What happened at the 2010 Monster Science Festival

We are now busy planning the 2011 Inverness Monster Science Festival and will be updating this website with news and updates as we get them, but here, in the meantime, are a few of the highlights from last year's Festival to whet your appetite!

Richard Dawkins in Inverness

Richard visited 3 schools as part of the Monster Science Festival programme, talking to pupils at Millburn Academy about evolution, at Moray Firth School about whether there could be alien life and how we could find out about it if so, and at Dingwall Academy about the Wonder of Science.

The Wonder of Science was also his topic for his public event which launched the Festival. 432 people came along to hear him talk about science and why an understanding of it can greatly add to our appreciation of the world around us; and, to illustrate his point, he told us about the astonishingly complex egg-laying habits of the female cuckoo. We all knew that the cuckoo lays her eggs in other birds' nests, but many of us had NOT known that only certain species of birds have their nests parasitized in this way (the nests have to be accessible to the female cuckoo, of course, and the host birds must have a diet that is also suitable for a growing cuckoo chick) ... or that females nearly always lay their eggs in the same kind of nest that they themselves were hatched in ... or that this tradition passed down the female line (probably made possible because, in birds, the Y chromosome is passed down by females, not males as in mammals) means that, thanks to evolution by natural selection, female cuckoos that parasitize reed warbler nests lay eggs that look very like reed warbler eggs, and those that parasitize, say, robin nests lay eggs that look very much like robins'. Meanwhile, the same evolutionary arms race has led to birds whose nests have been parasitized by cuckoos for thousands of years becoming extremely paranoid about any alien objects left in their nests, whereas those species whose nests are not parasitized are far less likely to be concerned about them.

All in all, an absolutely fascinating lecture, and one that certainly illustrated the point: that a scientific understanding of the world around us can only enhance our appreciation of it!

Biodiversity at Inverness Floral Hall
The Floral Hall played host to two Biodiversity Days - one for schools only, and one on Saturday. Visitors could marvel at Arkive, an astonishing database of all living species on Earth; squirm at the snakes, scorpions and other creepy-crawlies brought along by local expert Nick Martin of Creatures Great and Small; learn all about the red squirrels in our woods, and the whales, dolphins and porpoises in our seas; discover what to plant to make their gardens attractive to wildlife; and become forensic scientists for the day to sleuth out the culprit in the Great Plant Robbery!. The photos tell their own story, we think!

The Big Scary 3: Diabetes, Heart Disease and Cancer
Few of us will be fortunate enough to get through life without being personally affected by at least one of these diseases at some point, so these three events were an invaluable opportunity to find out about them, their prevention, management and treatment. What made these sessions unique was that they combined the very best of expert information (each event included talks by specialist consultants and surgeons from Raigmore Hospital) with a relaxed, friendly atmosphere which made it easy to ask questions. There were also exhibitions by a number of relevant organisations that offer support to those affected by the diseases, and the opportunity to take some simple health tests that can act as early warnings. We are very grateful to everyone who spoke or exhibited at the events, and to the Centre for Health Science for hosting them.

Highlands Astronomical Society (HAS)
Over the course of two evenings, members of HAS amazed and delighted us with fascinating insights into the beautiful universe of which the Earth is such an infinitesimally tiny part!

Arthur Milnes explained the enormous challenges of powering the satellites and spaceships we send into space, especially in view of the difficulties (and often the impossibility) of repairing them if anything goes wrong; and he also outlined the ways in which the challenges have been overcome.

Pat Williams talked about the possibility of Lossiemouth becoming Europe's only spaceport, offering tourist trips into space: a development that wouldn't just be hugely exciting for all budding astronauts out there, but would present huge opportunities for tourism, education, research and business in the Highlands.

Paul Jenkins described the incredible feat of sending a spaceship from Earth to a planet orbiting a 'nearby' star - though 'nearby' is, of course, a relative concept! The selected star in this case is Barnard's star, a 'mere' 5.973 light years - or nearly 60 trillion kilometres! - from Earth. Providing enough power, keeping on target, not being destroyed by radiation or extreme heat or cold or by collisions with asteroids - these were just some of the challenges involved. But what an exciting prospect it would be!

And finally Pauline Macrae had us all donning 3D glasses for an astonishing and breathtaking sequence of photographs of our universe, as we had never seen it before.

Our sincere thanks to all four of them for taking the time to share with us some of the extraordinary wonders of the universe.

Dr Bunhead's Crash Test Science Show
Millburn Academy was the venue for an evening of science as few of us rarely experienced it in school! A capacity audience was enthralled by Dr Bunhead's madcap presentation, which included bangs, whizzes, explosions and much much more! How could science NOT be fun when presented like this!

Monster Science Open Day
What a day we had at the Midmills Campus! There were a huge range of science-based activities on offer, ranging from 'Blood, Bile and Body Bits' (could YOU put all the organs back into a torso - in all the right places?), hair-raising experiments with electricity (did YOU know Rice Krispies could fly?), and a K'nex maths challenge that got grown-ups and children alike scratching their heads, to an 'Orrible Science Drawing Masterclass, an amazing Meccano exhibition, a chance to build your own sun-dial or rocket-launcher, and a close encounter with some micro-monsters that like to make themselves very much at home in our bodies if we're not very careful! Below you'll find a few photos to give you a flavour of the day.

Attendees could test whether they were losing their grip!

These micro-monsters like nothing more than to take up residence inside our bodies ...

... and some can even control our brains! OK, so the mouse on the scooter isn't real, but the toxoplasmosis parasite really does make mice lose their fear of cats ... because toxoplasmosis needs to get into a cat's stomach in order to complete its breeding cycle. Clever, eh?

It wasn't just children who had to rack their brains to solve the K'nex Maths Challenges!

Artist Gary Erskine leading his workshop on how to create comic-book heroes and villains

Who knew how many amazing things could be made out of Meccano?

Grantown Grammar School took part in our Meccano Challenge. They had never used Meccano before, but just 3 weeks after a workshop with the Meccano Society of Scotland, they came up with all these fabulous creations.