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Science In Public

Science writers, communicators, media, training, and public relations

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Wearable technology on the runway; knitting neurons; and can science save humanity?

National Science Week is quickly approaching, with less than one month before it all kicks off.

Find out what’s happening in your state by coming along to one of our briefing events in the coming weeks in:

  • NSW on Tuesday 21 July at Business Events Sydney
  • ACT on Friday 24 July Canberra Innovation Network
  • VIC on Thursday 30 July at the Royal Society of Victoria

Register via Eventbrite.

We’d like to share information on the wide range of activities and promotions you can tap into for the Week, and hear about your organisation’s plans.

[Read more…] about Wearable technology on the runway; knitting neurons; and can science save humanity?

National Science Week: you in?

Celebrate all things science and technological during National Science Week from 15-23 August.

Now is the time to take your science out into the community.

We’ve just been appointed as the national media and communication agency for the next four years. So, over the coming weeks we’ll tell you more about how you can use Science Week.

This year’s Science Week is shaping up to be out of this world, with

  • astrophysicist, author and presenter of Cosmos Neil deGrasse Tyson
  • astronaut Chris Hadfield
  • over a thousand science events
  • ‘Galaxy Explorer’ – the national experiment, inviting ordinary Australians to do real science – classifying galaxies to understand how they grow and evolve.

The secret of Science Week is strength in numbers: local events and stories together build the buzz that becomes a national shout.

Now is the time to register any events you’re planning, whether it be a simple science-themed ‘Brain Break’ morning tea in your workplace or a mega-celebrity science public event. Registering is important – both for building the buzz and getting bums on seats!

Register any events you’re holding on the National Science Week website.

We will be providing communication support for event organisers and briefing media outlets with tasty story leads. If you have an event or topic you think might have strong media potential, let us know and we’ll consider including it in media releases and briefings. Email us at scienceweek@scienceinpublic.com.au.

Our Science Week team is being led by Tanya Ha, the award-winning environmental writer and former Catalyst reporter.

Fresh Science judging

Nominations for Fresh Science 2015 have now closed and judging has begun.

Thanks to all 170+ nominees who took the time to tell us about themselves and their science.

We are reading all the nominations right now, and we’ll get back to you all as soon as as soon as we can.

We have quite a few to get through, so we’ll prioritise them by date: Victoria first, then Townsville, etc. We’ll make sure we give you all at least three weeks’ notice of the event in your state.

Looking for fresh, young researchers with a story to tell

Fresh Science 2015

We’re looking for the best and brightest early-career researchers who have made a peer-reviewed discovery and received little or no media attention.

Fresh Science is a national competition that selects researchers with research results, an invention, or a discovery, trains them in how to tell their story, and helps them share their findings with the media and the public.

We’re looking for:

  • early-career researchers (from honours students to no more than five years post-PhD)
  • a peer-reviewed discovery that has had little or no media coverage
  • some ability to present your ideas in everyday English (something we can build on).

Successful applicants will participate in Fresh Science 2015. First, a day of media and communication training, learning how to find the key, compelling story in their research, and how to tell that story. Then, in the following pub night, they’ll face the challenge of explaining their research. We’ll also publish short profiles on each Freshie, and we’ll pitch the best story in each state to the media.

Nominations are now open and close 1 July. [Read more…] about Looking for fresh, young researchers with a story to tell

Corals already have the genes to adapt to warmer oceans

Townsville and Texas researchers discover a genetic basis to temperature tolerance in coral. And it likely depends on ‘mum’s genes’.

Media resources:

A team of Australian and US scientists have discovered that corals already have the genes to tolerate global warming. It may only be a matter of shuffling them to where they are most needed.

[Read more…] about Corals already have the genes to adapt to warmer oceans

Corals already have the genes to adapt to warmer oceans – images

Please click on an image to access the high resolution version.

Far Nothern GBR_by LK Bay
Far Northern Great Barrier Reef. Reefs around the world are threatened by climate change. A new study shows that some corals have the genes to adapt to warmer oceans. Credit: Line K Bay, AIMS

[Read more…] about Corals already have the genes to adapt to warmer oceans – images

Share – and boost Australian research by up to five billion dollars

A national showcase and national study, 19 June 2015, Hyatt Hotel, Canberra, media welcome

Share your data and boost science productive is the message of a national workshop in Canberra today.

Over 40 data collections will be released – covering everything from cloud measurement to pavements and roads, ancient DNA, oral histories of Western Sydney and the changing coastline.

A national study conducted earlier this year showed that sharing and reusing data generated by publicly-funded research activities could lead to haring data could boost Australian research output by between $1.4 billion and $4.9 billion.

[Read more…] about Share – and boost Australian research by up to five billion dollars

University of Texas at Austin release

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Corals are already adapting to global warming, scientists say

AUSTIN, Texas — Some coral populations already have genetic variants necessary to tolerate warm ocean waters, and humans can help to spread these genes, a team of scientists from The University of Texas at Austin, the Australian Institute of Marine Science and Oregon State University have found. The discovery has implications for many reefs now threatened by global warming and shows for the first time that mixing and matching corals from different latitudes may boost reef survival.

The findings were published this week in the journal Science.

[Read more…] about University of Texas at Austin release