Author: Paul Roach

Dr Paul Roach in Loughborough University’s School of Science hosted visitors from St. John’s College Cardiff to get hands on experience of practical laboratory work over a range of discipline areas. These included culturing living cells in the StemLab biolabs, making micro-devices in a clean room facility, using a scanning electron microscope and understanding how chromatography is used for a whole host of analytical methods. The students fed back from their experience that they learned a lot and were able to explore areas of science that they have never thought about.

During July, I undertook a work experience with Dr Roach at Loughborough University which was an incredible experience. It really brought my passion for science alive and I was able to experience chemistry and biology in a practical setting. My most memorable moment was probably gas chromatography which interested me by how many uses it had and the explanations by the members of staff were brilliant. I was able to use this experience to strengthen my application for medicine and it motivated me to continue along this career path.

Matthew Logan

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We went to Loughborough University to undertake work in the laboratories there with Dr. Roach for work experience, during which we experienced quite a lot of amazing things that combined chemistry, physics and biology together. My favourite part was looking at electron microscopy, as I could look into any part I wanted to observe and the appearance was so magical that it let me realize that a very, very small corner on the earth could have such a wonderful world inside. Besides this we also done many fantastic things such as cell cultures, fluorescent imaging and analysis Chemistry which greatly broadened my horizons. As an overseas student, I haven’t done any formal practical work before the AS level, so this trip was quite challenging for me, but it really taught me a lot of useful skills and developed my interest in natural science. Really want to thank Dr. Roach as he was so kind and knowledgeable that he arranged our rewarding trip perfectly and helped us so much along the way.

Thank you very much for this amazing trip!

Estella Shi

It was quite a long week with lots to see and do, but everyone left smiling and making plans for a return next year. St. John’s College Cardiff students are welcome anytime – and their teachers are pretty fun too.

Paul Roach

News Article

On 29^th September the Science Council held its first ever policy conference titled The Science Council Climate Conference – The UK Pathway to Net-Zero. The event brought together Science Council members and other organisations from across the science and engineering community to discuss how the UK can meet its targets for reducing emissions and reaching net-zero in the coming years.

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The conference drew on the diverse expertise of Science Council member organisations, exploring in depth topics such as the challenges and opportunities in the food system, achieving net-zero in the steel industry and the role of hydrogen in balancing future supply and demand.

Speaking at the conference, Sir Patrick Vallance, Government Chief Scientific Adviser and National Technology Adviser, said:

“Every year, we’re losing Arctic sea ice and CO₂ levels have dramatically increased since the industrial revolution. There are clearly unarguable changes that are occurring. Science and technology are undoubtedly central to what we need to do. We need to be focused on technologies that we can already see, technologies that we have already invented, and ask how do we work out which of those we can implement and scale.”

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The Science Council’s President, Professor Carole Mundell, closed the day by summarising six themes that became evident to her throughout the discussions. These were science, scale, society, supply chains, systems and solutions. Professor Mundell also thanked all of the societies, partners, speakers and participants for their part in making the day so inspiring, insightful and motivating.

The Science Council looks forward to building on the connections and conversations from the conference and will continue its convening role within and beyond its membership.

To find out more about future events held by the Science Council and its professional body Members see their website: https://sciencecouncil.org/category/event/

Videos of the livestreamed sessions can be found here:

Plenary Panel 1 – The UK’s Net-Zero Challenge: https://youtu.be/cCLGOmlQS-I

Keynote Address by Sir Patrick Vallance: https://youtu.be/CZx9jnQcmQ8

Plenary Panel 2 – The role of the UK science and engineering community: https://youtu.be/XJaIbQ7QVME

The full programme of the conference is available here:

https://sciencecouncil.org/web/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Climate-Conference-September-2022.pdf

Contact: Ruth Herbert, Marketing and Communications Officer r.herbert@sciencecouncil.org or marketing@sciencecouncil.org

In this year’s annual student conference the Society launched a student journal – this is a great opportunity which we are excited to announce.

Students can publish work carried out in their undergraduate projects, maximising dissemination of their research in the Natural Sciences and giving them a platform to further strengthen their CV and develop a research-focussed career. Submissions are welcome from any student carrying out their project in the Natural Sciences, with multi-, cross- and interdisciplinary work being particularity sought.

Please see here for more details. We look forward to seeing this journal grow in the coming years!

The Society for Natural Sciences is a professional body for scientists, educators and students who work across the disciplinary boundaries in science. It exists to encourage collaboration and the sharing of ideas among its members, share best practice for science education and interdisciplinarity, represent interdisciplinary science in education policy and promote the benefits of interdisciplinary science to prospective students, educators and industry.

This social media interns role is to support society activity on social media by generating ideas for content and producing content which can support our work to promote interdisciplinary science to prospective students, raise the profile of natural sciences and interdisciplinary science as a whole and raise the profile of the society and the work that it does.

The Society for Natural Sciences are looking for a few enthusiastic Natural Sciences students from one of our member institutions to help us to raise the profile of the work of the society and Natural Sciences. The role will entail regular online meetings with our Social Media Manager to discuss, plan and generate ideas for content and then independent work to create static and video content which can be used on our social media channels. The Social Media Interns will also take an overview of our digital presence and make suggestions for improvements and development.

Please see here for more details.