The Wasted Works - An Interview with Artist Gina Czarnecki

      The Wasted Works is a controversial exhibition created by artist Gina Czarnecki. This striking collection of work, created from 'discarded body parts,' is available as part of Manchester Science Festival. As the Works opened at MOSI last week, we thought we'd grab a few minutes with the artist herself and see what she thinks about the issues involved.

      

     1) Should people be allowed to donate parts of their body to an artist? 

      Yes - as long as full consent is given by the donors and the artist endeavours to retain the integrity of the work in being mindful of the context that it will be exhibited. For example, if people donated fat to Canopé - I would consider it bad practice to then put the chairs in an exhibition about obesity…

2)  Is it right for galleries to exhibit artwork made of real human bones, teeth or fat?

At the moment, a licence is required from the Human Tissue Authority (HTA) for the display of tissue from deceased donors. For tissue from living donors, the same bio-hazard protocols are in place, but a permit is not required (however this is new territory and the expansion of DIY biology and experimentation in this area may highlight the need for a similar license for tissue from living donors in the future). Keeping living tissue in a gallery context, such as SymbioticA have done, requires lab equipment (which is not cheap to hire, own, run or maintain). Crucially though, if it is art then galleries should, in my opinion, be able to show this. If it is 'right' or not comes down to personal values, the integrity of the work and taste.

3) Who owns our body parts when they are removed from us? 

If you lose your hand in a farming accident - on the farm - then you can do with the arm what you like. As soon as this is in a medical establishment, we do not 'own' parts of our body once removed. Once removed, the tissue becomes a possible bio-hazard and is treated accordingly.Technically, no one really owns this but it is the responsibility of the medical profession and we are not allowed to take bits home …but I wonder how Roald Dahl got his hip bone…there are certain bits we can take - stones. In some cases, the umbilical cord and placenta…I guess not too many people ask.

4) Does the use of human tissue in art serve any purpose, or is this just sensationalism?

This depends on the art. In Wasted, this was to draw attention to the grey areas of consent, ownership, donor participation,  etcetera - the Chapman Brothers source bones in their artworks from China. Gunther Von Hagen's first 'bodies' were given to medical research and not for display as art. The Wasted Works were not ultimately about the bones but the process of ethical approval, treatment of bio-hazardous materials and patient consent. I made these works because of living in Liverpool - and the shadow of the Alder Hey Organ Scandal as it has become known and the people who were personally affected by not being asked. My father was a concentration camp survivor and at 7, my visit to the Majdanek camp was shocking and has informed much of my art practice and position since. The basic agreement with medical research is not to cause harm, in any way but for the benefit of improving quality of life in some way...I think if the artwork can do this then it is not just sensationalism. We are also talking of a time when teenagers are having botox (and silicone breast implants have recently exposed bad practice of the use of builders' grade silicone). This just shows us how little people investigate what poison is going into them or the fact that this is the intentional disabling of the body when it is in the name of 'beauty' but those same people will be disgusted by sitting in a chair made of fat - human or otherwise…

5) Should this type of art require formal approval?

Currently, there is no formal body set up that can approve or not this sort of work - the HTA deals with tissue from dead donors and medical research. Universities have their own panels that can approve or not this sort of work. Through The Wasted Works, I have started the process for a national Art and Ethics Advisory Panel and with a significantly high level of people and institutions giving advice in relation to ethics, then this may develop a direct resource for people in the future to know public sentiment, sensitivities and legalities of individual projects. We are not a committee to approve or not the ideas/projects but are advisory only - and with the intention of developing the debate in a public participatory way.

6) Which piece is your favourite and why?

My favourite is The Wasted Works - they co-exist. The palace is the tip of the iceberg, all the pieces do different things and together do more than the sum of the parts and allow one another space - I wouldn't feel comfortable showing diagram for a summerhouse without the lightness of the palace…but the bits I enjoy most at the moment, are the drawings and stories coming in from the donors of the milk teeth. I like this because there is a response on a personal level, and its not the silence of an art audience or the feeling that your work is in a void, but that every one sent is helping to make The Palace grow.


The Wasted Works is available as part of our Art Meets Science programme. Visit our website for a full list of events. 

