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We're an independent charity connecting people of all ages and backgrounds with science. 📺 Home of the #XmasLectures 💥 Weekly science talks online/in person
London & Beyond
Joined July 2009
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One Month. One Theatre. One Ri ❤️
Explore Science in our Theatre and Online this May. But hurry tickets are already selling fast.
Book yours today 👇
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Today's date (22/02/2022) is both a palindrome AND an ambigram! It reads the same left to right, right to left, and when turned upside down.
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You find the number sequence and associated golden ratio/spiral peppered throughout nature. But the sequence was perhaps first noticed around 200 BC in relation to patterns in poetry, by Pingala. It was developed in Indian mathematics and introduced to Europe in 1202 by Fibonacci
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1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, who do we appreciate?
Fibonacci, because it's
#FibonacciDay
(11/23)
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317811...
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Drumroll, please 🥁 The 2021
#XmasLectures
will be led by Professor Jonathan Van-Tam! The 3-lecture series is titled: ‘Going viral: How Covid changed science forever’.
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When we had a chance to send something up to
@astro_timpeake
on the ISS, this is what we sent. Happy
#TowelDay
!
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DRUMROLL PLEASE 🎉 Our 2019 Christmas Lecturer is the one and only
@FryRsquared
!
In the ‘Secrets and lies’
#XmasLectures
, Hannah will unveil the hidden numbers, rules and patterns that govern our daily lives.
Read all about it at
@guardianscience
-
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This is Kathleen Lonsdale's actual handwriting, NOT a digital font.
We're going to go away now and feel bad about ourselves.
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DRUMROLL PLEASE
Our 2020 Christmas Lecturers are Chris Jackson, Helen Czerski & Tara Shine!
In 'Planet Earth: A user's guide'
@seis_matters
,
@helenczerski
&
@shine_tara
are teaming up to tackle climate change through earth, ocean and air
#XmasLectures
🌏
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That feeling when you’ve nailed 3
#XmasLectures
🥳 HUGE congrats and thanks to
@FryRsquared
for unveiling the mathematical patterns in life, showing everyone how cool algorithms are & inspiring a new batch of mathematicians!
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We love this disappearing sculpture that is inspired by quantum physics and wave-particle duality. See more of Julian Voss-Andreae's incredible work:
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'Planet Earth: A user's guide' starts TODAY! 🥳
@seis_matters
kicks us off with 'Engine Earth', showing how our planet’s oldest rocks and fossils provide evidence of radical climate changes, and how humans are now tipping the balance.
📺 8pm,
@BBC
Four:
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@CorneelAbrasion
@seis_matters
@helenczerski
@shine_tara
Everyone but white males was passed over for 170 consecutive years so...
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A towel is about the most massively useful thing interstellar hitchhiker
@astro_timpeake
can have 🚀 Happy
#TowelDay
!
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Did you know? The Fibonacci sequence is a handy tool to approximatively convert miles to km.
👉 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34...
5 miles ≈ 8km
8 miles ≈ 13 km
13 miles ≈ 21 km
and so on!
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On this day in 1856 Charles Darwin started writing On the Origin of Species. He sketched his famous first diagram of an evolutionary tree in 1837, with the note 'I think'
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It’s
#LeftHandersDay
! Only 10% of people are left handed🤚🤙 - It’s thought that our preference for our handiness is determined as a growing foetus, even before the connection between the area of our brain which controls movement, and our spinal cord, is fully formed (1/3)👇
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The difference between FM and AM radio? 📻 Basically, FM radio is tuned to changes in the frequency of radio waves, whilst AM is tuned to the amplitude of radio waves. So AM radio is more vulnerable to interference, but its longer wavelengths mean better range
#NationalRadioDay
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📣 To feedback about the 2020 Christmas Lectures, please email us xmaslecs
@ri
.ac.uk and please don’t abuse our speakers.
A thread ⤵️
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Science is at its best when we ALL have a voice!
