Media Highlights 2010
2 Media Highlights
Welcome to Media Highlights, which covers a selection of our standout media coverage achieved in 2010. The College receives considerable media exposure be it in print, broadcast or online. The Communications team is responsible for media relations; corporate and stakeholder communications; internal communications (with staff and students), crisis communications and social media. We promote the work of the College through local, national and international media, responding to requests for information and expertise on a wide range of subjects, as well as pro-actively sourcing news and stories from our research departments and institutes. See the right-hand column for individual contact details for the team and the relevant communication leads for each faculty.
For regular news updates, please see www.qmul.ac.uk/media Join us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/OfficialQMUL Follow us on Twitter: twitter.com/qmul
The Communications team sends out a daily e-news round-up of media stories about Queen Mary and higher education called Queen Mary in the News. Please contact the team at press@qmul.ac.uk to be added to the mailing list.
Head of Communications Sally Webster s.webster@qmul.ac.uk 020 7882 5404 Humanities and Social Sciences Emma Lowry e.lowry@qmul.ac.uk 020 7882 5378 twitter.com/emma_lowry School of Medicine and Dentistry (Institute of Dentistry; Institute of Health Sciences Education; William Harvey Research Institute) Alex Fernandes a.fernandes@qmul.ac.uk 020 7882 7910 School of Medicine and Dentistry (Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science; Barts Cancer Institute; Wolfson Institute of Preventitive Medicine) Kerry Noble k.noble@qmul.ac.uk 020 7882 7943 Science and Engineering Sian Halkyard and Bridget Dempsey s.halkyard@qmul.ac.uk b.dempsey@qmul.ac.uk 020 7882 7454 Internal Communications Vacancy press@qmul.ac.uk 020 7882 7453 Local interest stories Vacancy press@qmul.ac.uk 020 7882 3004
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4 Queen Mary in the News
Queen Mary in the News
Newsnight, BBC 2, 9 December 2010
Principal Professor Simon Gaskell, Dr Warren Boutcher and Student Union President Vratislav Domalip were interviewed for a BBC Newsnight report about the future of higher education. Professor Gaskell said: “There are core values in universities which have existed for hundreds of years and will continue for hundreds of years to come. Those are to do with the generation of new knowledge, the creation of new knowledge and the
dissemination of knowledge through multiple channels.” Vratislav warned: “The majority of students may now only be going to university to improve their future yield of income and improve their graduate prospects.” Doctor Boutcher, Dean for Taught Programmes, said: “The government is so radically changing the rules that we won’t know what higher education is going to look like probably until four, five or six years down the line.”
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January
February
At the start of the year, the Times Higher Education ran a piece about the student experience, featuring comments from Professor Morag Shiach, who explained: “I wouldn’t say we want to duplicate the experience of a self-contained campus, but we do want to try to give all the benefits of that in terms of a sense of coherence, accessibility and community.” Queen Mary was awarded the 2009 Times Higher Education Award for Most Improved Student Experience following survey of more than 11,000 full-time undergraduates on all aspects of university life in the UK.
A series of Olympics lectures took place at Queen Mary during the year and BBC London focused on these events, which were organised by Professor Miri Rubin, of the School of History. She said: “Our public lectures will illuminate key moments in the long history of the Olympic Games and attempt to convey the often dramatic economical, political, and cultural landscape behind them.”
Gaskell was interviewed for the piece and said: “I think it’s going to be very difficult, but not impossible, for individual institutions to continue to transmit a very positive message about their own higher education and research provision, when the UK is apparently devaluing the importance it attaches to higher education.”
The Financial Times wrote about impending government funding cuts, which some warned would lead to a decline in vital foreign students. Queen Mary Principal Professor
Three undergraduates from Queen Mary and the Student Union president Nasir Tarmann were interviewed about their experience at university and student debt for BBC News online.
March
London’s Olympic history revealed, BBC London, 9 February 2010
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Cuts threaten lifeline from foreign students, Financial Times, 20 February 2010
British actress Romola Garai studied English at Queen Mary for a year before completing her degree with the Open University. Speaking to The Independent about her time at the College, she said: “The teaching at Queen Mary, right in the depths of the East End, was brilliant. I loved it there. Lisa Jardine gave the first lecture we had, on Shakespeare – really inspiring.”
‘I did my degree with the OU – and got a first’, The Independent 25 March 2010
stories, such as Apatech.