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Exploring the Polar Regions and Locating Lionel

Andrew Glester is the Producer/Director of Polar:Explore and Locate Lionel at this year's Manchester Science Festival. For this week's blog, we've asked  him what he loves about science, who is Lionel and what we will love abut his events.

Tell us about Lionel?     

Lionel is my campervan but, inspired by the words and works of Carl Sagan, he is also the Spaceship of Our Imagination. He’ll be landing in Manchester just before and, then again, during the festival.

As he’s a Space and Time machine, we don’t actually know where or when he’ll appear but keep an eye on the twitter hashtag #LocateLionel and Facebook for news on sightings. If you happen to locate him, you’ll be able to step inside and watch a selection of films…and, stocks permitting, a bit of fresh popcorn.

How did the idea come about?

You’d have to ask Lionel. All I know is that I was camping by Coniston Water, reading Carl Sagan’s book Cosmos and now I’m turning up at festivals in the Spaceship of Our Imagination. I’m not really sure how that happened.

   

What will people love about Lionel and Polar:Explore?

Locate Lionel is a lot of fun but there are also some really beautiful and thought-provoking films which he’ll be showing and I know that people will be able to relax in that unique environment and take in a film or two that they won’t have seen before.

Polar:Explore is a bit different. We brought Polar, the full scale orchestral concert to the festival last year and Polar:Explore enables us to take it further. There will be a string quartet and a harpist performing some of the best chamber music ever written, combined with a special version of the film from Polar but the real difference is that we have teamed up with the British Science Association and are able to introduce real scientists to the audience to explore the science of these magical frozen lands.

We have an astronomer on hand to talk about the ethereal Northern Lights and a zoologist who knows a thing or two about the animals from the poles but there will be hands-on activities for children of all ages too.

Polar:Explore is taking place at Manchester Museum which is just brilliant because we have all their resources and people to call upon to really help us explore the themes of Polar with the audience.

Why do you love Science?

When you look out into the night sky, you see stars which no longer exist. When some of those stars exploded, they sent all sorts of exotic particles out into space. Particles the stars themselves had cooked up over billions of years before going supernova. Those particles are what everything is made of: this planet, those trees, that computer, the atmosphere, you, me, my daughter, this pencil…everything. We don’t know that because we sat quietly and thought about it or because we had some revelation in a dream. Science is the reason we know these things. It’s the reason we know pretty much anything.

Exploding stars spewing out matter which comes to life and gains a consciousness which allows it to understand that it is, itself, made out of those dying faint dots of light in the night sky.

As Carl Sagan put it, “We're made of star stuff. We are a way for the Cosmos to know itself.”

I don’t see how you fail to be interested in that.

Why will people love Lionel and Polar: Explore?

At Sound of Science, we try to bring the beauty of reality to life. It doesn't really need our help but, personally, I like to take time out occasionally to look at the world and the universe around us and appreciate just how beautiful life can be and I think that’s what Lionel and Polar: Explore can do for the audience.

I don’t make anything for a specific age or type of audience. I just make things that I know I would love to experience and I imagine the 4 year old me would love hanging out in a campervan watching films as much as the slightly more grown up version does and I know that adults will enjoy Polar:Explore as much as the children in the audience will. I don’t believe we ever stop wanting to have fun or to marvel at something beautiful or thought-provoking. The programme says it’s for families but you don’t need to bring yours with you. Come on your own or with a friend and talk to the scientists and the musicians.

Alice, the lead violinist in the quartet has been to the Arctic on a field trip with her dad who is a marine biologist.  Greta, who will be playing the harp, doubles as a neuroscientist and actually made her own harp. These are people worth talking to! I suppose I should probably mention that both events are completely free of charge too…

Lionel is on Facebook  and Twitter and you can follow him via #LocateLionel. 

Locate Lionel and Polar: Explore are available as part of our Art Meets Science and Family Fun programmes. Visit our website for a full list of events. 

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WARNING: Domino testing in progress!

Matt Parker gets practicing for the main event

What happens when you let a group of mathematicians loose with 3000 dominoes and a large, flat public space? That’s right - they will attempt to create a giant domino computer....