Happy International Day of Women & Girls in Science 🎉
All areas of science are enhanced and enriched by both the work and presence of women and girls in the discipline.
#WomenInScience
#WomenInSTEM
#WomenInScienceDay
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BIG NEWS 📣 In the 2018
#xmaslectures
,
@theAliceRoberts
will be exploring the fundamental question of life: ‘Who am I?’
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Did you see today's
@GoogleDoodles
celebrating Marie Tharp?
The geologist completely revolutionised the way we see the formation of the world as we know it by studying the ocean floor - without ever being allowed on a boat.
#Thread
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HUGE thanks and congrats to our 3 incredible Christmas Lecturers! We've learnt so much about how the earth, ocean and atmosphere work, and how we can protect the planet and people from the impacts of climate change 🌎🌍🌏
We hope you have too!
#XmasLectures
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Can you post some festive science content?
Fine, here's a chemist-tree
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This is a monumental moment in science! The first image of a black hole has just been revealed by the Event Horizon Telescope, an international array of 8 radio telescopes. It's measured to be 40 billion km wide 😲
#EHTBlackHole
@ehtelescope
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Liquid oxygen has paramagnetic properties 🧲
When you pour it between two poles of a strong magnet (at room temperature) the liquid is held there until it boils back into a gas.
Watch the full demo:
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Happy 95th birthday to national treasure Sir David Attenborough! 🎂
His 1975 Christmas Lectures broke the cardinal rule of broadcast television: "never work with animals or children" - and they were awesome. Watch here:
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Question: What is chemistry?
Andrew Szydlo: Hold my beaker
Watch the full family-friendly lecture here:
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The
#XmasLectures
start TONIGHT! 🎉
Join us on BBC Four at 8pm as Jonathan Van-Tam and a team of expert Guest Lecturers share the science of viruses: how they work, how they spread, and what we can do to stop them.
Read more:
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We're excited to announce our 2022 Christmas Lecturer: Professor Dame Sue Black!
This year's
#XmasLectures
will be all about forensic science, as Sue reveals the secrets of real-life investigations, separating forensic fact from fiction.
Find out more:
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Happy Boxing Day! This means only one thing - the first of the 'Secrets and lies'
#XmasLectures
🤫 Tune in to
@BBCFOUR
at 8pm to see
@FryRsquared
&
@standupmaths
unravel the mathematics of luck
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Today's Google Doodle celebrates the birthday of Georgios Papanikolaou, the Greek medic and researcher who invented the Papanicolaou smear test – aka the Pap smear – to screen women for early signs of cervical cancer 🔬
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Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened 🥲 It's a wrap on the 2022
#XmasLectures
!
Please join us in saying a massive "well done" to our Christmas Lecturer, Sue Black 👏 How great was she?!
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Liquid oxygen has paramagnetic properties, so when you pour it between two poles of a strong magnet (at room temperature) the liquid is held there until it boils back into a gas 🤩
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That's a wrap on
#xmaslectures
number 1! Well done
@theAliceRoberts
&
@aoifemcl
! Tune back in tomorrow at 8PM for a closer look at our human lineage in 'What makes me human?'
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🧲This jaw-dropping visualisation of a magnetic field has got us hypnotised 😵
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Is today the day when we post our best sodium pun?
Na.
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Why is the sky blue? 🔵 Jemma recreates 19th-century demonstration of Tyndall scattering.
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Only seven sleeps until the 2021
#XmasLectures
! 🎄 Join Jonathan Van-Tam and six Guest Lecturers to learn all about how viruses work, how they spread, and the scientific breakthroughs that allow us to fight them.
📺 BBC Four (8pm) on 28, 29, and 30 December.
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Sodium flames can appear black in the light of a sodium lamp.🔥⚫
Isn't physics awesome?!
