Building bridges between Art and Science

Studying the sciences, I’ve often heard peers say, “I’m a scientist, I’m not really a creative type.” I’ve also heard this sentiment expressed in the reverse, as people claimed to be artistic, not scientific; creative, not critical; intuitive, not logical. 

More often than not, people classify themselves as either an artist or a scientist. This dichotomy is perpetuated in higher education, where science labs are located across campus from art studios, courses that span both disciplines are rare, and collaboration between faculties is limited.

As a student, I came by my love of the arts and sciences separately. Both disciplines excited me, both piqued my interest in exploration and learning, but I could not see how to connect the two. It was in science communication that I found a natural intersection between my interests, a point where I could use creativity and design to share science in a fun and understandable way. And it was in science communication that I learned we need to build bridges across the divide that exists between the disciplines of art and science. 

This is where the SciArt Exhibition comes in.

Innovation and exploration flourish when we look at ideas from a different point of view, and that is why the LU SciArt Exhibition challenges students, artists, and researchers alike to look at their work from a new perspective. Local students have used sculptures, paintings, or interpretive dance to enhance their understanding of their science curriculum. Researchers and faculty at Laurentian have reimagined their ideas in quilts, sketches, and a variety of artistic media. Community artists have used their chosen medium to visualize challenging scientific concepts in unique and beautiful ways.

For the past 5 years, the LU SciArt Exhibition has featured as a part of Laurentian University’s Research Week. This year, I have had the privilege of working with students, researchers, and community artists to bring the 6^thannual LU SciArt Exhibition to life.

I’ve spoken to artists about the challenges of bringing themes of science into their work, and the many opportunities it brings. I’ve seen the work of artists who use nature to inspire their pieces. I’ve listened to researchers explain how they turn their data into poetry, or quilts, or sculpture, to reshape their understanding and visualize their research.

I’ve sat down with high-school students who felt they didn’t have an artistic bone in their body, and together we’ve dreamed up sketches and sculptures that beautifully illustrate the threats we face from climate change. I’ve worked with a memorable group of Grade 4’s, who taught me a thing or two about coding as they brainstormed their project that intersects sculpture and robotics. 

Through all of this, I’ve learned that the divide between science and art is not so insurmountable as I once thought. When people are challenged to think about these disciplines together, rather than as two separate fields, they naturally begin to amalgamate and new ideas flourish. 

Maybe you’re like me, and you’ve struggled to find a connection between your twin passions for the arts and sciences. Maybe you’re a science enthusiast struggling to visualize your concept of interest, or you’re an artist looking for new themes to represent in your work. I challenge you to rethink the separation of art and science. Consider a new perspective, and explore new angles.

You may just create an innovative piece of SciArt.

- Kyelle Byne, SCOM 2019

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The SciArt Exhibition takes place on Wednesday, March 20^thas a part of Laurentian University’s Research Week 2019, before moving to Science North where it will be on display from March 25^thto April 5^th. There will be a special Gala evening to celebrate science, art, and SciArt poetry at Science North on April 2^ndat 7pm. The exhibition is free to attend, and all are welcome!

Science Café - "Stress: Too much, or never enough?"

From Margaret: 

On Wednesday April 27, I had the opportunity to moderate a Science Cafe that was organized by Science North (in partnership with CIHR). The theme of the Science Cafe was one that we can all identify with: stress. We had a stimulating array of researchers on the panel, and a curious and thoughtful audience that was totally engaged the entire night. It was great to see such a casual discussion among the panelists and audience. 

We were able to have such an interesting and diverse discussion partly because the researchers on our panel offered unique perspectives on the topic of stress. They were also really great science communicators! One of our panelists was Dr. TC Tai, from the Northern Ontario School of Medicine. He is a professor and researcher at Laurentian University, and he studies the cellular and physiological mechanisms of stress. Our other panelist was Behdin Nowrouzi, a PhD candidate studying occupational stress at the School of Rural and Northern Health at Laurentian University. 

These two researchers gave us insight into how they view and study stress, which opened the floor to an interesting discussion. We talked about the chronic effects of stress and the importance of being in control of your stress. It was nice to see that people were interested in understanding why and how they experience stress. We also discussed the difference between positive and negative stressors, and some of the issues and solutions that revolve around stress and managing stress in the workplace.

Margaret moderates the science café, and discusses stress with panelists Dr. Tai and Behdin Nowrouzi.

Leigha and Josh were in the audience, showing support and enjoying the discussion.