Recently we were lucky enough to get a bit of a sneak preview of the Domino Computer Challenge, one of our exciting upcoming Festival events and the brainchild of Josh Award winner and Science Communicator in Residence Matt Parker.

It’s quite difficult in words to convey exactly what a domino computer is (it’s far easier when you see one in action so check out Matt’s demo video of a domino logic gate) but the Challenge will essentially involve Matt and his dedicated team building a giant physical representation of a simple ‘adding’ computation, similar to that which takes place when you use a calculator to add two numbers together.

As Matt explains on a recent edition of Pulse-Project's Maths/Maths podcast:

“At the very basic, a computer is adding binary code (made up of 1s and 0s) together. It uses what’s called a logic circuit where you input 1s and 0s, does some calculation on them and then gives you an output in 1s and 0s. So a very simple thing you might want to do is add two numbers together. For example 4 + 5 = 9, or in binary terms 100 + 101 = 1001. You can do this with electronic components, or circuits, like normal computers do, but we’re trying to build circuits out of dominoes.”

So by placing thousands of dominoes (and using a huge amount of skill!) in a complex circuit pattern and then setting off domino chains where a falling domino represents a binary code change from 0 to 1, the Domino Computer will, in theory, be able to add together two 3-digit binary numbers and get a 4-digit answer.

The computer will be built in front of MOSI's
replica of The Baby - the world's first
stored-program computer

A project as ambitious as this takes a lot of planning and testing. From the risk of rogue falling dominoes to an error in the circuit design, there is a lot that could potentially go wrong. So along with his team of volunteers and armed with more dominoes than we’ve ever seen in one place before, Matt recently visited MOSI to test out the floor (which thankfully proved to be flat and smooth enough to host the challenge) and try out some initial circuit designs. Despite the urge to knock over the domino chains (who wouldn’t be tempted?) we managed to resist and looked on in slight awe as the team created a few small test circuits and posed with our photographer for a few snaps.

So what’s made Matt want to take on one of his most fiddliest and nerve-biting challenges to date? It’s all about explaining the mysteries of computing:

“When people look at a computer, no one really understands how it works. For most people it’s a mystery box where ‘magic’ happens, so we want to show them a laid out example of a very, very basic computer. We’re showing how if you carefully plan and organise physical objects, in this case dominoes, they can ‘think’ and do calculations. This is the basis of all computing and we just want to show people at a fundamental level how that happens.”

Well said Matt, and we can’t wait to see it in action!

Event info:

The Domino Computer Challenge will take place on Sat 27th and Sun 28th Oct in MOSI’s Manchester Revolution Gallery, and as well as watching the construction team in action, building the computer domino by domino, there will be the chance to have a go yourself with some smaller domino hands-on activities. And if you miss the computer being "switched on" don't worry - the team will be creating a time lapse video to capture the whole thing!

by Nicola Frost, Science Festival Project Officer, MOSI

Newbie Picks

I've just joined the Manchester Science Festival team and thought I’d begin with a blog about what I’m most excited about in the programme this year. I've picked my favourites from each section. Let me know yours!

Family Fun

Meteorite day 

Some of you may have been lucky enough to see the meteorite streaking through the sky in the UK last weekend. This event gives you the chance to get your hands on real pieces of space rock over 4 billion years old and look at moon rocks brought back to Earth by the Apollo astronauts. We’ll also hear about the ways in which scientists are using these ancient rocks to explain the mysteries of our solar system! Can’t wait! 

Make, Do and Hack

Culturing bioluminescent bacteria 

I remember watching the King of natural history Sir David Attenborough on Blue Planet, exploring the wonders of the deep, and being fascinated by the wondrous creatures living in our oceans. Creatures that can create their own light in order to repel predators or attract prey, seem very ‘other-worldly’ and I’m dying to recreate this phenomenon in our MadLab! 

Art Meets Science

What am I worth? 

The issues of organ donation generate a vast range of opinions affected by many factors but it’s a subject that could potentially affect us all during our lives. This performance explores the subject in a light-hearted way and there’s even an opportunity to test our views in an after-show debate.