Later in the month Queen Mary spin-out firm ApaTech was sold to pharmaceutical firm Baxter International Inc for $330m. The Times reported that Lord Mandelson wanted to increase the number of commercial successes
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June University league tables were published by the Guardian and The Times in June. Linguistics was rated best in London and third overall behind Oxford and Cambridge in the Times Good University Guide. Physics made the top ten in the Guardian’s rankings and Law was best in the capital and third overall.
The appliance of science at its best, East End Life, 17-23 May 2010
April The East London Advertiser covered plans to restore the People’s Palace, based at Queen Mary, back to its original grandeur of 1936. The building is used for graduation ceremonies and major College events but will be used for more culturalfocused occasions in the future.
May The Independent published its university guide in May and Queen Mary ranked at 39, up from 43 last year. The list was topped by Oxford and Cambridge. Local newspaper East End Life splashed Queen Mary’s Centre of the Cell, the science education centre, on the front page after it was awarded the Educational Initiative award at the 2010 Museums & Heritage Awards for Excellence.
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July Professor Gaskell spoke to the Times Higher Education about resurrecting an intellectual property policy at Queen Mary, to boost research income and attract the best staff. Having launched the new Strategic Plan, Professor Gaskell asked academics to “create” and “disseminate” knowledge, similar to a successful policy at the University of Manchester where he previously worked: “Academics who want to exploit
their IP need help doing it, and if you have good enough in-house services, academics make use of them.” The Independent featured taxidermist Polly Morgan’s latest exhibition in the summer. The Queen Mary English alumna, who originally was spotted by British artist Banksy, hailed by Hirst, and later picked up by art dealer Saatchi, is now regarded as one of the most important artists of her generation.
The call of the wild, The Independent, 16 July 2010
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Helping me is second nature to her, The Times, 17 August 2010
August Queen Mary’s Disability Support Officer Paul Jarman featured in the ‘Body and Soul’ section of The Times. He wrote about the last day with his guide dog Hattie before she retired: “I have become conscious that I have so long just taken what she does for me for
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granted. I don’t mean that I have ceased to appreciate just how much Hattie contributes to my everyday existence, but that, human nature being what it is, our appreciation of something always reaches it apogee at precisely the time when that thing is to be taken away.”
September The funding of scientific research was high on the news agenda throughout September and Queen Mary capitalised on this by generating significant media coverage. The Business Secretary, Vince Cable, spoke at Queen Mary’s BioEnterprises Innovation Centre and was cautious over further investment into the subject. His comments on rationing research funding featured
on the Financial Times online. The Times Higher Education launched a sophisticated new league table, ranking the top 200 universities in the world. Queen Mary was placed 120th, ahead of other British institutions including Lancaster, Sheffield and Birmingham. The table was topped by Harvard University, while Cambridge and Oxford were ranked 6th.
Cable warns of shrinking funds for research, Financial Times, 8 September 2010
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October The media focused on Queen Mary Honorary Fellow Mario Vargas Llosa in October, who was awarded the 2010 Nobel Prize in Literature, the first Peruvian to have received the accolade. He is best known for works including Conversation in the Cathedral and The Feast of the Goat but also still writes for Spain’s El Pais daily. Founder of the College’s Mile End Group and leading authority on contemporary British history, Professor Hennessy was appointed as a crossbench peer at the House of Lords in October. The East London Advertiser featured his reaction: “I’m terribly pleased and honoured. I hope I can help the House of Lords a bit on constitutional matters. I’ll certainly give it my best shot.”
Historian gets post in Lords, East London Advertiser, October 2010
Cuts to science funding will ‘destroy UK’s potential’ as world leader, the Guardian, 24 September 2010
Later that month, the Guardian covered a Science Media Centre press briefing where the leaders at some of Britain’s top universities warned that cutbacks to scientific funding and an immigration cap would impact institutions attempting to recruit the world’s best academics over to the UK. The Principal, Professor Gaskell, said:
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“The international nature of universities is absolutely critical, whether that refers to student bodies or staff and, certainly as far as staff is concerned, the experiment has already been done. US universities have based their success over many decades by taking talent from across the world.”
Children bump into a prince at science lab, East London Advertiser, November 2010
Queen Mary Master’s student Tom Chigbo, was interviewed on Sky News about tuition fees. He said it would be “unfair” if students were charged higher fees and that it would force undergraduates to choose their degree based on its price, not from an academic perspective.
