work on the nervous system, vaccination and vitamin-deficiency disease respectively, has transformed our lives today.

The 1913 lab installation is juxtaposed against a contemporary neurotechnology lab headed by Dr Aldo Faisal, whose team uses bespoke software, video game technology and computer algorithms to interrogate how the brain helps us move. A future sound installation explores our hopes and fears for the next century. What will the world be like in 2113?

The opinions of public figures, from Melvyn Bragg to Robert Winston, are shared alongside those of UK primary schoolchildren. The public is invited to add to the growing video archive of talking heads recorded in the act of imagining the future.

---

Yesterday

A century-old laboratory, typical of those funded by the early Medical Research Council, transports visitors back in time to the research environment of Sirs Henry Dale and Almroth Wright, and Dame Harriette Chick. Scientists within the 1913 lab reenact classic experiments using antique equipment, from hand-blown glassware to a clockwork kymograph, revealing how important discoveries in neurophysiology, bacteriology and nutrition were made. Dale conducted pioneering research on the central nervous system and described how nerves transmit electrochemical messages in the form of neurotransmitters. He identified the first of these chemicals: acetylcholine, the principal chemical messenger used by the brain to initiate muscle movement, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1936. Wright pioneered the use of preventative medical treatments such as the autogenous vaccine (using bacteria from patients to create vaccines) with the result that British soldiers were the only troops in WWI to be immunised against typhoid. Demonstrations of his antiseptic and war-wound studies are relived. Chick’s research on vitamin-deficiency disease demonstrated the importance of dietary and environmental factors to health. Like Wright, she was aware of the importance of preventing disease, through adequate nutrition. After WWI, she was sent to Vienna to investigate whether vitamin deficiencies observed in animals had a parallel in humans. Her trials showed that treatment with cod-liver oil and sunshine can cure rickets in human subjects. Visitors are invited to sample some of Chick’s vitamin-rich recipes.

Today we have a much better understanding of how our brain and nervous system works, we’re routinely vaccinated against infectious diseases and we understand the importance of a healthy balanced diet. The 1913 lab reveals the stories of these great advances in medical research that have shaped the world as we know it. Scientists working for the Medical Research Council today continue to search for solutions to the major public health concerns of the modern era.

---

Today

The present-day installation is based on the research of neurotechnologist, Dr Aldo Faisal (Department of Bioengineering, Imperial College London) whose team explores the role of the brain in movement. As Aldo explains, “movement is the only way that the brain can communicate with the world.” Faisal’s team combines expertise in engineering, physics, programming and computational biology to better understand the brain. Using everyday digital technology from Wii balance boards to custom-made devices such as the eye-tracking headset (pictured), they investigate healthy movement and provide solutions for people with disabilities. Faisal’s interest in movement could provide better diagnostics for conditions such as Parkinson’s disease. He is currently comparing the way healthy people move compared to patients. In his words, “disease might be detected early by simply analysing the way someone walks, for example.” Visitors will have the chance to play a video game using only their eyes and to experience what it’s like to be very old or very young. The living-room style lab plays host to a research subject wearing a motion capture suit, the same kind used to create characters from the film Avatar. A series of routine activities is translated through 45 body sensors into a detailed trace of body movement, a data rich stream for analysis. Visitors join scientists in assessing the raw data as it emerges through a live monitor.

Dr Simona Parrinello collaborates with the Faisal lab to investigate the way that broken nerves can repair. Faisal feeds data from Simona’s experiments into bespoke computer algorithms that model the molecular processes fundamental to nerve regeneration, facilitating a better understanding of how intervention might affect the fundamental processes at work. Parrinello and Faisal’s research, and that of several other scientists funded by the Medical Research Council, is revealed by a series of short films – Science in Progress – screened in the Strictly Science cinema. Professor Jimmy Bell asks what makes us fat; Professor Wendy Bickmore explores how genetic information is stored and read; and Dr Clare Davy explains how a virus can cause cancer.

---

Tomorrow

What do these public figures all have in common? Dr James Lovelock invented the electron-capture detector while working for the Medical Research Council over 50 years ago; Mona Siddiqui is Professor of Islamic and Interreligious Studies at the University of Edinburgh; Lord Winston combines his professorship at Imperial College London with medical practice, scientific research, TV and radio presenting and politics; Mary Warnock is a life peer and in her own words ‘down to earth’ philosopher, specialising in morality, religion and politics; Melvyn Bragg presented the South Bank Show for over 40 years and now brings us In Our Time; and Baroness Greenfield is a neuroscientist, broadcaster and writer, who also sits in the House of Lords.

They have all taken the time to answer the following questions on camera for the Strictly Science future sound installation. If you fell asleep and woke up at some point in the next century, what year would you choose, and what would the world look like? What are your greatest hopes and fears for the future? Their views – and those of other leading experts across the domains of science, politics, religion, media, technology, economics and the arts – are shared alongside those of primary schoolchildren across the UK, who participated in the Imagine the Future competition. A sneak preview of future visions is available through our YouTube channel.

Today’s featured video: Jon Snow Journalist and presenter shares his hopes and fears for the future with the 100-year old Medical Research Council. Get tomorrow’s video update via Twitter. 1 day remaining until exhibition launch…!!

Contact:
Brona McVittie (brona.mcvittie@csc.mrc.ac.uk or 020 8383 8247)
Anthony Lewis (anthony.lewis@imperial.ac.uk)

Press contact
Paget associates
Alice Parsons
+44 (0) 20 7836 2703
17 Tavistock Street
London WC2E7PA
alice@pagetpr.com
http://www.pagetassociates.com/

Press preview: THURSDAY 4th APRIL from 6pm

Imperial College London
Exhibition Road - London SW7 2AZ
10:00 - 18:00

stampa

permanent link