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It's
#NationalAvocadoDay
! Did you know that avocados contain more potassium than bananas? Potassium is vital for a number of vital bodily functions - helping our muscles to contract and regulating our heart rhythm and blood pressure🥑💪❤️
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Alan Turing will be the face of the
@bankofengland
's new £50 polymer note! 💷 “Turing is a giant on whose shoulders so many now stand"
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A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have, so
@Kevin_Fong
sent one to
@astro_timpeake
back in the 2015
#xmaslectures
.
Happy
#TowelDay
everyone! Wear yours to pay tribute to Douglas Adams, author of 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'
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Two
#XmasLectures
down, one to go! Watch us tonight on BBC Four at 8pm, as Jonathan Van-Tam is joined by Guest Lecturers Teresa Lambe and Sharon Peacock to tell us about the science of vaccines and how we can use technology to beat viruses in Lecture Three: 'Fighting Back'
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Mars will be at its biggest and brightest starting tonight, as the Earth will sit between Mars and the sun at 5:22AM (this is 'opposition', the planetary equivalent of a full moon).
Clear skies permitting, folks in the UK should be able to see the red planet most of the night.🔭
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If you're raising a glass on
#BeerDay
(you know—for science), chemistry is here to help you make an informed decision at the bar. 🍻
Via the excellent
@compoundchem
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11 sleeps until the
#XmasLectures
begin! They're on
@BBCFOUR
at 8pm on the 28, 29 & 30 December 🌍
28 Dec: 'Engine Earth' by
@seis_matters
29 Dec: 'Water World' by
@helenczerski
30 Dec: 'Up in the Air' by
@shine_tara
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Carl Sagan, who would have been 87 years old today, sent a message out to the Universe during his 1977
#XmasLectures
. We worked out how far that message would have travelled at the speed of light since then. 🌌
Watch his full lectures, "The Planets":
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Happy Birthday Charles Darwin! Darwin was born on this day in 1809 🦍👣
You can read 'On the Origin of Species' here:
And read all known letters Darwin wrote and received up to the year 1873 thanks to
@MyDearDarwin
:
#DarwinDay
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One week to go until the 'Who am I?'
#xmaslectures
with
@theAliceRoberts
&
@aoifemcl
!
First up on Boxing Day, Alice and Aoife explore our place in the tree of life. Tune in to
@BBCFOUR
at 8pm
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Let's welcome our next Guest Lecturer: Julia Gog 🙌 Julia is Professor of Mathematical Biology at
@cambridge_uni
, and a specialist in modelling the spread and evolution of infectious diseases.
Are you ready for some maths fun?!
#XmasLectures
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Biggest congratulations to our Christmas Lecturers
@theAliceRoberts
&
@aoifemcl
on a stellar series of
#xmaslectures
! Your smarts and enthusiasm is going to inspire generations 👏🥳
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'How to Bend the Rules'
#XmasLectures
.
@FryRsquared
&
@standupmaths
& friends. 8PM TONIGHT. Be there or be a regular quadrilateral
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Boy: Dad, can you tell me what an eclipse is?
Dad: No sun.
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How will the Universe end? 🌌 Cosmologist
@AstroKatie
tells us about three theories with names so cool, they could be heavy metal bands.
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Happy
#InternationalDayofWomenandGirlsinScience
!
Follow the hashtag for empowering stories and experiences from women working in science. We love these STEM role models posters from
@neverthelesspod
for extra inspiration 💫👩🏿🔬👩🏼🔧👩🏾🚀👩🏽🏭👩🏻🌾👩🏽⚕️
@WomenScienceDay
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We’ve seen that Prof Chris Jackson has once again been the subject of abuse in relation to his work in the 2020 Christmas Lectures. We want to reiterate that we are so proud of the work Chris, Dr Helen Czerski and Dr Tara Shine did as our Christmas Lecturers. (1/2)
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The furthest place from land on Earth is known as Point Nemo, almost 2,700km away from the nearest island.
At the right time of day, the nearest humans are those on board the International Space Station, at ≈400 kilometres altitude.