Science After Dark

Science on the Screen 

As a film fanatic who loves a good sci-fi movie, I can’t think of anything better than gathering to watch this diverse range of flicks exploring the implications of scientific developments in the pop-up HD cinema in MOSI’s 1830s warehouse. Picks: GATTACA and Contagion. 

Join the Conversation

The battle for the internet 

Social media has exploded in the last five years. With many of us living out our lives online, this discussion (led by technology strategists Norman Lewis, Mindy Gofton and Keith Teare, explores the future of the internet and the controversial topic of regulation.

Walks and Tours

The archaeology of a revolution 

How many of us have walked along a street in Manchester or Salford and wondered about the history of the impressive buildings - some of which still proudly declare their origins? With so much fusion between industrial heritage and new developments, this tour takes us along Salford’s Chapel Street through to Manchester. Put on your cosy coat and enjoy as the story unfolds.

Gabriella

Request a brochure: info@manchestersciencefestival.com
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Make, do, hack and more...

Well this year’s Manchester Science Festival programme has well and truly launched! We hope you’ve already browsed through the programme and found lots of event for you to go to. If not you can browse the programme on the Festival website.

We’ve themed events around strands such as Family Fun and Join the Conversation. This year we have some brand new strands to help you get to grips with the brilliant programme.

Science After Dark is an opportunity for adults to relax and enjoy some events on the weekends and after work. Immerse yourself in the beautiful 1830 warehouse at MOSI and enjoy our series of science-inspired films. Head to the Lowry and join the Festival of the Spoken Nerd crew for some laughs. Explore issues surrounding organ donation at a performance at Contact Theatre.

Our series of events in Make, Do and Hack invites you to make, do and play... and leave the kids at home! Paint with bacteria, make robots or create your very own USB microscope.

Explore our Arts meet Science programme... there’ll be a Field of Jeans exploring new technology to purify the air around us, a palace made of milk teeth provoking discussion around stem cells and donating body parts for art, and the Osmosis Machine, playing with a gloop material forming beautiful shapes.

We invite you to play, create and explore science at this year’s Festival. We believe we have created a fantastic programme for families, young people and adults full of hands-on activities, performance, film, discussions and more. We hope there are plenty of events that you’ll love. Enjoy! 

Hack Manchester: 24 hour coding competition at MSF12

Tickets launch today at 1pm for the very first Hack Manchester, an exciting 24-hour coding event that will take place at MOSI as part of this year’s Manchester Science Festival.

From 27-28 October 2012, teams of hack-enthusiasts will get creative with their coding skills as they have their very own ‘Night at the Museum’ and battle to come up with the best new apps, games, websites and digital products in just 24 hours.

There’ll be food, plenty of caffeine, wi-fi, entertainment, chill-out areas, games and a few fun surprises along the way. Rounding off the competition will be an award ceremony where teams will present their hacks to a panel of expert judges, with prizes being dished out to winners of each category.

There are no limitations on platform or technology to take part, with Hack Manchester co-founder Sean Handley noting: “If you can click it, swipe it, press it and run software on it then it’s a perfect platform to run your fledgling app!”

Aiming to showcase the thriving tech-community in Manchester and the North West, Hack Manchester is sure to be an amazing event with teams from local universities, tech companies and user-groups encouraged to get involved. Don’t have your own team? Don’t worry! Hack Manchester will be offering a match-making service and bringing people with different skills together to form new teams.

The first batch of tickets for the competition go on sale at 1pm today for £5 each and places are limited so we doubt they’ll last long! Visit the Hack Manchester website and check out their fabulous video below (make sure you have the sound on for full effect!) to find out more.

Seeking Perfection scoops public engagement prize

Manchester Science Festival is part of a team that has scooped a prize in a European competition for best innovations in University outreach and public engagement.


A creative project called Seeking Perfection has been awarded the ‘Recognition of Distinction’ as part of the ‘EngageU’ programme. Over 100 projects were submitted from Universities across Europe, but this project was selected because of the quality of the collaboration between The University of Manchester, Nowgen, Contact Theatre and the Manchester Science Festival. The creative approaches used made this a distinctive and innovative project. The project team created a short video about the project. To watch this, please: click here 

Natalie Ireland, Director of Manchester Science Festival and Kate Dack, Nowgen's Public Programmes Manager were delighted that the Seeking Perfection project was recognised for its creativity and the depth of the engagement process.

