At the beginning of June, the MRC WIMM hosted a stand in the Discover Zone at Cheltenham Science Festival. The stand, called Targeted Therapies, featured activities designed to help visitors understand the challenges faced by scientists developing new treatments and to introduce the concept of using gene therapies to treat diseases in the bone marrow.
Over 10,000 people visited the Discover Zone across the six days of the festival, including 7,000 children from 78 schools around the UK. Researchers from the Sir William Dunn School of Pathology, Department of Oncology and other departments across the Medical Sciences Division joined volunteers from across the MRC WIMM to help run the Targeted Therapies stand.
The cancer cell shooting game was a hit, with visitors queuing throughout the day to take their turn. In the game, participants shoot at red targets representing cancer cells. These targets are large and easier to hit on the 'In the Lab' side of the board, but much smaller (and worth more points) on the 'In the Body' side. The activity was designed to get visitors thinking about how models used in the lab to develop new treatments are much simpler than real systems in the body, and why developing better models is so important.
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Later, in July, the MRC WIMM welcomed twelve Year 12 students from state schools across Oxfordshire, from Chipping Norton to Wallingford, for the summer MRC WIMM Work Experience Programme. During the two weeks, students spent time with different research groups and facilities, getting hands-on experience of laboratory and computational techniques and learning about research taking place across the Institute.
Their placements covered topics including cancer, DNA repair, viral infection, developmental disorders, gene regulation and childhood leukaemia. Alongside their placements, students took part in group sessions on haematology, genetics and immunology, as well as a session on UCAS applications.
Students particularly enjoyed the opportunity to do practical work, use equipment they would not normally encounter at school and learn science beyond the curriculum. They also valued meeting researchers, discovering different career paths and getting a sense of what it is like to work in a research institute. One student highlighted:
Lab sessions and learning new techniques like flow cytometry and immunofluorescent imaging. Also learning about the science behind what we were doing.
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The group sessions also introduced students to new areas of science and some of the wider questions that researchers have to consider. Reflecting on the genetics session, one student said:
I learnt a lot as the things that were said were very new and interesting to me. It involves a lot of ethics.
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The programme finished with students preparing short presentations about their placements and sharing what they had learned with fellow students and lab hosts. In addition to the main summer programme, research groups across the Institute also hosted ad hoc placements for local and international students, at both secondary school and undergraduate level.
Thank you to everyone across the MRC WIMM and the wider Medical Sciences Division who gave their time to support this summer's activities.