November
“The most damaging thing that we could do to UK higher education, UK Research and UK science is to reduce the attractiveness of this country to overseas scientists. We would like to recruit the best students from wherever they come.” Professor Carl Murray also expressed his concerns over cuts to science funding in real terms in the programme.
Professor Gaskell’s views on science funding and the immigration cap were further sought in November by The Politics Show on BBC One. He said:
The Octagon played host to BBC One’s current affairs panel show Question Time. Joining David Dimbleby, were Home Secretary Theresa May MP,
broadcaster Clive James, Shadow Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government Caroline Flint MP, diplomat Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles and broadcaster and author Douglas Murray. The Earl and Countess of Wessex visited Centre of the Cell towards the end of the month, where they met staff and local school children. Their visit, which was part of a tour of various London projects, featured in the local media, including the East London Advertiser and East End Life.
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Humanities and Social Sciences In October, Dr Tom Sebrell, of the School of History, initiated a series of public tours around London, revealing the untold story of Britain’s position in the American Civil War. He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that many people among the British aristocracy were sympathetic to the southern Confederate states. “A lot of British people were concerned about how quickly the United States was growing. If the American nation was cut in half, that would preserve the future of the [British] Empire,” he said, explaining the thinking of the time.
Really neutral? BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, 2 October 2010
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Angry Obama vows to tax cash-rich Wall Street, the Guardian, 15 January 2010
January In January, British banking commentators reacted to news of President Obama’s radical plans to shake up the US financial sector. While some critics expressed fears that, if copied by UK authorities, it could lead to an exodus of top banks from the City, Professor Stefano Harney, of the
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School of Business, thought otherwise. Speaking in the Evening Standard he said, “Not to follow [Obama’s] lead would be to condemn the City of London to become the largest offshore banking colony in the world, with all the corruption and instability that would come with that.”
Internet users are, according to Professor Ian Walden, of the School of Law, being spied on in their own home as the Government uses the threat of terrorism to justify the expansion of a surveillance society. Commenting in the Daily Telegraph, he said: “Once happy to leave cyberspace ‘unregulated’, governments, including that of the UK, seem increasingly willing to encroach on what we do, say and see over the internet.”
Big Brother is watching you on the internet, Daily Telegraph, 23 January 2010
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February Professor Markman Ellis, from the School of English and Drama, spoke on BBC Radio Four’s Thinking Allowed in February about his research that shows eighteenth-century women first stirred the British love of tea. “By the 1750s, when tea becomes an everyday commodity, women up and down the social order were emulating aristocratic women in their habits of tea-drinking and porcelain collecting, and their genteel manners,” he said.
March In an interview with Times Higher Education in March, Professor Nicholas O’Shaughnessy discussed why rhetoric is so effective in manipulating mass consciousness, and how its misuse has furthered the agenda of sinister causes throughout history. The topic is now rarely studied as a stand-alone academic discipline in the UK, but Professor O’Shaughnessy, from the School of Business and Management, argued that “rhetoric is not a trivial instrument or a decorative motif in history. On several occasions it has even acted as the amanuensis of genocide”. Shami Chakrabarti, director of human rights group, Liberty gave the Butterworth Law Lecture at Queen Mary in April. On the subject of religious rights in the workplace, she said judges are adding to fears that Christians are being treated less favourably than other minority groups. “It seems to me that the Court of Appeal’s judgement has fuelled the fire of those that think or want to think that the law does nothing to protect them. It bends over backwards for Muslims and Sikhs while Christians are being persecuted with impunity,” she said. Her comments were printed in the Daily Telegraph.
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Tony, George and Adolf’s fighting talk, Times Higher Education, 11 March 2010
Obama factor prompts MA in community organising, The Independent, 13 May 2010
April The future of Thailand’s coalition government looked uncertain in April after the Election Commission ordered the ruling party be dissolved for allegedly covering up campaign donations. “This is a massive blow to the Democrat Party’s legitimacy, and suggests their wider alliance may just perhaps be starting to fragment,” commented Dr Lee Jones, of the School of Politics and International Relations, to Associated Press.
May The School of Geography launched a new Masters in Community Organising in 2010, capitalising on the “Obama factor”. Following in the footsteps of the US President, who famously began his political career as an organiser on the streets of Chicago, Masters students are offered a five-month placement working on community campaigns such as better social housing. Course leader, Professor Jane Wills, told The Independent: “The techniques you learn on this course will be useful in a whole range of jobs in the private and public sector. Whether you want to go into the voluntary sector, local government or become a politician, this experience will be valuable.”
