Earlham Institute is opening its doors for one day, on which you will get the chance to explore a fascinating and diverse range of important scientific research projects: from reading and understanding DNA and how it affects the function of all of life through to untangling the complex webs and interactions which underpin our health and the wellbeing of the range of Earth’s diverse ecosystems.
In the “Tree of Life” zone, you will be immersed in our science through the organisms that we work on - from bacteria in the human gut and algae in the deepest oceans through to important crop plants and animals such as tilapia, koalas and the Andean bear. You will get the chance to meet our researchers and ask them about their research into climate change, food security, and better understanding the mechanisms shaping human, animal and plant health.
Working your way up through the building, you will then be invited to explore the GROW rainforest zone, where you will be immersed in the sights and sounds of the Amazon rainforest in a celebration of our important work in Colombia. You’ll find out how we are working with local tribes and ex militants, as well as researchers and government in the second most biodiverse country in the world, to improve scientific capacity in Colombia, while also preserving biodiversity and supporting socioeconomic development.
Extending up into the top floor, where we host our excellent scientific training courses, you will pop your heads up into “The Cloud.” Here, we will showcase how we provide open access tools to support the life science community to perform world class research, all over the world. There will also be a variety of activities, including a live human genome sequencing (the Ned-ome), as well as a showcase of our work into robotics, machine learning and artificial intelligence. Our scientific computing specialist will also be more than happy to open the doors to our data centre - one of the biggest supercomputers of its type in Europe.
We will open up our labs on the day, which will give you a chance to see some of the most cutting edge equipment available to life scientists today. In our Genomics Pipelines lab, we have each and every one of the most up to date DNA sequencing machines on the market, which allow us to sequence a staggeringly high amount of genetic material. In the DNA Foundry and Synthetic Biology labs, you can see how we are able to not only understand life better, but bring an engineering-based approach to how we solve some of biology’s greatest issues.
In addition to this packed schedule, full of interesting insights, our experienced and excellent scientists will be putting on a range of talks, where you can hear more about their research looking into the breadth of life and all of its surprises.
