Researchers were all over the city of Lisbon to show the science carried out at NOVA Medical School to various audiences.
Last Friday, September 30th, between 17:00 and 24:00, the European Researchers' Night was celebrated, an initiative to bring science closer to scientists and the public, that attracts more than 1 million visitors every year and takes place in 26 countries.
NOVA Medical School was once again represented at the Museum of Natural History and Science (MUHNAC), with two activities related to this year's themes, Sustainability and Inclusion, organized by the PhD Student Committee and Post-Doctoral Committee.
The Sustainability activity consisted of an exhibition that took place throughout the event in the cloisters of the museum, showing the public how waste from biomedical research is treated in a didactic and fun way, with a direct and interactive approach promoting the participation of visitors, the handling of real laboratory material and games for the younger participants.
The theme of inclusion was addressed through an informal conversation about the numbers of gender equality in scientific career progression, with concrete data from NOVA Medical School and NOVA University of Lisbon. This roundtable between researchers and the public was moderated by researcher and Professor Paula Macedo, NOVA Medical School's representative in NOVA's Gender Equality Plan, which fueled an interesting debate on the current challenges of equality in science while discussing potential solutions and highlighting the need for these debates to happen more frequently.
For the first time, the annual night dedicated to science was also celebrated together with COLife partners at Champalimaud Foundation, in an initiative promoted by the RAISE project. Researcher César Mendes participated in a roundtable with PhD students, post-docs and principal investigators who had in common having done research abroad through a Marie Curie grant. Attending were some young people who aspire to have a scientific career and who took the opportunity to talk directly with several scientists to better understand the day-to-day of those who do research, the satisfactions and difficulties and even hear some advice from those who do researc or are looking for a laboratory to start working. Patient Innovation also participated in this event, with a demonstration aimed at the younger audience, in which children were challenged to prepare something with their own hands, thinking of a family member or friend who was sick and wanted to help.
Researchers from NMS Research were also present at the Pavilhão do Conhecimento – Centro de Ciência Viva, where the group lead by researcher Sílvia Conde participated in the "Eu Nunca" activity and promoted several exhibitions related to food and the research work they develop, namely learning to read food labels to be healthier, the cells in our body, what are diabetes, the organs in our body, and how much sugar do we have in our blood?
Also at the Knowledge Pavilion, at the DÒING space, researchers Sandra Tenreiro, Susana Silva and Cláudia Almeida, from the LabKnitting at NMS Group, organized a knitting workshop, not only with practical demonstrations of knitting stitches, but also with an exhibition of scientific models. knitted biomedical papers with the corresponding scientific explanations.