A cosmic ray detector.
A heart scanner.
And a handheld ultrasound probe that connects to a smartphone.
These were some of the fantastic hands on technology demonstrations that you could see and try out for yourself at this years New Scientist Live. Alongside this were many other interactive exhibits and really interesting and engaging people to speak to. And, as ever, there was also an outstanding program of talks and lectures by world leading scientists and speakers.
Dark Matter
First of all, lets talk dark matter. We don’t know if it exists. However, we infer its presence from many things. One example is the orbital speed of stars within galaxies. These starts are moving faster than they should be for the matter that we see present. This implies there should be something that we can’t see that is responsible for the extra gravity holding those stars in place – dark matter.
The Lux-Zeplin dark matter experiment is designed to look for dark matter. However, it is incredibly sensitive and needs to be shielded from all the cosmic rays that are constantly bombarding our planet and even moving through you and I right now. To illustrate their frequency, they set up a cosmic ray detector at the show. It was absolutely fascinating and was easily one of my favourite things to see this year.
Medical Technology
Moving along to medical technology, the Butterfly Network ultrasound probe is an amazing device. It replaces a huge amount of kit. This kit is typically the size of a couple of suitcases and is wheeled around a hospital on a trolley. This new handheld probe plugs into a tablet or smartphone and runs via an app. Much simpler!
Kirsten Christensen-Jeffries and Antonios Pouliopoulos from the team at Kings College London Quiin Lab showed me how it worked. We used it to spot objects in pots of dark liquid as an analogue of doing an actual ultrasound. This experience was informative and great fun.
The potential applications for something as mobile as this are clearly huge. The technology is so portable and can be used pretty much anywhere. This includes developing countries or remote villages where this kind of technology would typically not be available.
Moving around the corner I came across the team from Medical Mavericks. They used a small laptop connected to us by 3 stick on disposable sensors. The setup was used to take our heart rate. Again, such impressive tech in a small package using everyday available hardware is sure to be useful in areas where you can’t take huge diagnostic machines. A big shout out to the team who were super enthusiastic and great to talk to as well.
Thankfully my heartrate appeared ok on the day!
Engaging Talks Schedule
One of the highlights for me every year is the talks schedule. There were so many to go to, and as ever, I missed some due to the clashes. However, this year I paid an extra £10 to allow me to see the recordings of the ones I missed – a great facility!
If I had to pick out my two favourite talks, my first would be Tim Gregory‘s session on Nuclear. Tim discussed both previous, current and potential future use of nuclear to power space missions. Tim is a very engaging speaker who is clearly passionate and excited about what he does. That rubs off on the audience and makes his talks so easy to watch and listen to.
My other pick would be the final talk of the first day on the Our Planet stage. Dr Gillian Forrester showed how the thermal imaging of facial blood flow can reveal whether humans (and other animals) are stressed or not. I found this absolutely fascinating as this is a phenomenon that is easily measured using simple infrared (IR) cameras that are available today. The research itself was compelling enough, but then Dr Forrester did a live demo with two volunteers from the audience. This really reinforced how usable this method could be for detecting stress using physiologically measurable markers.
Own your own piece of the Universe!
Finally, it wouldn’t be a trip to New Scientist Live if I didn’t visit Martin on the MSG Meteorites stand. This year my haul (as my daughters would refer to it) included a large unclassified meteorite found in North West Africa. It’s fantastic to hold and look at and wonder what secrets it might one day reveal. I also picked up a nice piece of Tektite, which is a natural glass formed from the heat and debris of a meteorite impact. Martin is extremely knowledgeable and passionate about his subject and his stall is packed with fascinating artefacts.
There is so much more to write and congratulations if you’ve got this far. If you’ve never been, I highly recommend it. This was our third year and every year it’s better and better. You’re in a space with thousands of other people who are curious and interested in the world around them. You listen to and talk to world-leading experts in their fields and you experiment with cutting edge technology. What could be more fun?
Dan Roach Flying Author 