Nobel Laureate and Holiday Science

During the holidays, girls had the opportunity to attend a real Scientific Conference on Batteries and Energy solutions for our world. During an action-packed day, students attended presentations by Dr Gavin Harper from the University of Birmingham about recycling batteries and Professor Vanessa Peterson from ANSTO about how nuclear particles from our local nuclear reactor in Sydney can be used to improve batteries.

Students also heard a very thought-provoking presentation by Nobel Laureate Professor Stan Wittingham encouraging more action on climate change and encouraging students and younger Scientists to get involved in innovating solutions to current problems.

During morning tea, students Speed-Scienced (like Speed-Dating but better!!), having the opportunity to meet and chat informally to various Scientists about their career, research areas and aspirational goals. Students also learnt about making Scientific posters and had the chance to assess the variety of Scientific posters on display. Students particularly enjoyed finding some of the best and some of the not so good posters! See if you can guess which is which…

Some students were very lucky and had the opportunity to control the newest and latest Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) including observing their own hair under the microscope and examining electrode materials for batteries.

At the end of the day, students were excited to be provided with a kit to make batteries from lemons at home. Overall, it was a day full of amazing opportunities! A big thank you goes out to the International Meeting on Lithium Batteries and the Australian Battery Society for hosting this event!

Mia Sharma
Science Teacher