Planetariums, Stars and Spacecraft..

In today's society, we spend a significant proportion of our lives staring at television and computer screens trying to keep up with the world. By doing this we often forget to look at our own planet, especially the sky. If you're new to physics and all this space-y stuff (as I am), then a planetarium is a great way to explore the skies and learn about the feats of mankind in exploring the planets, whilst remaining warm.

I was lucky enough to visit two planetariums whilst on a recent trip to Newcastle and both were equally fabulous. First, I visited the Centre for Life which I have mentioned in a previous blog post, where I watched a short film titled 'Back to the Moon for Good'. The film faded in to millions of stars and you felt like you were floating in outer space, miles away from civilisation. Amazing graphics took you on a journey through the cosmos and told you the story of the first moon landing and why no one has been back since.

Google Lunar XPRIZE

Debts and austerity mean days of exploring planets are the last thing on governments minds as obviously getting to the moon isn't the most cost-effective enterprise. However, the Google Lunar XPrize, initiates the  race to the moon once again. 33 teams from all over the world must build a spacecraft which can successfully land on the moon, travel 500 metres across the surface and send images back to Earth. The best part? The teams expenses must be no more than 10% government funded, meaning getting to the moon on a budget! Who knows, one of these teams may revolutionise rocket building as we know it and design a cheaper way of sending spacecraft into orbit, meaning more missions could take place. Exciting stuff. The deadline of the competition is December 31st 2015 which really isn't that far away. It's brilliant that people from all over the world can have a go at sending something they have designed themselves into the skies. Many teams rely on volunteers to aid the success of their project, and it gives a chance for people not originally from the field of physics to get involved. The film showed that one team member was a neuroscientist who compared the building of a rocket to the human brain and all the processes that go on are delicately intertwined. I cannot convey how much it made me want to be a physicist (and this is coming from a chemist). The winning team will receive the grand prize of  $20 million and I imagine will go down in history. Since watching the film, I've been reading a lot about the respective teams and all of them have chosen different ways of approaching the challenge and comprise of different scientists and engineers from different fields; it's truly inspiring.

Whilst also in the North-East, I visited the Great North museum, previously the Hancock, which also blew me away with it's planetarium. You have to pay for the planetarium at this venue, but it's not expensive at all. I paid £1.95 for a film titled 'Dawn of the Space Age' which was around 40 minutes long. Not bad at all, and totally worth it! In 'Dawn of the Space Age' you relive space exploration, starting from the first time an artificial satellite was launched, through the space race where the Soviet Union and the USA battled to see who could get into space first. The Soviets won with the launch of Sputnik 1 in October 1957, and the battle continued to outdo each other, resulting in the USA's Apollo 11 landing in 1969, whereby the first humans set foot on the moon. As someone who has only recently developed an interest in space and doesn't really know much about space travel, it was enlightening and entertaining to be taken through the growth and advancements of spacecraft through the ages. Being the feminist that I am, I only have one issue with the film and that was that much emphasis was placed on the first man on the moon, but not on the first woman in space. Valentina Tereshkova was the first woman in space and was on board the Soviet's 'Vostok 6' which launched 16th June 1963. The Great North has many other planetarium shows available to watch and I thoroughly recommend visiting any planetarium. Learning about space is fascinating and opens up so many questions that you want to find the answers to. It's great if you're an inquisitive individual.

My love for Science museums

During my time in Newcastle, the most outstanding place I have visited has been the Centre for Life. Situated in Times Square, Newcastle upon Tyne the centre attracts around 250,000 visitors a year and is the 'largest provider of school science workshops in Europe'.

Curiosity Zone

The centre provides all sorts of activities including the 'Curiosity Zone' where science activities are provided to children, along with instructions' (sometimes) but the actual aim of the activity is not given. The curiosity zone aims to replicate research and development and compares research to a 'formal sort of play'. I fully agree, as all scientific research involves some playing around with concepts or reactants; the path is never straightforward and and the target almost never met first time around. I really loved the idea of leaving children to make what they wanted of the equipment provided and explore it for themselves without an adult telling them what they should be doing. Each child approached activities in a different way and had different ideas of what they 'should' do or what the equipment was used for. It's a great way to inspire budding scientists and give children an opportunity to 'think like a scientist'.

Some of the activities on offer in the Curiosity zone included 'The Reactable', a table where you can create sound using programmed shapes. The sound can then be adjusted by placing other shapes next to those already laid on the table, as the pucks interact with each other. Hence by using the process of placing shapes carefully and adjusting and fine-tuning the sounds you want, you can create a digital musical masterpiece. The Reactable aims to encourage creativity and curiosity and all in all is fun to play around with. 

 A video of me dancing to our own musical masterpiece. I have some seriously groovy dance moves going on that I sincerely apologise for. 

