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General Information

 

Date:	Tuesday 16th May
Title:	The Arctic & global warming
Speaker:	Quentin Cooper, host of Radio 4's Material World Chaired by Sheila Ochugboju (local biomedical scientist and science communicator
Description:	The Arctic, global warming, science, science communication, the radio and suchlike ...

Date:	Tuesday 27th June
Title:	Lonesome George - the life and loves of a conservation icon
Speaker:	Henry Nicholls
Description:	Lonesome George is a 5ft long, 200lb tortoise aged between 60 and 200. In 1971 he was discovered on the remote Galapagos island of Pinta, from which tortoises had supposedly been exterminated by buccaneering whalers and seal hunters. He has been at the Charles Darwin Research Station on Santa Cruz island ever since, on the off-chance that scientific ingenuity will conjure up a way of reproducing him and resurrecting his species. Meanwhile a million tourists and dozens of baffled scientists have looked on as the celebrity reptile shows not a jot of interest in the female company provided. Today, Lonesome George has come to embody the mystery, complexity and fragility of the unique Galapagos archipelago. His story echoes the challenges of conservation worldwide. It is a swashbuckling tale of combat and collecting on the high seas, Darwin, sexual dysfunction, hostages, moonlit escapes, culture clashes, cloning, DNA fingerprinting and eco-tourism. Henry Nicholls writes for many of the world's leading science periodicals including Nature and Science. Following his PhD in Evolutionary Ecology with Tim Birkhead (Promiscuity and The Red Canary), he edited The Encyclopedia of Life Sciences and wrote for BioMedNet News before becoming Editor of the leading history of science journal, Endeavour. He lives in south London with his wife and new son.
Date:	Tuesday 25th July
Title:	Intellectual Property - we patent products but can or should we patent ideas?
Speaker:	Wendy M Grossman
Description:	“The difference between ideas and things is obvious as soon as someone hits you over the head with an idea - so obvious that until recently it was entirely clear to the law. Things could have owners and ideas could not. Yet this simple distinction is being changed all around us. Ideas are increasingly treated as property - as things that have owners who may decide who gets to use them and on what terms.” Andrew Brown, Owning Ideas, The Guardian, 19.11.05. Wendy M Grossman is an American freelance writer based in London. She writes a weekly column, net.wars, as well as writing for publications such as Scientific American, The Guardian, the Daily Telegraph, and ZDNet UK. Wendy was founder and former editor (twice) of the British magazine The Skeptic and still writes a column for it and also one on scepticism for the Philosopher's Magazine. She has also written or edited five books and sits on the advisory boards of several privacy, open rights and intellectual property organisations.
Date:	Tuesday 29th August
Title:	Our nearest star, the Sun
Speaker:	Paul Harper, Chair of Croydon Astronomical Society
Description:	Paul will take us on a fascinating tour of our local star, the Sun; its formation, its make-up and how it affects us both here on Earth and in space. If we are going back to the moon and on to Mars, what are the dangers for the space traveller? Why is space weather very important to space agencies? Croydon Astronomical Society has around eighty members of all abilities. The Society was found in 1956 and is celebrating its fiftieth birthday this year. Its observatory on Kenley Common is open to the public on Saturdays through the winter and it holds regular lectures at the Royal Russell School. Paul Harper has been chairman of the society for just over a year and is a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society. His main interests are planetary and solar observation and human space flight.

Date:	Tuesday 26th September
Title:	Fusion: powering the future?
Speaker:	Chris Warrick (UKAEA)
Description:	With fossil fuel reserves dwindling and environmental concerns over the emission of greenhouse gases, research into alternatives such as nuclear fusion (the process that powers the sun) takes on increasing significance. The world’s largest fusion experiment, the European JET experiment at Culham Science Centre in Oxfordshire, has heated a plasma (hot, ionised gas) to greater than 100 million °C and demonstrated the fusion of deuterium and tritium ions, producing some 16MW of fusion energy. To progress to a fusion power station, the larger ITER international device is to be built in Cadarache, France over the next ten years.  ITER will be able to produce 500MW of fusion power and test the reliability and engineering of the device for future fusion power stations. ITER could be a path to commercial fusion power which may see the first demonstration plant within thirty years. Fusion could be an abundant, safe and environmentally responsible additional energy option for the middle part of this century. Chris Warrick is a member of the Public Relations team at the UKAEA Culham Science Centre. After graduating with a degree in physics from the University of Wales, Chris joined UKAEA at Culham in 1990 working as an experimental physicist on various fusion devices until 2001.  He was particularly involved with plasma microwave heating systems and plasma radiation measurement devices. Since 2001, Chris has been a member of the Public Relations team with particular responsibility for education and public outreach.