Moderating this event was a rich experience for me in many ways. It was an excellent way of applying the skills I had learned in our SciComm program, particularly our Live Programming class. It was also a rich experience because I got to watch and listen to real scientists communicate to a general audience. The two panelists were great presenters - they were engaging, personal, funny - and it really made a difference in the quality of the discussion at the event.

I'm a huge fan of Science Cafes. They are a hip way of connecting researchers with the public. The environment, which in our case that night was the SRO Nightclub Lounge, was casual. People were eating and drinking. The topic of the event - stress - was one that everyone can connect to. We all experience stress. People were not only asking questions, but expressing opinions.

It was great to be a part of, and I encourage current and future Scommies to try it at some point!

Adventures in SciComm: Science Centre Showdown

If you watch The Discovery Channel, you may or may not have tuned in to watch The Daily Planet's "Greatest Show Ever" to celebrate its fifteenth anniversary.  As a part of Science North, our class had the opportunity to participate in this episode through a science centre showdown in which science centres across Canada competed with science demonstrations. Jalyn, Steph and Josh volunteered for the demonstration.

From Josh:

School started just over a month ago and I have already been on national television; what other program offers an opportunity like that? At the beginning of September we were asked by the science centre staff if any of us would like to participate in Science North's entry into Daily Planet's Science Centre Showdown. Jalyn, Steph and myself were lucky enough to be chosen to help out. The day before filming we were taught the experiment and went to dress rehearsal with the rest of the team. A few hours of practice and we were set.

The next night, a Monday in mid-September, we met in the Vale Inco Cavern at Science North. The crew from the Discovery Channel was already there when we arrived and ready to go. Filming is a long process and a long set up for a quick experiment meant a lot of downtime on the set. But good pizza and great company meant that we all had fun. The rest of the class showed up to watch a take of the experiment, and so did Alan Nursall, Daily Planet television personality and exhibits professor for the program. Between takes we were able to talk to the crew from Discovery Channel about their jobs and the traveling they get to do; their next stop after Science North was the Discovery Centre in Halifax. Many hours, and many takes later we were done filming.

Last night, a month after filming, the final product finally aired. The hours we spent at Science North filming had been edited down to just over two minutes, but I saw each of us a few times. It may have only been for a few seconds, but the three of us can say we were on Daily Planet's Greatest Show Ever! It was the experience of a lifetime and a great way to start off the year.

 If you missed The Daily Planet's Greatest Show Ever, you can catch it online here (Science North appears at the 10:30 mark).

Internships

We (Merissa and Sarah) both completed our 8-week internships at Science North. Now that we are finished our internships, we decided to interview each other about the experiences we had!


What did you do during your internship?

Merissa: I worked on the new travelling exhibit, Wildlife Rescue. I was assigned the area of "Emergency Response," where I had to research the way wild animals are treated in emergencies. I interpreted research about wild animal rescue and I wrote content documents for the exhibit. The content documents will be used to write the content on the graphic panels in the exhibit. I also contributed ideas for interactive exhibits in the area.

Sarah: During my internship, I helped re-vamp teacher workshops, which are books of activities that are presented to teachers across Ontario to help them with interactive activities in the classroom. I also developed pre- and post- activities for school programs, developed new content for camp-ins, and even got to deliver a few overnight camp-ins.

What was one of your most positive experiences?

Merissa: My most positive experience was during the second design team meeting. I felt really passionate about one of the interactive exhibits, so I fought to keep the exhibit. I thought it was really important to have something for younger kids.

Sarah: I really enjoyed doing the overnight camp-ins. I got to observe one and deliver two of them. I thought it would be hard to stay up from 7 pm to 7 am, but it was lots of fun and you really realize how much kids enjoy Science North.

What did you learn from your internship?

Merissa: I learned essential skills like team work, creative thinking and flexibility. The content was always changing and I had to learn how to cooperate and come to consensus with other people about ideas.

Sarah: I really learned the importance of getting people’s opinions on things; it’s helpful to get other people’s input to make a good idea even better. Doing jobs like this also happen in a fast-paced and changing environment, so you need to learn how to be flexible.

How was your internship related to Science Communication?

Merissa: I was doing work on an exhibit for a science centre. I was learning how to communicate complicated science to a grade 8 audience across North America. I was really living Science Communication.

Sarah: I was able to take science topics that can be difficult to understand and create hands-on activities that can be used in classrooms. Having a science and teaching background was helpful since I would be more likely to know if certain experiments work or not, and I would be able to expand on explanations that would be easier for teachers who are not specialists and children to understand.