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This chart illustrates how the number of Crayola crayon colours doubles every 28 years. 🖍️
According to Crayola's law (yes, it's a thing), by 2050 toddlers will have to choose from a whopping 330 colours.
Read more:
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It's our 222nd birthday! 🎂 We don't feel a day older than 221.
What better way to celebrate than replicating one of Faraday’s famous candle demonstrations?
The smoke contains vapourised wax (fuel for the 🔥) and it burns all the way back to the wick, reigniting the candle.
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Very important law of science
Newton's third law of motion states that for every action there is a an equal and opposite reaction - for instance, the force exerted on lambykins’ ears cause an equal and opposite reaction in lambykins’ tail.
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Celebrate 10 years of the Large Hadron Collider
@CERN
⚛️ On 24 Sep we're live-streaming with a panel of physicists from its 4 giant experiments –
@ALICEexperiment
,
@ATLASexperiment
,
@CMSExperiment
&
@LHCbExperiment
Register for free >
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During the first of the 2021
#XmasLectures
, Jonathan Van-Tam and Guest Lecturers
@ProfKatieEwer
and
@ravgup33_ravi
will tell us all about how viruses infect our bodies, damage our cells and force our immune system to fight back.
📺 Watch tonight, on BBC Four at 8pm!
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The Ri are sorry to hear of the passing of one of the great physics minds of our time Peter Higgs.
Our thoughts are with his family, friends, colleagues and all those he influenced during his life and phenomenal career.
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AI is the most rapidly evolving area of science today
Join
@wooldridgemike
for the
#XmasLectures
, supported by CGI, revealing the truth about AI - from its impact on daily life to showing how AI technology really works
📺8pm on BBC Four on 26, 27, 28 December & BBC iPlayer
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Did you miss the first night of the
#XmasLectures
? Fear not, technology is here to help — it's already on BBC iPlayer for catch up!
Join us tonight at 8pm on BBC Four for Lecture Two, to delve into the science of how viruses spread.
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Look at your formulae notes
Look at Kathleen Lonsdale's formulae notes
Give up on science for the day
#NationalHandwritingDay
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2 days to go until
@FryRsquared
's
#XmasLectures
with
@standupmaths
🥳
Tune in to
@BBCFOUR
at 8pm on Boxing Day for 'Secrets and lies: The hidden power of maths':
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Look out for a super pink moon tonight 🌕
The biggest full moon of 2020 is set to light up the night sky this evening
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Less than a week to the
#XmasLectures
with Sue Black! 🤩 Follow us on an illuminating journey using forensic science to investigate crimes from the crime scene, through to the lab and into the courtroom.
📺 Tune in on BBC Four and iPlayer at 8pm on 26, 27 and 28 December
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Whoever does these incredible fractal patterns in the snow is putting snowmen everywhere to shame (via
@spleenywaves
)
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Mind-blowing fact of the day: there's more time separating the T. rex and the Stegosaurus (c. 82 million years) than there is between the T. rex and the iPhone (c. 65 million years).
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Bet you've never seen sound waves this way before! 🔥
@AnnaPloszajski
takes us on a whistle-stop tour of the science of materials, from plastic mattresses to brass trumpets! Watch now:
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Marie Tharp was born
#otd
in 1920! As a geologist and oceanographer, Marie was the first person to scientifically map the Atlantic ocean floor along with Bruce Heezen. As part of her extensive work, she also proposed the concept of continental drift and plate tectonics.
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Our 2021 Christmas Lecturer is Prof Jonathan Van-Tam! 👏 He will be joined by leading scientists who played key roles in our response to the current pandemic, taking a deep dive into viruses, including Covid-19.
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3.1415926535 8979323846 2643383279 5028841971 6939937510 5820974944 5923078164 0628620899 8628034825 3421170679 8214808651 3282306647 0938446095 5058223172 5359408128 4811174502 8410270193 8521105559 6446229489 5493038196 4428810975 6659334461 2847564823 3786783165 2712019091
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Just three hours until the
#XmasLectures
start on BBC Four at 8pm!