When I first got there I was already extremely excited, but my excitement got taken to a whole new level when I saw that one of the exhibitions on show was 'BODY WORLDS vital', which is an exhibition by Dr. Gunther von Hagens, using real human bodies. Dr von Hagens invented the technique of plastination in 1977 whilst working as an anatomist in Germany and the exhibition is approved by the Human Tissue Authority. To see real human bodies and the amazing things they are capable of is truly fascinating. Real people may donate their bodies to plastinated after they pass away and although this may seem a little grim, the result is a display of amazing exhibits informing the audience of how the human body works and how to live a healthy lifestyle. Samples of healthy lungs compared to those with emphysema and lung cancer can be seen and it's shocking to see how much damage you are capable of doing to your body. Although a lot of people are initially unsure about the exhibition, it is there to spread a good message about the importance of life. Of course photographs are not allowed to be taken inside the exhibition, after all these are people's bodies and must be respected, so I took a picture of the poster instead.

I also visited the centres Planetarium, however I'll leave this for the next blog post as I've been fortunate enough to visit two planetariums in two days, so I'll leave the awesome space stuff for later. :-)

 Centre for Life

My favourite females

As you've probably guessed by now, I'm all for getting more girls into STEM subjects and science outreach is something I'm really passionate about. It's obvious that throughout history, women in science and technology have been overlooked and their ideas and achievements not seen as important as those of their male counterparts. Whilst referring to women who happen to be scientists as 'female scientists' doesn't exactly help with striving for equality between the sexes in STEM fields (afterall we don't refer to men as male scientists), there have been some pretty damn good women in science and I thought I would share my favourites.

This is a list of women from STEM fields who inspire me. I've purposely left Marie Curie out of this list because in case you didn't know, she's not the only women who has played a role in pushing science into the 21st century. Also, some of these women are living today and that's just fab; these women are role models for girls like me and inspire me to continue in my field and make a career out of it in the hope that one day, I'll achieve great things too. So here it is, AWESOME WOMEN ALERT.

1. Hedy Lamarr
In my opinion, one of the most beautiful women ever, Hedy Lamarr also happened to be extremely intelligent. She and George Antheil invented an incredibly sophisticated piece of electronic engineering which they called the 'Secret Communication System' whereby frequency hopping was used to prevent infiltration of signals from radio-controlled missiles. Simultaneously, the radio frequencies of  missiles would change, preventing enemies from detecting the signals.

Hedy Lamarr

Most people would say that she 'doesn't look like a scientist', however she proved that it's possible to have beauty and brains. As a woman, you can have it all, you don't have to choose between being intelligent and being attractive.

The woman who was one of the most popular Hollywood actresses of her day also had a room in her house reserved for drafting ideas and the shelves filled with engineering books. I find the fact that she was extremely creative both inspiring and fascinating because as well as being an actress, she also applied her creativity to engineering and problem solving and helped pave the way for modern day technologies mobile phones.

2. Dorothy Hodgkin
Dorothy Hodgkin won the Nobel prize for Chemistry in 1964 and quite rightly so. X-ray crystallography is a common method used by chemists today and Hodgkin advanced this and discovered the 3D structures of some of the  most important biomolecules. I learnt about Dorothy Hodgkin in one of my lectures about medicine and chemistry. She found the structure of penicillin, a chemical so often used in treatment and therefore made a significant contribution to both chemistry and medicine as often in science structure determines function. She also discovered the 3D structure of insulin and also taught students, notably Margaret Roberts (later Margaret Thatcher).

Dorothy Hodgkin

3. Rosalind Franklin

Rosalind Franklin

When people think about discovery of the structure of DNA, most people associate James Watson and Francis Crick with this amazing feat, after all they were awarded with the Nobel prize in 1962. However what allowed them to recognise the 'double helix' as DNA's structure was the x-ray images of DNA produced by Franklin. She practised x-ray crystallography techniques many times and had received a doctorate in physical chemistry. Unfortunately she died before the Nobel prize was awarded to Watson, Crick and Wilkins (another scientist involved)

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4. Helen Sharman 
I love Helen Sharman. It might be because I'm following in her footsteps by doing the same degree at the same University, but nevertheless, she is truly inspirational. She also deserves to be on this list because she was the first British person in space. What's cooler that being an astronaut?

Helen Sharman

5. Natalie Portman
Okay, so when you think of Natalie Portman, you don't automatically think 'scientist' but this woman has serious brains. As well as being my ultimate woman crush and all round Hollywood beauty, she's been published in scientific journals, as well as a writing a paper titled "A Simple Method to Demonstrate the Enzymatic Production of Hydrogen from Sugar." Basically, I want to be Natalie Portman.