 
During our internship, we were able to share an office space. This made things even more exciting for us. We were able to run ideas past each other and share interesting facts along the way. Here is a list of the top 10 things we learned while we were on our internships:

1. World Turtle Day is May 23rd. Turtles are an important part of our ecosystem and help keep our lakes clean. Did you know that road mortality is a major cause of turtle death in Ontario?
2. Using a Mac computer when you are not used to it is a hard thing.
3. Snack time is at 10:30 a.m., or when we both pull out a banana to eat it at the exact same time.4. If you want to stay awake all night for a camp-in, staying hydrated is the key! Drink lots of water (with your reusable water bottle).5. Meetings can be long, but getting free food is pretty awesome.
6. Magic mud is pretty cool. It can dance on speakers and people can run across pools filled with it. Try it at home (small-scale, of course!) by mixing some corn starch with water!
7. To keep the mood light, having a joke of the day can be helpful. For example, “Why didn’t the brain want to take a bath? Because it didn’t want to get brainwashed!”
8. Oiled birds get their heads cleaned with toothbrushes. And yes, they really use Dawn dish soap (but they have to do other steps before they do this).
9. There are beautiful sunrises over Ramsey Lake at 5 am.
10. Our internships at Science North were awesome!

- Merissa and Sarah

Science exhibit design class

Designing, building, prototyping, testing and evaluating an exhibit is an intense challenge to do in 6 weeks. It is also an apt description of our exhibits course. The course is taught by Alan Nursall who has over 25 years of science programming and exhibit design experience among other things. People familiar with Daily Planet may recognize Alan from the "Alan Nursall Experience" segments.

All of us in the class are now finalizing our projects and getting them ready to be showcased at Science North. We have a small budget and a small amount of time to complete this task. Most of us have been able to scrounge up materials from our own houses or from various areas of the science centre. The guys in our Tech shop are also great. They have built many exhibits over the years and their experience has really helped us figure out what is "doable" and what isn't. We wouldn't be able to do this without the help of all the staff here at Science North - THANKS GUYS!

I'm working on a Shadowgraphing exhibit (Top left picture). You can use shadows to visualize movements in fluids (gases, liquids). Just think about the last time you saw heat waves coming from a barbecue. In my exhibit, a heat source will warm up the water. By shining a light through the aquarium you can project shadows of warm and cold water. Light bends differently when it goes from warm to cold water and vice versa, producing dark and light areas on a whiteboard. What is really interesting to me is that this technique is used to visualize flow around ballistic and aircraft designs. Visitors will be able to place objects in the tank to see this.

Merissa's exhibit involves "brain shortcuts" (right). Think about the last time you reached for coins in your pocket. How do you know which coins are which with your fingers? Well, we've learned it through experience and it helps that each coin is designed to be recognized through touch. For example, dimes are small and thin with ridges and pennies are small with no ridges. From what I understand, the brain makes shortcuts for recognizing the coins. How does this translate though when we try identifying American and British coins? Merissa's exhibit allows people to explore it by putting their hands in boxes of coins.

These pictures are from last week when we were testing the science behind each of our exhibits. Our final exhibits are in the process of being constructed. Stay tuned to be dazzled....

How I forgot to send it in.

We put a lot of emphasis on narratives in science communication, so I'd like to share a story with you. Every week we have assigned readings for our "Theories and Principles of Science Communications" class. The class covers rhetorical analysis of science communication. We send in discussion questions before class and find a communication artefact (article, video, poster, etc.) that demonstrates the topic we’re discussing. Our last day of class, my classmate James, forgot. This is his e-mail to our professor, Dr. Philippa Spoel.

From: James Baxter-Gilbert
To: Philippa Spoel
Subject: How I forgot to send it in.

Sorry I did not send you my questions from the reading for Monday. I would like to tell you the story of the explanation why and how it happened.

How I forgot to send it in... a tale by James Baxter Gilbert

Our story begins with a plucky young science communication student named James. There was something unique about James, he had the uncanny ability to lose all track of time (both during the course of a day, the day of the week, and occasionally what year it is). This ability to become temporally lost has hindered James on many occasions, but it also becomes very handy when camping or doing tedious tasks. It may be linked to his aversion to wearing a watch, but no one knows for sure.

One Sunday James was preparing for a communication trip to the Far North, to attempt to establish ties with the Eabametoong Aboriginal community. James had complied a mental list of things to do, such as pack, prepare for the meetings, get a good night’s sleep, and, of course, do his rhetoric readings and send them in, as well a myriad of other things.