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In the event of nuclear war: the Queen’s Scottish ‘floating bunker’, Daily Telegraph, 12 July 2010
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June
July
September
During the World Cup, held in June, an ambush marketing stunt for Dutch brewers Bavaria may have lured the attention of the world’s media, but it also led to arrests, threats of legal action and the sacking of an ITV sports pundit. “Events like these are hugely expensive to put on, so they need big-money sponsors and this in turn means that the organisers must protect aggressively against ambush marketing,” commented Barrister Phillip Johnson, Visiting Senior Fellow, in the School of Law, to BBC News online, “But this means there is potentially huge exposure for anyone who manages to outwit them.”
In July, Fox News picked up the story that a team of archaeological researchers had found evidence that ancient humans first settled in Britain over 800,000 years ago, 100,000 years earlier than previously thought. The conclusion was drawn after the team, which included Queen Mary geographer, Dr Simon Lewis, found more than 70 prehistoric flint tools on an archaeological dig in coastal Norfolk.
With gap-toothed models increasingly in demand on the catwalks and ever-present on the covers of the fashion glossies, the trend is leading the most dedicated fashionistas to embark on extreme cosmetic dentistry to achieve the same look. In September The Wall Street Journal spoke to historian Professor Colin Jones, who is currently researching the history of dentistry. In medieval times, he noted, women with a gap in their teeth were regarded as “lustful and licentious”.
Professor Peter Hennessy, of the School of History, obtained secret documents that revealed the Queen would have boarded the Royal Yacht and sailed to hidden Scottish lochs if Britain came under nuclear attack during the Cold War. “That’s contingency planning for you, the beauties of the British constitution, but my heavens it’s a very grim story,” said Professor Hennessy during an interview with the Daily Telegraph in July.
October A new study from Queen Mary that revealed half of multi-national firms using arbitration to settle disputes are disappointed with their appointed arbitrator, made headlines in the Financial Times in September. Lead researcher Professor Loukas Mistelis, from the School of Law, explained: “The pool of arbitrators is small. Many key arbitrators are booked up a long time in advance and often there is a time delay between them hearing a case and delivering a ruling.”
Arbitrators disappoint in business disputes, study finds, Financial Times, 5 October 2010
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October New legislation being introduced will make it an offence for British companies and their employees to be involved in any kind of bribery, which occurred during the 2010 Commonwealth Games. Professor Peter Alldridge, of the School of Law, told CNBC: “The British company will need to do a risk evaluation, it will ask itself, well we are talking of entering into a contract with a company in India with regard to the Commonwealth Games, is this high risk for bribery? And it will have a whole scheme of things that identify the kind of contracts that are high risk for bribery.” Dr Toby Dodge, of the School of Politics and International Relations, commented in October on the leaking of 400,000 classified Pentagon documents, which exposed the causal attitude to civilian deaths and an absurd level of security in Iraq. He told in the Guardian that “the political storm caused by the Wikileaks documents failed to ignite public outrage. The Iraqi population has lived with violent instability, a civil war, and routine abuse by militias, police and the army since the invasion of 2003”.
Iraq war logs: experts’ views, guardian.co.uk, 28 October 2010
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November A combination of volunteering and travelling is a rapidly growing industry around the world, and one of the most popular choices is orphanage work in Asia and Africa. However, researchers argue that in some cases, volunteers are not helping children, but are instead harming them. In a November interview with NPR, Amy Norman, of the School of Geography, said “You’ve got tourists that are coming as sort of the third wave of this abandonment. Children are left behind to remember a series of these foreigners who come in and then leave them there.” Russian cinema expert Dr Jeremy Hicks, from the School of Languages, Linguistics and Film, has discovered a collection of films documenting Nazi atrocities targeting Soviet Jews, which have been hidden for more than 60 years in state archives. More than 100 hours of footage has been uncovered, originally recorded for Soviet newsreels. Dr Hicks discovered the films whilst researching a book, and argues that the images, dating back to 1941 when the Germans invaded the USSR, should be designated as the first cinematic representations of the Holocaust. “Their plight has not had its place in cinematography,” Dr Hicks explained to The Jewish Chronicle. Giant billboards displaying Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki were swiftly taken down after they were said to undermine his authority, reported The Washington Post in December. Dr Toby Dodge, of the School of Politics and International Relations, said: “We’ve seen Maliki move with masterful precision to control the army, then the intelligence services, and then secure a tighter and tighter
grip over the civilian arms of state. These aren’t the actions of a decentralizing democrat. These are the actions of a man who wants to concentrate as much power as possible in his own hands.”
