Manchester Science Festival has fast evolved and taken shape since it began in 2007. It was an innovative and creative blend of events for families and adults when it was first established and we've taken that ethos and shaped it into one of the most cultural and vibrant Festivals on the Manchester events scene.
This year we added a film strand, co-produced at art and science exhibition, brought more art, comedy, theatre and lively debates to the programme, as well as curating a family friendly programme of events and activities. The Festival is proudly produced by MOSI, and this year we invited some of our favourites artists and communicators back, such as Helen Storey and Science Junkie, to create even more amazing live events.
It was also a first for us this year. We're proudly produced by MOSI and working together with the University of Manchester and the Manchester City Council (as well as lots more!) we created our first citizen science project Turing's Sunflowers. To celebrate the life of mathematician and code-breaker Alan Turing we invited people from around the world to grow sunflowers and explore the patterns in the sunflower seed heads. We were looking to back up Alan Turing's theory that Fibonacci patterns form in the sunflower seed heads, and sometimes, if they didn't, what would we find instead. A whopping 12,000 sunflowers were pledged to the project from countries across the globe.
So as we reflect on an amazing year, we wanted to thank everyone that was involved in Manchester Science Festival in some way; our sponsors and partner organisations, event organisers, artists, scientists, science communicators, staff at MOSI and all host venues, our designers and web team, our brilliant volunteers and most of all our wonderful visitors. We thank you all for your contribution, we wish you a fantastic 2013 and we'll see you in October!