Sadly James' internet had been down for the past week, and he was relying on the Science North’s connection to receive his emails. So he knew he had to head in to complete all of the tasks on his list.

Throughout the course of the day James was checking thing out his list.... and then it struck. James had lost his sense of time once again and suddenly it was night. He was worried he would over sleep and miss Dr. Dave in the morning and in doing so... his flight! He rushed to bed forgetting to check his list, and forgetting to send in his questions for his rhetoric class.

Luckily he did not over sleep, and made the flight north. While sitting at breakfast the next day James' mind began to review the work he needed to do when he got home from the trip. Seeing a geologist working on her laptop he thought to himself, "I mustn't forget to send in the question for the rhetoric reading for Monday's class". And then it hit him... today was Monday... he had miss sending it in, his computer was 600km away, and he had no Internet or cell phone coverage to let anyone know. Sadly there was nothing he could do until Wednesday when he returns to Sudbury and Science North.
And here I am.    

The end.

On why I like Arthropods

In science... or in any job/career for that matter, it is important to work in a field that you enjoy. You never know when a particular field will pique your interest!

I didn’t always like arthropods. In fact, as a child, I was pretty afraid of them. At the sight of a spider, I would get my dad to come into the room and kill it for me. Even as a teenager, the idea of creepy multi-legged creatures would make my skin crawl. It wasn’t until university that I began to change my mind about arthropods.

Left: Jenn holding a giant millipede and a giant hissing cockroach.

You may be wondering, what are arthropods? Well, they can be one of very many things. They can be arachnids, such as the little house spiders that terrified me as a little girl. They can be millipedes or centipedes, those speedy little many legged, multi-segmented creatures. They can also be crustaceans, like lobsters, crabs and shrimp, which may end up on our dinner plates. But my favourite type of arthropods is the insects, such as the hard-working honeybees, and beautiful butterflies.

The transition from fear of arthropods to liking them didn’t occur quickly. It started with a second-year university class on the ‘Biology of Plant Pests’. That was my fist introduction into insect life, and I learned mostly about insects that we call pests: the highly adaptive Colorado potato beetle, the invasive gypsy moth, and the destructive cotton bollworm. Although the course generally put a negative spin about insects, it did enlighten me about insect life stages, and I gained a new understanding about this category of creatures.

In my fourth year of university, I had the opportunity to take another course about insects. It was called ‘Behaviour of Insects’, and the prof was always full of energy and enthusiasm in his teaching. This course really introduced me to the cool things about insects: cannibalism, mating rituals, and the roles of insects in the environment.

There is a famous quotation from biophilosopher Dr. Jonas Salk: "If all the insects were to disappear from the earth, within 50 years all life on earth would end.” My professor for ‘Behaviour of Insects’ really hit that point home, in teaching the class all about the roles of insects for decomposing waste matter, pollinating flowers and crops, and producing useful materials such as silk and honey.

Shortly after taking my fourth year insects course, I worked as a research assistant for an entomologist. She entrusted me with the job of feeding, watering, and cleaning her ‘pets’. These consisted of giant African millipedes, Madagascar hissing cockroaches, and Indian walking sticks. At this point, I was only comfortable handling the walking sticks, because they look (and are) absolutely harmless: they look just like sticks. More importantly, they don’t feel like much: a gentle tickle as their feet move across your palm. That summer, I only ever summoned up the courage to hold the walking sticks, but it was a start.

Right: A Giant millipede in Jenn's hand.

Now, however, I am working at Science North in the Nature Exchange. This is the epicentre for touchable arthropods at Science North. Among the arthropods, there is the massive, harmless atlas beetle, giant African snails, and my two nemeses from the summer of 2008: Madagascar hissing cockroaches and giant millipedes (these ones happen to be from Malaysia, though). By interacting with my fellow Nature Exchange staff, who are wonderful people, and by taking out arthropods for visitors to see, I have gained the courage to pick up and hold all of the above creatures.

I think I can now declare myself fully initiated into the world of arthropods. The two methods that worked for me to get to this stage were: education and exposure. My advice to you would be, that if you would like to become more comfortable with arthropods, you must do two things. First, you must learn more about them, and secondly, you must force yourself to go see them. Perhaps you will summon up the courage to touch their exoskeleton. Maybe one day, you’ll even feel ready to hold an arthropod.

- Jenn McCallum, B.Sc.