Soviet archives reveal earliest Holocaust film, The Jewish Chronicle, 26 November 2010
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24 Medicine and Dentistry
Medicine and Dentistry In January, The Daily Telegraph featured research led by Professor Gavin Giovannoni which found that a new pill to treat multiple sclerosis could dramatically reduce the chance of symptoms recurring. At the time, two new treatments were found to have the potential to save sufferers having to face painful injections and frequent hospital visits. Professor Giovannoni worked on the Cladribine study and said; “We think ours has the advantage because it only has to be taken a few times a year – instead of every day which is the case with Fingolimod (the other treatment). Cladribine will make a major difference to people with MS and we hope it will be available to patients by the summer.” This story featured widely in the media including the Financial Times, Times Online and on Bloomberg.
New drugs cut pain and the risk of relapse for MS victims, The Daily Telegraph, 21 January 2010
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Traffic fumes increase risk of pneumonia for children, The Observer, 24 January 2010
January Later that month, The Observer featured a study by Professor Jonathan Grigg showing that children who live close to main roads are at an increased risk of catching pneumonia, due to the pollution damaging their lungs. Professor Grigg found that those living within 100 metres of a main road were 65 per cent more likely to suffer from
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pneumonia, where previously the complications were linked to conditions including asthma and wheezing. “These findings strongly suggest that particles pollution is a major factor in making children vulnerable to pneumonia. We’ve shown a very firm link between the two,” he said.
February In February the Daily Mail ran a story on the high salt content of soups served in takeaway shops and in supermarkets. Research by Consensus Action on Salt and Health (CASH) revealed that some portions contained more than the recommended daily salt intake. Professor Graham MacGregor said: “It is the very high levels of salt that are put in our food that leads to thousands of unnecessary stroke and heart deaths. Furthermore there is increasing evidence that salt intake is linked to stomach cancer, osteoporosis, obesity and kidney stones and kidney disease.” The BBC News website, Metro, Daily Mirror and the Express also picked up the story.
March A month later The Times featured a study of 80,000 women led by Professor Stephen Duffy, which revealed that breast cancer screening saves the lives of two women for every one who receives potentially unnecessary treatment. Professor Duffy said; “This shows that the benefits of screening outweigh the harms. Unfortunately, we haven’t yet got a flawless screening test, and some cases that are picked up wouldn’t have needed treatment. But for every case like this, screening saves two women who would have otherwise died from breast cancer.” The Daily Mail ran news of a revolutionary new technique of delivering chemotherapy to treat ovarian cancer that is up to 1,000 times stronger, offering new hope to those suffering from the disease. The drugs, which go straight into the abdomen via a catheter instead of through the bloodstream, are
Can new ‘super chemo’ conquer ovarian cancer?, Daily Mail, 2 March 2010
being trialed at Queen Mary. Professor Iain McNeish said: “We hope that intraperitoneal chemotherapy will give women with advanced ovarian cancer a better chance of beating the disease in the long term.”
April Research by Queen Mary scientists has found that gaps between cervical cancer checks could be extended to five years for women over 30 if
human papillomavirus (HPV) tests are used in screening was reported in the Scotsman in April. The disease affects up to 2,800 women a year and is one of the few cancers that can be detected in its pre-cancerous stages. Lead author professor Jack Cuzick said: “Using HPV testing as the primary screening method for cervical cancer would not only mean women could be screened less often but it would also mean efficiency savings for the NHS.”
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Unit to tackle heart disease, East London Advertiser, 20 May 2010
May The East London Advertiser revealed that scientists at the new Cardiovascular Biomedical Research Unit are investigating how drinking beetroot juice on a daily basis could lower blood pressure levels and therefore reduce the risks of heart disease. Professor Amrita Ahluwalia who is leading the trial said it is the chemical nitrate which is found in the juice and in green, leafy vegetables, that is the key ingredient. “When the healthy volunteers drank the beetroot juice their blood pressure lowered immediately, so it should be fantastic for someone with high blood pressure.”
