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Public invited to shape future science research

Monday 16 October 2017

VISITORS to Manchester Science Festival (Oct 19-29, 2017) will be learning how to monitor air quality from a smartphone and to measure the impact of plastic on life in our oceans.

Citizen Science – where the public get the opportunity to participate in and even, advance science – is a strong theme of this year’s festival and further proof that science is no longer an elite activity.

But to help take science out of the lab and even further into the street, The University of Salford is now part of a national drive which could revolutionise research in the UK

The OPENER project, funded by the Natural Environment Research Council, is the first step in helping researchers harness growing public enthusiasm for being involved in the big environmental challenges of our time.

Eyes and ears

Public science has been proven to have considerable impact in advancing research,  providing extra eyes and ears for scientists to record animal and plant species and get hands-on with things like growing food, like Salford’s own FarmLab pioneer and Opener collaborator Erinma Ochu.

Innovative methods have also allowed researcher to reach far bigger audiences, like the climate spiral graph created by the University of Reading’s Professor Ed Hawkins – another OPENER collaborator – which illustrated global temperature rises to billions of people when it was used in the opening ceremony of the 2016 Rio Olympics.

Dr Ochu said: “It’s very exciting to be part this and Iwill be working with researchers, cultural organisations, community groups and businesses to achieve our aims.

“For example researchers at Salford with the support of our cross-disciplinary science communication platform, The Scicomm Space, will be getting the public involved in environmental research such at our citizen science showcase and virtual reality experiences at The Manchester Science Festival(Oct 21/22).

Relevant to everyon

Led by the University of Reading, OPENER also involves University College London, Imperial College London, Newcastle University,University of Salford and the Earthwatch Institute. It will set up a national consortium to ‘recruit’ the public and base new studies around their participation.

Dr Hilary Geoghegan, Associate Professor of Human Geography at the University of Reading, and project lead, said: “We want to harness the power of the public, regardless of age and ability, to address major environmental challenges. Our vision is to leverage the power of the people to co-produce innovative research that is relevant to people’s lives.”