Thousands taken on our scientists' journey

26 Jul 2013

University scientists showcased their work to 7,000 visitors at this year’s Royal Society Summer Exhibition.

Our physicists recounted their involvement in last year’s hunt for the Higgs boson at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider on the Franco-Swiss border and the Fermilab Tevatron in Chicago, while our chemists displayed their latest research about sugars and how a relatively new discipline, ‘glycomics’ – the study of sugars – could provide answers to a range of previously unsolved problems, ranging from disease to clean energy.

The informal and interactive setting was much appreciated by the scientists and visitors – from all kinds of backgrounds, ages, and levels of prior knowledge in particle physics – alike.

Team member Darren Price, an EU Marie Curie Fellow, said: “We got some incredibly insightful and probing questions from the public, and we had a fun time talking about the details and implications.

“From the enthusiasm and interest of the people we talked to, we like to think everyone got something out of the exhibition. The enthusiasm was certainly infectious – it was really fantastic to hear the support the general public has for what we are doing and that the excitement we have for it is shared.”

The Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition showcases cutting edge research in science and engineering from across the UK. It is held annually at the Royal Society, the UK’s national academy of science.