Young scientists from Liberton take part in CRH workshop

Ginnie Clark (Comms and Public Engagement Manager), Rocio Martinez Aguilar (Maybin lab), Francesca Hearn-Yeates (Horne lab) and Grace Forsyth (Mitchell lab) visited Liberton High School on Tuesday 27 September to offer students the chance to take part in our reproductive health themed scientific workshop.

The MRC CRH team held two workshops with enthusiastic students from S3. They learned about the challenges of creating a new life from the successful fertilisation of an egg to the growth and development of an embryo, and what is required to ensure the creation of a healthy human.

The students participated in microscope activity to discover how cells grow and change and what happens when cell growth goes wrong. They played ‘jigsaw cell match’ to reveal the role of different cells and organs within the body, experimented with fluorescence, studied the difference between healthy and diseased tissue, learned about the reproductive system of different animals by taking part in an interactive quiz, and worked out the different stages of embryo foetal development by examining mouse embryos.

The event concluded with a Q&A and those who had participated in the workshop were invited to ask questions about different areas of reproductive health research and what a ‘typical day in the life’ of a scientist looks like. The students were keen to ask our researchers about study tips for future exams and the ethics of testing on animals.

We were delighted to visit Liberton High School and encourage an interest in science and research and the teachers expressed an interest in CRH researchers visiting again in the near future.