June June saw Professor Trisha Greenhalgh’s report evaluating the Summary Care Record – a new database containing the confidential information of millions of patients – featured in The Daily Telegraph. The report warned that people remain unaware that their personal details had been uploaded because they ignored notification letters sent to them. Professor Greenhalgh led the evaluation of the scheme and said that up to eight out of nine people will not have given their consent. She said “This research shows that the significant benefits anticipated for these programmes have, by and large, yet to be realised – and that they may be achieved only at high cost and enormous effort.”
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Patients in the dark as files are put online, The Daily Telegraph, 17 June 2010
July
August
September
The Observer featured news that doctors from Queen Mary are studying whether patients with irreversible heart conditions could have their lives prolonged if they had stem cells taken from their leg or hip injected into the defective organ. The investigation with the London Heart Attack Centre could help up to 30,000 sufferers with dilated cardiomyopathy. Professor Anthony Mathur said: “We are using stem cell therapies and regenerative medicine to try to improve the heart’s function and maybe prolong their lives. These patients have such a poor prognosis, so it’s very important for them to be exposed to a potential new therapy that might change the outcome of their condition.”
In August Channel 4 News interviewed Professor Greenhalgh about her report on the Summary Care Record, detailing patient information, which divided GPs and the British Medical Association (BMA). She said: “Sometimes the information is going to be life saving but our analysis suggests those cases are so rare that the amount of infrastructure and effort and resources being put in order to create the potential for accessing that record may or may not be worth the trade off.”
the Guardian featured a study by researchers at the Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine and the Institute of Education in September, which revealed that a white school pupil’s social class is more likely to determine their academic performance than that of those from an ethnic minority background. The gap in performance among white pupils is 32 per cent, while for Bangladeshi children the gap is only 7 per cent. The study also found that Chinese pupils from families with routine and manual jobs perform better than white children whose families are from managerial and professional backgrounds. Social class affects white pupils’ exam results more than those of ethnic minorities – study, the Guardian, 3 September 2010
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The scone that’s as salty as a Big Mac The Daily Mail, 23 October 2010
October The Daily Mail featured research by the Consensus Action on Salt and Health (CASH), based at Queen Mary, which revealed that scones and muffins bought in coffee shops contain high levels of salt. The worst offender was a fruit scone from Café Nero, which contains 2.1g salt, or a third of the recommended daily allowance.
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Lead researcher Professor MacGregor said: “It is absurd that a sweet muffin contains more salt than a Bacon and Egg McMuffin. Every gram of salt removed from our diet is estimated to prevent 6,000 deaths each year from heart attacks, heart disease and strokes, creating potential healthcare savings of £1.5billion per year.”
November In November in the Daily Telegraph, Professor Duffy, one of Britain’s top cancer screening experts, said women with a family history of breast cancer should be offered mammograms before they are 50. This move could save 50 lives a year and offer others peace of mind as some women below 50 still fall into the moderate or high risk group. He said: “It’s only a small minority of women who fall into this category but it’s worth doing because nowadays people are more and more aware of relatives with cancer and it causes a lot of worry.” This story featured widely in the media including the BBC News website, MSNBC and the Las Vegas Sun.
December At the end of the year the Daily Express ran news of a major trial of a drug to treat breast cancer showing that it can prevent or delay 80 per cent of tumours for women at the highest risk. Scientists testing Arimidex argue this treatment should now replace tamoxifen, which was developed more than 30 years ago. Professor Jack Cuzick lead investigator said: “These results provide further support for using Arimidex as the first-line treatment.”
Wonder drug leads war on breast cancer, Daily Express, December 2010
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Science and Engineering
The insect superhero Daily Mail, 25 March 2010
March saw burly beetles capture the media’s imagination, with Onthophagus Taurus put through its paces by Dr Rob Knell. In distressing news for weightlifters, a new benchmark was set by the dung beetle, measured as being able to pull 1,141 times its own body weight. Dr
Knell, of the School of Biological & Chemical Sciences, explained that this all evolved so the male of the species is able to push away competitors for mating. The research was reported by the Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, The Independent, Channel 4 News and internationally on MSNBC.
