Engaging people with our science is a job for all. We have some amazing people in Oncology and some of them are not afraid to get out of their comfort zone. In this blog, Roxy Peerless, from our finance group, shows once again that public engagement is not just for scientists.
On Wednesday the 3rd of April 2019, myself and 30 other students, from Sir William Borlase\u2019s Grammar School, attended the Oxford University Oncology Open Day at the Cancer Research Centre, Oxford.
How do we attract tomorrow\u2019s brightest research students?\r\nStep 1: Make sure they know we exist. We don\u2019t teach undergraduates; you can\u2019t study oncology at A\u2019 level. We need to give them a chance to explore how physics can cure cancer. How biology leads us to a better understanding of cancer, and how chemistry helps us design imaging agents that will guide therapy choices.
When Roald Dahl\u2019s beloved children\u2019s book character Charlie Bucket buys a Wonka bar and finds the final golden ticket, he starts his now famous journey of discovery at Willy Wonka\u2019s chocolate factory. Charlie, like most children, loves chocolate and his visit to the factory not only indulges his passion but also inspires deep scientific curiosity. In the end, the boy\u2019s humility and desire for discovery convinces Wonka to name Charlie as his successor.
Galileo is said to have muttered \u2018E pur, si muove!\u2019 \u2013 \u2018And yet, it moves\u2019 as he left the courtroom in which he had been forced to concede that the sun moved round a fixed earth. Today, these words could be used to under-pin the value of MR-Linacs in radiotherapy.
The cure for cancer, often hailed as the holy grail of medical research; something everyone is searching for and no one is finding, doesn\u2019t actually exist.
Readers will remember the blog from Timo Reislander, who wrote about his time spent with the FROG group; in this guest blog we hear from Jean, Co-ordinator of the FROG
How would you react if I told you I could calculate your age if I took a sample of your blood? I wouldn\u2019t be lying! Every day our cells are exposed to damaging agents that can cause harmful changes which accumulate over time and lead to ageing related diseases such as cancer. Quantifying these changes has allowed scientists to develop models that calculate a person\u2019s biological age, a measure of the \u201cwell-being\u201d of their cells.
I was a Final Year medical student when David Weatherall was appointed Professor of Haematology in Liverpool University in 1973. He was an outstanding Lecturer, extremely popular with the students and helped to make Haematology an exciting and popular subject.
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