Tune in to learn all about viruses and pandemics with Jonathan Van-Tam and a team of Guest Lecturers. Tonight,
@ProfKatieEwer
and
@ravgup33_ravi
for Lecture One: 'The Invisible Enemy'.
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You need to see this. That is all.
So, a baby tapir has been born...
And here he is testing out his tiny trunk for the first time 😍
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Did you know the first-ever 'scientist' was a Scottish woman?
This is Mary Somerville, and you can find one of her very rare busts in our library. She was the first person to be described in print with the word 'scientist'.
- A
#StAndrewsDay
thread🦄
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One week to go until the
#XmasLectures
! Tune in to
@BBCFOUR
at 8pm on 28, 29 & 30 December 🌎
@seis_matters
,
@helenczerski
&
@shine_tara
present a user's guide to Planet Earth through geology, oceans and climate science:
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We had so much fun filming the 2021
#XmasLectures
!
We can't wait to show you on BBC Four at 8pm on 28, 29, and 30 December 📺
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Mark your calendars! 🗓️ The 2022
#XmasLectures
will land on BBC Four and iPlayer on 26, 27 and 28 December at 8pm.
Sue Black will uncover how real-life forensic investigation works - from the crime scene to the lab, and in the courtroom.
Learn more:
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Congratulations to our Christmas Lecturer
@theAliceRoberts
, the newly appointed President of
@Humanists_UK
!
'If we can use science wisely and work together, I believe we can overcome the huge challenges facing us this century.'
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We used this new AI app from
@MyHeritage
to animate a photo of the man himself, Michael Faraday. We like to think that if he were alive today, he would be on social media and have tons of followers. He was the OG science influencer!
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Why do atoms form those lovely regular structures when packed together? ⚛️
Sir Richard Catlow shows us with a surprisingly simple yet effective demonstration.
Watch the full talk about molecular models:
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🏔️
@NorthSeaCore
lent us these beaut rock cores spanning an age range of 150-350 million years, drilled out from under the sea-bed offshore of Scotland. From these geologists like
@seis_matters
can read Earth's history, from plate tectonics to mountain formation
#XmasLectures
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A huge thank you to all of you who have shown your support for Chris, Helen, Tara and the Lectures in these last couple of weeks 💛 We're very lucky to have you and them. The Xmas Lectures will be amazing.
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Drumroll, please... 🥁
We are excited to announce that the 2023
#XmasLectures
will be presented by Prof Mike Wooldridge (
@wooldridgemike
) and will be all about artificial intelligence!
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Greatest Scientists of All Time:
20. It's
19. Absurd
18. To
17. Rank
16. Scientists
15. As
14. If
13. They
12. Were
11. Films
10. Or
9. Craft
8. Beers
7. Rather
6. Than
5. Our
4. Smartest
3. All-time
2. Thinkers
1. Michael Faraday
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Neil Armstrong was born
#OTD
in 1930! The American astronaut is best known for being the first person to set foot on the moon. 🌕 Given the limited atmosphere on the moon there is almost no erosion, and so 50 years later his footprints are still on its surface.
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This spinning blu tack shows why the Earth isn't (perfectly) round, and the solar system is all in one plane:
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The happy-clappy maths is in the bag, now let's test the limits 😈
Savour the final precious 33.33'% of the
#XmasLectures
with "How Can We All Win?".
@FryRsquared
,
@standupmaths
& friends at 8pm on
@BBCFOUR
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It was great to have Peta Hayes, Miranda Lowe (
@NatHistGirl
) and Chris Dean from
@NHM_London
join
@seis_matters
, sharing their knowledge and giving us a glimpse into the depths of the Natural History Museum collection 🌿🐠🦕
#XmasLectures
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A neutron walks into a bar and asks how much for a beer. The bartender replies, “For you, no charge.”
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