Date:	Tuesday 31st October
Title:	Upgrading humans – technical realities and new morals
Speaker:	Kevin Warwick
Description:	Implant technology is diminishing the effects of certain neural illnesses and increasing the abilities of those affected. As part of his research, Kevin Warwick received a neural implant that linked his nervous system directly to a computer. Neural signals were transmitted to various technological devices, such as the fingertips of a robot hand, both directly and via the Internet and feedback came from ultrasonic (extra-) sensory input and signals from another human’s nervous system. Would someone whose brain were part human-part machine have abilities that far surpass those who have only a human brain? Would they have different moral and ethical values? If they did, what effects might this have on society? Kevin Warwick is Professor of Cybernetics at Reading University researching into artificial intelligence, control, robotics and biomedical engineering. He is also Director of the university's Knowledge Transfer Centre. His work is used as material in A-level physics courses in the UK and in universities including Harvard, Stanford, MIT & Tokyo. His implants are on permanent display in the Science Museums in London and Naples and he was responsible (with Jim Wyatt) for Cybot, a robot exported around the world via Real Robots magazine. In 2005, Kevin gave over twenty lectures, including presentations in Los Angeles, Kuala Lumpur, Poznan, Prague, Barcelona, Hong Kong, Coimbra, Leuven, Istanbul, Calgary, Eindhoven and Paris.

Date:	Tuesday 28th November
Title:	Does the world still need scientists?
Speaker:	Sheila Ochugboju
Description:	The older generation regularly worries about the lack of young people taking up science. Industrialists, bankers and learned societies raise alarms about the future of British economic growth and global prominence if the study of science continues its decline. Classrooms are emptying in schools and universities and courses disappearing, as young people deserting science, engineering and technology in droves. Does it really matter? Is the rapid expansion of global technology and capability evidence that a growth is taking place in new areas? Sheila Ochugboju argues that science and the creative arts are  forging new natural alliances and promoting new forms of knowledge. The scientist of the future will have to be creative and innovative. We need to develop new strategies to engage extraordinary young people in science and the creative arts in dialogue. Sheila Ochugboju has been dedicated to promoting science, using creative arts and imaginative new media, for more than ten years. As a Daphne Jackson Research Fellow at Oxford University, she researched into the use of genetically engineered viruses as biological pesticides. She has worked at senior levels in academia, business and the public sector.

Date:	Tuesday 30th January
Title:	Nerves! - the neuro-emotional basis of modern ailments
Speaker:	Nick Read
Description:	Fifty per cent of visits to doctors are for illnesses that have no obvious physical cause and cannot be cured. Drawing on research in affective neuroscience and psychology and his extensive clinical experience, Nick Read offers an explanation for this seeming modern epidemic and offers an alternative means of dealing with it; discussing why unexplained illnesses are getting more common, why the medical profession is unable to deal with them and how we can find a way back to health.  Nick held chairs in physiology, human nutrition and integrated medicine at Sheffield University.  He now works in private practice as a physician and psychoanalytical psychotherapist and writes popular articles and books on various topics including medicine.  His latest book is Sick and tired; healing the illnesses doctors cannot cure.  Copies will be available at the cafe.

Date:	Tuesday 27th February
Title:	Life and death decisions about newborn babies - an ethical debate
Speaker:	Catherine Moody, Acting Director of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics
Description:	"Let premature babies under 23 weeks die, doctors told" The Guardian "Doctors cannot 'play God with babies' lives" The Daily Mail "When to let a baby die: experts set the guidelines" The Times  These are just some of the headlines sparked by a recent report of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics on the care of extremely premature or seriously ill babies. Should you try to give intensive care to the earliest babies when their chances of survival are so slim? At what point might an older baby's life become so intolerable that you should consider letting them die?  Should doctors ever actively end a baby’s life? Who should make decisions on behalf of babies who cannot speak for themselves? Dr Catherine Moody will lead an exploration of the ethical, social and legal issues which are raised by this controversial and emotive topic. Catherine has a background in the biomedical sciences and has been at the Nuffield Council for three years, drawn by an interest in ethical issues raised by scientific progress. She began her career as a research scientist before becoming a scientific programme manager for the UK Medical Research Council, which funds scientific research aiming to improve human health.

Date:	Tuesday 27th March
Title:	The scientific basis for herbal medicine ... is there one? !
Speaker:	Liz Williamson
Description:	There is a huge market for herbal medicines, but many people think they are either unproven placebos, or perhaps dangerous untested drugs. Liz will try to separate some of the truth from fiction, explain how herbal medicines are made, how they differ from other drugs obtained from plants, and whether they are in fact safe, especially with prescription drugs. Professor Williamson is a member of the British Pharmacopoeia Commission, an adviser to the European Pharmacopoeia on herbal drugs, and a former member of the Medicines Commission. Her research interests centre mainly on evaluating the quality and pharmacological effects of herbal medicines, in particular their synergistic interactions, including the medicinal use of cannabis.