The Seeking Perfection project explored human enhancement - which provides a rich vein for public engagement, exploring issues such as boosting athletic performance, taking stimulant drugs to improve memory and using plastic surgery. A team of 15 young people worked with researchers, ethicists and artists over a six week period to develop a performance about enhancement with creative partners. This was delivered in unusual settings, such as busy shopping centres, to reach local communities who would not typically engage with biomedical science. Seeking Perfection successfully promoted engagement with local communities.


The performance was then taken to the Zion Arts Centre, complimented with a public debate on issues brought up in the project. Andy Miah, Sarah Chan, Mark Gasson and David James were on the panel and expertly discussed and debated the issues with a lively audience. 


The project team had diverse backgrounds, but they were able to share their strengths to allow everyone to try something new. The Seeking Perfection project is contributing towards building a society where all can realise their potential. In this project the young people worked successfully as collaborators with university researchers, artists and also with other professionals in the team.

Seeking Perfections performers take to the stage

Many of the teenagers involved described being more intrigued by science after the project. One said: “I thought when I finished school I would never have to think about science again, and I’ve learnt it’s around us all the time and I should maybe pay more attention. I might blink and the world could be a completely different place.”


Seeking Perfection relied on the talent and experience of researchers within the University of Manchester, the enthusiasm and creativity of young people involved and the artistic backgrounds of Contact Theatre and artists involved. 


This project was funded by a People Award from the Wellcome Trust and we thank them for their support.


Further information about the competition: click here

Science meets fiction

Friday saw the culmination of lots of hard work of dedicated young authors from around Manchester. Earlier this year we partnered with the Manchester Literature Festival and the Manchester Children’s Book Festival to launch "The Midland Future Manchester Young Writers Competition", a writing competition for young people about the future of Manchester. There were so many fantastic entries and the winner and runners up were announced at the event at MOSI on Friday. Authors of brilliant science fiction spoke about their work and life at the event, making it a brilliant event. Congratulations to winner Josh, the runners up and all the writers. Here’s a review of the event from local blogger Hannah Clarke...

Having only snippets of knowledge on the authors attending the Science Meets Fiction event today at the Museum of Science and Industry, I wasn’t fully sure what to expect. Would there be Doctor Who Daleks roaming the event? Would there be a live experiment to show the public the advance of science? Would the authors try to explain their own theories on time travel? You’ll soon see.

As I sit in the MOSI, I quickly recognise there isn’t a better home for this event, as the authors, Julie Bertanga, Jane Rogers and Saci Lloyd all delve into how science inspires them and what role it plays in their novels.

As well as the full room of 11-16 year-old students having their scientific minds in top form, there is also a sense of anticipation, as this event will also reveal the winners of ‘The Midland Future Manchester Young Writers Competition’, judged by Julie Bertanga.

As each author takes their place at a microphone, they all have their own way of drawing the audience in and grabbing their full attention, enlightening and inspiring us by talking about their inspirations, then reading short fragments of their latest novels. Julie starts with her novel Exodus, the first of a trilogy (Zenith andAurora are the second and third books), where she shares with us how the idea of this novel came from reading an article in a newspaper 10 years ago. The article itself was an SOS from the South Sea Islands, as climate change was taking an unheard, dramatic effect in the form of rising sea levels. The story follows Mara’s life 100 years from now after the impact of climate change. Julie also expresses how the science of today has huge inspiration behind her work, such as the recent discovery of the Higgs Boson (‘The God Particle’) and how this explores the destructive and creative aspects of human nature.

Jane Rogers is next with her novel The Testament of Jessie Lamb. Taking place a mere six months in the future, the thought that not much can change is deceiving. Jane takes long, dramatic pauses, intensifying the story, almost bringing it to life. The novel explores a threat of biological terrorism as the disease MDS (Maternal Death Syndrome) starts to attack. By targeting pregnant women, it is quickly evident that this will soon be the cause of a shrinking population. The novel explores an inter-generational conflict between the youths and their elders with the characters having to succeed in finding a solution, which the previous generation failed to do.