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January The year began in tongue-in-cheek fashion with YouTube sensation Matt Parker debunking an earlier story suggesting how prehistoric people used ancient locations such as Stonehenge to create a sophisticated ‘sat nav’ system. Parker, from the School of Mathematical Sciences, looked at the location of 800 sites that were previously Woolworths stores and jokingly found “precise geometrical patterns”. He said: “It is mathematically known that if you have a sufficiently large set of random data, you can find any pattern that you want with any given level of accuracy.” His comments were picked up by Times online, the Guardian and Times Higher Education. January also saw the BBC and Science Magazine picking up on the remarkable discoveries into the echolocation mechanisms of bats and dolphins. In collaboration with colleagues in China, researchers from the School of Biological & Chemical Sciences shed light on an incredible similarity in the molecular processes involved in these very different species. Dr Stephen Rossiter explained the uniqueness of the situation: “We were surprised by the sheer number of convergent changes in the DNA that we found. The fact that we’re able to link convergence of the DNA with a phenotype I think is unique, and in such a complex phenotype as hearing as well.”
February The media buzz around astronomy this year was alive in February, as Times Online and Wired Science featured the spectacular images captured by the VISTA telescope. Our own scientists led the team that designed and built the telescope,
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with Professor Jim Emerson from Queen Mary’s School of Mathematical Sciences leading the 18 university strong VISTA consortium. Times Online reported the project – which has revealed dramatic images of the Orion Nebula – as “leading the world”.
Did aliens help to line up Woolworths stores, The Independent, 16 January 2010
Saturn: a ringside seat, The Independent, 19 March 2010
March Saturn expert Professor Carl Murray, of the School of Mathematical Sciences, found himself the centre of attention once again as the Cassini satellite project returned more secrets about the planet. The media focus on
astronomy was drawn back to our own solar system, as proof that Saturn’s rings originate from a continually colliding collection of objects. Professor Murray explained to the BBC News website and The Independent how
the mysterious “F-ring jigsaw puzzle” fits together. The research was featured heavily in the smash-hit BBC television series ‘Wonders of the Solar System’, which propelled physics into the mainstream conscience.
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May You wouldn’t want it on your dinner plate, but the ‘sabre-toothed sausage’ was being served as a spring special. The BBC News website feature was not in fact about a bizarre culinary experiment, but about the naked mole rat, which was compared to a gruesome hot-dog filling by Dr Chris Faulkes. Dr Faulkes, of the School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, has spent the past 20 years studying the peculiar rodent. “In huge colonies of up to 300, there is only a single female that breeds. And she mates with one or two, or sometimes three, breeding males. And then the
rest of the colony, of both sexes, have their reproduction suppressed and never ever breed,” he explained. The World Cup drew audiences of billions, the majority of whom were clenching their teeth at the incessant buzzing of the vuvuzela, the plastic trumpets blown jubilantly by supporters of the hosts South Africa. Luckily, researchers from Queen Mary’s Centre for Digital Music developed a computer application that filtered out the noise. On the first Monday of the tournament the downloadable “devuvuzelator” solution
was covered in New Scientist, and by the end of the week news had crossed the globe to the Sydney Morning Herald. The work was also featured by Reuters and Voice TV, in Thailand.
June June also saw exciting developments in the burgeoning field of nanomedicine. Dr Marina Resmini’s research on nanogels generated inches in The Engineer, after she was awarded an EPSRC grant of nearly £175,000. It is hoped that by 2012 her team will have a working proof of the material, which can be used to deliver drugs into the body and then disassemble at their destination. One of the major fears over nanotechnology is safety, but as Dr Resmini said: “The advantage of this method is that the drug would be released, but you wouldn’t have the issue with the toxicity because the material would essentially be decomposed.”
July Returning to the World Cup in South Africa, Dr Javier López Peña and Dr Hugo Touchette from the School of Mathematical Sciences revealed that they could have made a mint from predicting the outcome. In a Popular Science article in advance of the final (in which Spain were victorious), our football-fanatic researchers showed off their Graph Theory-based model which prophesised the result. And of course, when the late Paul the Octopus backed them up, they were vindicated even before the final! Their analysis also
Meet the ‘sabre-toothed sausage’, BBC News website, 5 May 2010
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revealed “gaping holes” in England’s strategy against Germany, which they say explained Team England’s loss.