Date:	Tuesday 24th April
Title:	Maths in the weirdest places
Speaker:	Paul Stevenson
Description:	Are the sorts of equations which make the news every now and then helpful in portraying maths and science in a favourable light, and what do they say about our numeracy? Paul will be talking about the use of maths in describing everyday things, such as how to walk in high heels, eat with chopsticks, choose the perfect beach or park a car. After graduating from the University of Oxford in 1999 with a D.Phil in theoretical nuclear structure physics, Dr Stevenson spent a year as a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. From there he was appointed as a Research Fellow at Surrey, a job he held for two years, which was followed by being appointed a Temporary Lecturer at Surrey in 2002, and a full Lecturer in 2005.

Date:	Tuesday 29th May
Title:	The neuroscience of love
Speaker:	Davina Bristow
Description:	A certain smile? A nice bottom? Too many large drinks? Just what causes attraction?  Explore this and much more in this alluring presentation. Davina will take us through the evolutionary purpose of love, why we fall in love, why we get jealous and why sex is a good idea. Davina Bristow studied biology at Oxford before going on to do a PhD in Neuroscience at UCL.  She now works full time for the BBC Science Department, and has also written about science for the Daily Telegraph.

Date:	Tuesday 26th June
Title:	A medical life in crime
Speaker:	Stephen Hempling
Description:	What is forensic medicine?  Dr Hempling will talk us through its many forms using examples from his varied career.  This fascinating session will also explore the history of forensic medicine, where we are now and what the future may have in store. Stephen Hempling worked as a GP for 25 years, and was a police surgeon from 1972 until 1991.  Since 1997, he has worked full-time as a forensic medical and medico-legal expert. He has a vast range of expertise, including causes and interpretation of injuries, child and adult sexual assault and medical negligence, particularly that involving GPs.

Date:	Tuesday 31st July - note change of date
Title:	Today's 'best buy' in public health: moderate or vigorous activity?
Speaker:	Gary O'Donovan
Description:	Gary O'Donovan is a Research Fellow in Exercise Physiology at Brunel University. His main research interest is the effect of exercise intensity on aerobic fitness and other heart disease risk factors. Gary is currently leading a team of experts which will produce the British Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences' consensus statement on physical activity in the prevention of chronic disease.

Date:	Tuesday 28th August
Title:	Twenty-first century technology in drug safety testing
Speaker:	Margaret Clotworthy
Description:	The problem of how best to safety test new drugs was recently illustrated by the Northwick Park clinical trial tragedy, where six young men almost died after taking a new drug shown to be safe at 500 times the dose in monkeys. Moreover, Vioxx, a painkiller, killed tens of thousands of people between 2000 and 2004. Is it time to modernise our drug testing requirements to embrace the latest, most human-relevant technologies? How should we decide how to go about discovering & developing new medicines today? Margaret Clotworthy has a PhD in cell biology from the University of Cambridge and an honours BSc in biotechnology from Dublin City University. She has worked in academic laboratories and in industry.  She is Science Consultant to Europeans for Medical Progress Trust.