Last to speak is the very animated, and funny, Saci Lloyd. Saci quickly informs us that she sees herself as a political writer and rather than basing her novels in the future with futuristic ideas, she enjoys taking today’s problems and twisting them. The audience is quickly engaged in Saci’s lively presence, guaranteeing laughter from everyone when reading a critical email from someone who said the future in her book wasn’t ‘realistic’ enough as the car company Saab have stopped creating a model which featured in her books. Reading from her novel Momentum, we hear how the characters Uma and Hunter are in London where parkour is popular, even more so than getting the bus.

We get to the Q&As. I learn how the ideas can advance just like science and how important science is within literature. We are told that science should support the story rather than the other way round.

“Take an idea and run with it.”

A member of the audience asks the authors how long it takes them to write a novel. Saci and Julie say roughly 1 to 2 years, whereas Julie says 5. They also share how not every novel they write finds instant fame and success. Exoduswas difficult to get published and also sell in North America. Julie also received emails from librarians telling her to stop writing ‘scary, climate-changing stories’. Tips get passed around on how to overcome procrastination; turning off the internet being one of the top ones. 

 “Writing is like snakes and ladders.” 

Now is the time to reveal the winners of the competition and present the top three with signed copies of the books from today's authors on top of a pocket video camera for first prize. 

Third place belongs to Rubab Zahra, with After the Dark Days

Second place belongs to Joseph Arthur Smith, with Fodder

First place belongs to Josh Degenhardt, with When the Rain Falls They Talk of Manchester

Julie finishes by reading the dramatic, edge-of-seat, winning piece. One thing is clear, these authors better watch out!

Exhibition call out: It’ll never work!

In conjunction with Manchester Science Festival this autumn, the fantastic Nexus Art Cafe have decided to celebrate the themes of invention, ingenuity and innovation in their next exhibition.

From the beauty of the blueprint to the enchanting rhythm of an ECG, the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics offer up a whole wealth of creative opportunity and inspiration.

Nexus Art Cafe are seeking artwork and imagery from artists, scientists, and engineers that showcases innovative and interesting ideas in a beautiful way.

Think inspiring infographics, magnificent maps, delightful diagrams and awesome anatomies – be it the stuff of hard scientific fact, or something a little more fantastical – the walls of Nexus will celebrate the creative side of these industries which so often gets overlooked.

If all this has sparked an idea or two, then get in touch. Please send an artist’s statement (no more than 500 words each), up to five images of the work you’d like to submit (max 1000 pixels square/72 dpi), and an artist’s CV to: submissions@nexusartcafe.com, with ‘It’ll Never Work’ as the subject title. Submission Deadline is 5pm on Wednesday 1st August.

How and why to look after your Turing's Sunflowers

Our project Turing’s Sunflowers is in full swing. We’ve had some brilliant planting events at MOSI and other partner venues like Manchester Museum and over 8000 sunflowers have been pledged on the Turing’s Sunflowers website. It’s been such a fantastic response.

The next step of the project now everyone’s seeds are in the ground, is the “nurturing phase”. Every day the Festival team are checking our sunflowers at MOSI and at home, watering them, removing pests and trying to prevent slugs. Some of them are also getting a little heavy and leaning over, so we’ve been lightly tying them to stakes in the ground. We need you to do the same!

In this hot weather keep your sunflowers well watered, but be careful not to over-water as this can loosen the soil and your plant might lean over. Mix in some liquid feed about once a month for good health!

As well as inspiring people with maths in nature, and Alan Turing’s work, what we’re really trying to achieve is lots of data from everyone’s lovely sunflowers. When they are in full bloom, we’ll be launching the next phase of the project with details of the information we need from your you. The main things to look at will be the Fibonacci patterns in the seed heads, the petals and the bracks (the green bits on the back of the flowers).

