A biological tale about "good cops and bad cops" claimed first prize in the inaugural Science Speak competition which took place in Dublin this week. Stephen Nolan representing University College Dublin won the day with a presentation about his research into kidney disease.
Science Speak is a new inter-university event that challenges postgraduate science students to explain their research work using ordinary language. Jargon and technical language are forbidden, and the object is to make advanced scientific research understandable to a lay audience.
RDS president Dr Austin Mescal launched the competition on Monday night in the RDS Concert Hall in Ballsbridge, Dublin. It involved postgraduate researchers from each the Republic's seven universities, who took the podium for a 10-minute talk, followed by five minutes of questions.
The master of ceremonies for the night was the popular RTÉ presenter Pat Kenny. The judging panel was chaired by director of the Chernobyl Children's Project, Adi Roche and included Katriona Devereau of RTE's Scope science programme; Peter Brabazon, programme director of Discover Science and Engineering; RTÉ security correspondent Paul Reynolds; and this reporter. Labour party spokeswoman on science, Dr Mary Upton, was on hand to present the prizes.
The top prize, a cheque for €1,000 sponsored by pharmaceutical company Wyeth BioPharma of Grange Castle, was hotly contested. Stephen Nolan of UCD's Conway Institute won with a presentation entitled "Kidney disease: when good cops go bad". It described how the body's own white blood cells contribute to the profound damage seen in kidney disease.
Now in the third year of his PhD research, he became interested in the subject as an undergrad. "One of the things we studied as undergraduates was renal biology," he says. He continued the subject as a PhD project under supervisor, Prof Michael Ryan.
Second place in the competition went to Nicolle Wilke of University College Cork's department of microelectronics and Tyndall National Institute, with a talk entitled "Microneedles - forget about pain and anxiety". She received a cheque for €300.
Third prize went to Ciarán Mac an Bhaird of NUI Maynooth's department of mathematics with an entertaining talk, "Solving equations and Gaussian sums". He received a cheque for €200.
The runners up were Edel Sugrue of the school of chemical sciences at Dublin City University, with "Need for speed", a talk about liquid chromatography; Jenny Ullgren of the department of earth and ocean sciences at NUI Galway, with her presentation, "Oceanography: traffic reports from the ocean"; Gillian Roddie of the zoology department of Trinity College Dublin, who discussed canine roundworms in a presentation entitled "Reservoir Dogs"; and Jim O'Doherty of the University of Limerick's physics department, with a talk, "Skin Deep-scratching the surface to reveal skin health".
It is hoped that the Science Speak competition will become an annual event. The Irish Times and the RDS organised the competition in conjunction with Irish Universities Promoting Science, a body formed by the seven universities, and with Forfas's Discover Science and Engineering programme.