Date:	Tuesday 25th September
Title:	Hypnosis: all the world's a stage
Speaker:	Paul Johnson
Description:	The subject of hypnosis provokes strong reactions, but it has become deeply embedded in our culture, from stage shows to therapy, and from self-help CDs to mainstream medicine and dentistry. Paul Johnson will ask: what’s really going on in hypnosis? Paul is a hypnotherapist with a keen interest in using scientific study to strip away the unnecessary mystique and mystery so often surrounding the subject.
Date:	Tuesday 30th October
Title:	Visions of the deep: the bioluminesence and eyes of animals in the deep sea
Speaker:	Ron Douglas
Description:	Vision plays a pivotal role in the existence of most animals, often being the principal route by which environmental information influences behaviour.  This is even true in the deep ocean; down to around one kilometre, sunlight provides light by which to see but lower down more light is produced by the animals which live there, through bioluminescence. The functions of bioluminescence are manifold and include being a means of communication. Ron Douglas will talk about some of the amazing visual adaptations of deep sea animals, such as a squid that whose left eye is about three times the size of its right and dragon fish that use ‘invisible’ red light for sex. Professor Ron Douglas is a marine biologist by training and now teaches human anatomy and physiology to optometry students as professor of Visual Science at City University. He has also written sections of the new edition of the classic medical text book, Gray’s Anatomy. He regularly participates in expeditions aboard research vessels to destinations including the waters off Madeira, the Canaries, Senegal, Hawaii, Midway, Costa Rica, Nicaragua and New Zealand.  Almost more than anything else, Ron Douglas likes to talk about his work, appearing on radio programmes such as the Naked Scientist and Radio 4 whenever he can and visiting schools. This will be his second outing to a Café Scientifique.
Date:	Tuesday 27th November
Title:	Drug addiction and crime in Croydon
Speaker:	Robin Moffat
Description:	Robin Moffat has been in forensic medical practice since 1959. From then until 1999 he was an appointed Metropolitan Police Surgeon (now known as Forensic Medical Examiner). He was elected president of the Section of Clinical Forensic Medicine at the Royal Society of Medicine and, a few years on, elected the Honorary Secretary. He is now a Council member of the Medico-Legal Society and of the British Academy of Forensic Science. He has appeared as an expert witness in numerous criminal trials involving criminal aspects such as non-fatal wounding, sexual offences and drink driving offences. There have been contributions by him in medical presses and he has also written chapters in medical text books.  Dr. Moffat has been a Police Surgeon in Croydon for several decades, working on numerous cases including the recent high profile Sally Anne Bowman case. He will be talking about his work and his experiences focusing particularly on the links between drugs and crime.

Date:	Tuesday 18th December
Title:	Albert Einstein: Kindness, Beauty, Truth
Speaker:	Ben Livingstone
Description:	At the beginning of the twentieth century, Albert Einstein's theories changed science forever, making him so famous that his image as the dishevelled, eccentric scientist is one that is recognised to this day. But how many of us understand his theories and what do we really know about the man? With the help of actor Ben Livingstone of Spectrum Drama, this is your chance to discover the beautiful simplicity of Einstein's theories and to learn more about the complex man behind them.

Date:	Tuesday 29th January
Title:	Climate change: will energy saving save the Earth?
Speaker:	David Shewan, the Energy-Saving Trust
Description:	David Shewan works for the Energy Saving Trust, a government-sponsored body that helps householders take individual action to reduce their CO2 emissions. David has provided advice to householders on home energy efficiency for five years, following his degree in Earth and atmospheric science.  David will talk us through the science behind climate change.  He’ll then give advice on increasing energy efficiency in our homes and guide us through the different renewable energy options: how they work, how much they cost and how much energy they save. This Café Scientifique is inspired by the Museum of Croydon’s latest exhibition: Croydon’s Climate Challenge, demonstrating what local people are doing to save energy.  We have asked a local family, a community group, a school, a local business and Croydon Council to show us what they are doing.  Come along and be inspired to take up the challenge yourself. Croydon Clocktower, 26 January - 26 April, 10.30– 5pm, Mondays – Saturdays FREE

Date:	Tuesday 26th February
Title:	Cradle of civilisation and the seeds of change
Speaker:	Anne-Marie Brennan
Description:	From coffee to clocks and surgical instruments to soap, few of us realise how many of the items we use in our everyday lives originated in the Muslim east. Hear Dr Brennan speak and visit 1001 Inventions, an exhibition bringing to life an often overlooked golden age of invention discovery from the seventh to the seventeenth centuries.

Date:	Tuesday 29th April
Title:	Evolution and creationism: a matter of acceptance and belief
Speaker:	James D Williams
Description:	The Darwin-Wallace theory of evolution is 150 years old on 1st July 2008. As theories in science go, it has been one of the most controversial, being blamed for everything from ‘proving’ that God does not exist to ethnic cleansing and teenage gun rampages in the USA and elsewhere. Those who oppose evolution, the creationists, would like to see it removed from the school curriculum, or at the very least demoted. Creationism is often seen as peculiarly American problem, plaguing the Southern States – the so-called Bible belt. But with a creationist museum already open on the South Coast of England and plans for a £3.5million creationist theme park in the Northwest of England, creationism is alive and well in the UK. The latest creationist attempt at infiltrating and overturning science in our schools is Intelligent Design Creationism. It dons the mantle of science to try and persuade us that some things just cannot be explained without invoking a designer.  In this talk James Williams, lecturer in science education at the University of Sussex, looks at the different types of creationism from Old Earth creationism to the Young Earth creationists who subscribe to a literal or plain reading of Genesis and on to the roots and aspirations of Intelligent Design Creationism. Using examples from nature and investigating ‘how science works’, misconceptions about evolution are exposed, flaws in the design argument are highlighted and creationism as a belief system is explored. Can evolution and creationism coexist and is a belief in God necessarily anti-science and anti-evolution?