It’s fairly well documented that you can see Fibonacci patterns in nature, but it really is anecdotal. There have only been a few small scientific studies on this and we want to collect a large amount of data (from about 3000 sunflowers to be precise) to form the largest study of this phenomena. The reason for doing this is the data will be useful to tell us how often this pattern is found in nature. We’ll make this data and photos available to others, so plant scientists and others can use the large data set for their own work. One of the principles underpinning science is experimentation and the replication of such experiments. It will help to further our understanding of the frequency of this pattern, what pattern or shift from the Fibonacci sequence we get if the sequence doesn’t occur, and perhaps why they appear in nature so ordered and regimented.

More information about how to spot the Fibonacci patterns in your sunflowers and how to count these patterns will be coming over the summer here on our blog and the Turing’s Sunflowers website.  

Are you planting a Turing Sunflower yet?

It's been an exciting week at Festival HQ. The new Turing's Sunflowers website launched, people have pledged to grow over 2000 sunflowers, we've had 18,000 seeds delivered, and of course we've been beavering away making plans for the Festival programme in October.

I took some time out from the week to plant some more seeds and look after my sunflower seedlings. It's been a little cold, but with a bit of warmth and a few rays of sun they've starter to sprout! 

So now is the time for you to get planting and join our big experiment... 

Head over to the Turing's Sunflowers website which will tell you loads about the project, how to plant your sunflower seeds, tips for the best flowers and more. There's also more information about what we're doing and why. More will be added to the site over the next month or so and we'll be getting to grips with the maths! You can share your stories with us online too. There will also be planting events and counting events taking place which will be listed on the Turing's Sunflowers and MSF websites. 

Turing's Sunflowers is inspired by maths and nature, and the links between the two that Alan Turing was exploring before he died. There's been such a fantastic response to the project from across the globe - from families wanting to contribute to some real science research to people really connecting with local hero Alan Turing. It's a brilliant project, but it takes people like you and our partners to really get behind something, make it exciting and make it happen. So thank you for such an enthusiastic response and your support. Please do spread the word... we need you to grow over 3000 sunflowers to help us collect the data we need! That's a lot, but we can do it. So get your seeds at the ready and get planting!

Happy planting!

Natalie, Manchester Science Festival Director

The wonder of maths in nature

Last week we were lucky enough to be joined by Jonathan Swinton, a Professor in Systems Biology who conceived of the Turing's Sunflower project for this year's festival.

Over several coffees in the MOSI cafe, Jonathan explained the mathematical concepts behind his idea to do a mass participatory experiment to build on the final work of Alan Turing in his centenary year.

World famous for his code-breaking skills and contributions to computing, Turing was also fascinated with the mathematical patterns found in plant stems, leaves and seeds, a study know as phyllotaxis. This was a key element to his research when he came to The University of Manchester.

Turing noticed, for example, that the number of spirals in the seed patterns of sunflower heads (and pine cones as Jonathan shows MOSI's marketing team in the picture) often conform to a number that appears in the mathematical sequence called the Fibonacci sequence (0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89…). Turing set out to explain how this might help us to understand the growth of plants. Sadly, he died before his work was complete and since then scientists have continued his work, but to properly test these hypotheses we need lots of data… and sunflowers are perfect for the job, so long as we can grow enough of them!

And that is the challenge... join us this spring to Grow a Turing Sunflower to celebrate his centenary and build on Turing's legacy to Manchester and indeed the world!

Up for the challenge? Sign up here.

Related:

• To read up on Turing,  Jonathan recommends Andrew Hodges 'Enigma', recently republished to mark the centenary year.
• Watch the ONE SHOW's take on the project featuring Jonathan and those all important spirals. Available on iplayer for a week (UK viewers only)

The wonder of the simple sunflower

We've been reminiscing a little in the festival team, remembering back to growing sunflowers as kids in our back gardens. The memory of these magnificent yellow flowers towering over the garden fence is etched into our minds. Recently we've been rediscovering the wonder of the simple sunflower as part of the Turing's Sunflower project and have been amazed at the facts that we've uncovered en route.

We were pretty amazed to discover that there is a guerilla gardening day on the 1st of May devoted internationally to growing sunflowers. An event that could prove timely to this project!

We've also discovered some pretty incredible facts about sunflowers... here's our top five so far in now particular order.