August In the traditionally ‘slow-news’ season of August, the media was invigorated by reports that milk from cloned cows was being sold to shops around the UK. Once again, Queen Mary’s researchers were keen to engage with the media, put the story in perspective and advance the discussion. Dr Brendan Curran and Professor Andrew Leitch were widely quoted and interviewed by the major British outlets, including Sky News, Evening Standard, BBC News website, Channel 4 News, The Independent, BBC Radio 2 and Farmers Guardian. They delivered their key messages to huge audiences – Dr Curran said: “I can’t see how it would be in any way dangerous,” whilst Professor Leitch expanded the debate in highlighting the necessity for new technologies in agriculture. Dr Qazi Rahman’s efforts to determine the cognitive differences between people of different sexual orientations received attention from The Times Eureka magazine. Dr Rahman conducted brain and behaviour tests on two women – one gay, one straight – to demonstrate his work. He then aligned the results to typical scores from other subject groups. The article revealed his defined archetypal attributes of males and females, and he explains that “gay male and lesbian brains are like mosaics, they have both male and female attributes”.
Sale of cloned cow farm milk is investigated, Evening Standard, 2 August 2010
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Can you see sound? It seems extraordinary, but the vOICe system has been helping the blind recover their sight by translating visual images to ‘sound-scapes’. Dr Michael Proulx, a cognitive psychologist from the School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, is using the system for his own research at the College. He gave his insight for a thorough article covering the technology in New Scientist: “What’s exciting to me is that it is possible, through extensive use, to actually have some sort of direct, qualitative experience that is similar to vision.” With outer space remaining on the news agenda, researchers from the Department of Physics and School of Mathematical Sciences were questioned about deep space,
and also rocks a little closer to home. Dr David Berman tackled the subject of the location of the centre of the universe, saying: “The remarkable thing about the universe is that it is the same everywhere and in all directions has no centre.” Professor Carl Murray – whose research contributed to the hit BBC series ‘Wonders of the Solar System’ – explained that despite asteroids being metal-rich, “the Earth’s magnetic field has virtually no effect on their orbits”. The article appeared in Metro. In the drive to make important discoveries, the model that group thinking can arrive at solutions to complex problems is being applied with the help of volunteers. Queen Mary’s Department of Physics is helping to organise the Citizen
Ear today, eye tomorrow, New Scientist, 14 August 2010
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Cyberscience Centre, which enables members of the public to contribute to research. This example of College outreach was discussed on Digital Planted, broadcasted by the BBC World Service.
October October was Nobel Prize month, and the focus was on carbon studies with the prizes for Chemistry and Physics going to researchers in this field. Professor Ton Peijs, School of Engineering and Materials Science, commented in The Observer: “Now we have the opportunity to use graphene (the substance produced for the Physics prize) to make even lighter and stronger carbon fibres and so make our aircraft even lighter and stronger.”
Why research scientists love carbon, The Observer, 10 October 2010
Having already appeared in the Daily Mail and The Scotsman, on BBC Radio 4’s The World Tonight in 2009, Professor Lars Chittka had an even greater media presence this year. He and his colleague, Dr Mathieu Lihoreau, from the School of Biological and Chemical Sciences focus their research on bee behaviour, and in November published a study that really caught the public’s imagination. They found that whilst foraging for pollen, bees calculate the shortest distance between flowers, essentially solving the ‘travelling salesman problem’. Professor Chittka said: “Studying how bee brains solve such challenging tasks might allow us to identify the minimal neural circuitry required for complex problem solving.”
Whales’ sunburn, The Sun, 10 November 2010
November BBC One’s Countryfile turned to expert in animal communication, Dr Alan McElligott and his postdoctoral researcher Dr Elodie Briefer to explain their research on vocal communication in fallow deer during the rut. The presenters were exploring what is behind the calls of the roar of rutting deer; our researchers reveal the ‘meaning behind the moaning’. November also saw Laura MartinezLevasseur and Professor Edel O’Toole hit the headlines with their inter-school
study into the effect of ultraviolet radiation on whales. A concerned public heard from Professor O’Toole, who predicted: “Whales will experience more severe sun damage if ultraviolet radiation continues to increase.” The team found blistering caused by the radiation, and that just as in humans, damage was more severe in the paler-skinned whales. The research was reported widely in the media, including the Daily Mail, The Independent, Daily Telegraph, and BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
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2010: Facts and Figures
Transfers Knowledge
Overseas Partnerships
Expert Opinion & Comment
Research Excellence
Messages delivered via media coverage
Estate & Environment
Fosters Diversity
Engages local communities Student Learning & Experience
Advertising Value Equivalence (AVE) for 2010
Influences policy
= ÂŁ9.4 million This is how much our editorial coverage would cost if it was paid-for advertising space.
Total print appearances =
1561 for 2010
All figures courtesy of ImpactWise
40 2010: Facts and Figures
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