1. The seeds make a tasty and healthy snack. You can eat them (and feed birds with them too) and cook with the oil pressed from them. Indeed the sunflower is the symbol of the vegan society and licensed for the sale of sustainable products.

2. You can create other useful and sustainable products including biodiesel as an alternative to petrol.

3. Sunflowers are a great learning resource to teach maths, biology and science. Baby sunflowers apparently track the motion of the sun across the sky, a phenomenon known as heliotropism. Further, the seeds grow in a spiral pattern in the sunflower head and if you count the spirals you will, more often than not, find that the number of spirals corresponds to numbers found in a mathematical sequence called the fibonacci sequence.

4. Sunflowers can be used to extract toxic chemicals from soil, including lead, arsenic and uranium, a process called phytoremediation. Through this process plants can naturally help alleviate environmental problems. Sunflowers were apparently grown to help reduce toxins after the Japanese Fukushima nuclear disaster.

5. Sunflowers are part of a rich cultural and artistic heritage with many artworks and cultural practices associated with sunflowers. Van Gogh's Sunflowers is perhaps the most obvious example but more recently Chinese Artist, Ai Wei Wei's sunflower seed installation has been in the news recently with Tate Modern buying 8 million of the 100 million porcelain sunflower seeds produced as part of the artwork. Bring the conversation back to food, we also discovered recently as the Manchester Histories Festival that sunflower seeds are handed out as a snack to celebrate Chinese new year.

To share and discover more about these amazing plants, including how to grow them, join us on an incredible and hopefully memorable challenge as part of the festival to Grow a Turing Sunflower (or 2 or 3 or 5 or 8 or 13 or more!)...

Turing's Sunflowers

You may remember that back in December we were on the hunt for a dynamic project manager to deliver a mass-participatory experiment across the whole of Manchester following in the steps of Alan Turing to raise awareness of maths in nature? Well, we're pleased to announce the search is over and Dr Erinma Ochu, ex-Manchester Beacon director has recently joined the Manchester Science Festival team to bring you Turing's Sunflowers. 


More info, including how to get involved in the biggest city-wide research experiment, coming very soon. Can't wait that long? Erinma will be talking briefly about the project at Social Media Cafe Manchester (SMC_MCR) tomorrow night in the Northern Quarter. 


Welcome on board Erinma!


Related info:

SMC_MCR takes place: 6pm – 9pm, Tuesday 6 March 2012.

Venue: Matt & Phreds, 64 Tib Street, Manchester, M4 1LW

Celebrate World Book Day!

Today is World Book Day, a world-wide celebration of reading and books. We've been pondering a few of favourite science and sci-fi books in the office today. 


Emma, Education and Interpretation Officer at MOSI loves World War Z by MaxBrooks, and she likes how some of the descriptions of the zombie war are quite realistic and remind you of real wars that have occurred. 


Nicola, Science Communication Officer has two favourites: 

• Death of Grass – set in the 50s - exploring what happens when a virus wipes out grass
• Power, Sex, Suicide: Mitochondria and the meaning oflife which she thinks is a must for biology geeks

Jamie, a presenter at the museum recently discovered The Sky's Dark Labyrinth and thought it was brilliant. He also heard the author speaking at a Festival in the south, and was really inspired. 

I love Genome, as I read this during my studies at Newcastle University and it inspired me to do the kind of job I do now. I also knew author Matt Ridley when I worked at the Centre for Life and found him really inspiring. Carbon Diaries is a modern sci-fi classic for young people which I have really enjoyed in the last few years and had a brilliant event with author Saci Lloyd at MSF 11. That really is a favourite. 

We'd love to hear your favourites too, but also, what better way to celebrate World Book Day than to get writing!


Why not enter our writing competition Future Manchester. There are only a few days left to enter, so now's the time to get your stories in! The competition is for 12 - 16 year olds and we want people to write a short story about their vision for a future Manchester. 


We've had lots of inspiration from local scientists who have written about their work and ideas for the future of their field. These have been great starting points for our young writers and are on our website. 


So, get writing today and submit your entries by 5 March! Find out more and how to enter here.


Natalie, Festival Director