ScienceMarch 22, 2017

Tears, cheers and a timely celebration of good, meaningful science

Veronika Meduna

Guest writer

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Veronika Meduna watches the gongs get handed out at last night’s big Prime Minister’s Science Prize ceremony.

Anybody who thinks of science as the dispassionate study of cold, hard facts would have had their stereotype shattered at last night’s awards ceremony for the 2016 PM’s Science Prizes.

Tears rolled and laughter erupted, often at the same time, as recipients accepted their prizes for work that directly links science with people.

The top $500,000 prize went to the Dunedin Study, a longitudinal and multidisciplinary project now famous around the world, partly thanks to the documentary series Why Am I, for gathering the most detailed data on human development and helping to unravel the interplay between genetics and experiences in shaping our lives.

It all began back in 1972 with about 1000 babies born at Queen Mary maternity hospital. Those babies are turning 45 this year and most of them have long left Dunedin, but next month they’ll start flocking back to the city for the next round of assessments and tests. Over the years, the study members’ collective life histories have shed light on many factors that influence health outcomes and behaviour, from the effects of teenage cannabis use on mental health in later life to the links between genes and antisocial behaviour.

Study director Richie Poulton accepted the prize on behalf of the research team, but says the study’s participants are the real heroes. “They do it because they know it will help other people.”

Read the Spinoff interview with Richie Poulton, ‘Future criminals revealed at age three? Not so fast, says Dunedin Study head’, here

Poulton, who first joined the study team as a 22-year-old “peroxide blond” psychology student and, after a few years overseas, returned as its director in 2000, says he has grown up with the study members. As they age, the research focus continues to change – and will likely keep shaping health and social policy far beyond New Zealand for years to come.

Earthquakes and the impact they have on communities is what drives University of Canterbury civil engineer Brendon Bradley, who won the PM’s MacDiarmid Emerging Scientist Prize. His work on modelling the impact of ground shaking on built infrastructure is feeding into several major rebuild projects in Christchurch and into the development of building codes internationally.

We know that the Alpine Fault and the subduction zone beneath Wellington are likely to produce a big earthquake. Even though it’s not possible to predict it, it is possible to prepare for the impact, he says. By building models that incorporate specific data about the underlying geology of different regions, Bradley can visualise how the shaking will affect buildings and structures that are most important to people in an emergency – hospitals, bridges, telecommunications headquarters, large office buildings – and how more robust designs can mitigate the earthquake impact.

In these post-truth times, it was good to see the PM’s Science Communication Prize go to someone who cares about the role of science in a democracy. Science historian, writer and Victoria University lecturer Rebecca Priestley plans to use her prize money to produce a massive online open course (MOOC) on science communication and to establish New Zealand’s first fund to support independent science journalism, with a focus on climate change and impacts of technology on society.

Rebecca Priestley and Bill English. Photo: VUW

“To make decisions about their future, people need to be able to understand, discuss and ask informed questions about issues such as climate change, water quality and emerging technologies. I think it is time for the science communication community to focus more on thinking about what we are doing, what we are trying to achieve and how we can do it better,” she said.

The most heartfelt reaction came from a group of pupils from Koraunui Primary School in Lower Hutt who had come to celebrate their science teacher Dianne Christenson, the first primary teacher to win the PM’s Science Teacher Prize, worth $150,000. Thanks to her, the kids get to study their local river and set up a taro patch in the school grounds. They have bee hives and make (and sell) balms and creams. They learn science by doing it, with all the exploration, risk-taking and failure that brings. They may not become scientists but they are bound to keep exploring and likely to remember those classes for the rest of their lives.

Onslow College in Wellington is another school that seems to have found a formula for inspirational science education. Former student Catherine Pot took home the PM’s Future Scientist Prize for tackling a tricky problem in semiconductor physics. Her win was the third time the school featured in the PM’s science awards.

The Spinoff’s science content is made possible thanks to the support of The MacDiarmid Institute for Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology, a national institute devoted to scientific research.

We know you know it’s tough out there. We are writing regularly about the economy, the price of butter, local business closures, and the cost of being a person in Aotearoa in 2025. We’ve seen the price of everything go up, cinemas are using off-brand Jaffas, and Hayden Donnell says everything is “rooted”. Sometimes it feels like things are hopeless, but there is still a meeting place for like-minded New Zealanders and a home for local stories, well-researched journalism, humour and hot takes. That place is The Spinoff.

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ScienceMarch 8, 2017

Today and every day we salute you: the brilliant, invisible women of science

Siouxsie Wiles

Contributing writer

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We recently asked a class of first-year students, most of them young women, to think of a scientist, writes Siouxsie Wiles. And who do you think they chose?

Today was the day to wear red. It’s a colour I mostly avoid because it clashes with my pink hair, but it wasn’t the day for worrying about that. Because March 8 is International Women’s Day. One day to celebrate the many and varied contributions of women to the world we live in, and to highlight that gender parity still isn’t a thing, despite us living in the 21st century.

Before anyone asks when International Men’s Day is (it’s in November), or why we need a day to celebrate women, because the past is the past and we’ve come so far, and what are we all complaining about, things could be so much worse … According to Wikipedia, the first Women’s Day was more than a century ago, in New York in 1909. We’ve spent more than 100 years celebrating the contributions of women, yet the World Economic Forum predicts that the gender gap won’t close entirely for another 170 years – not till 2186. Can you see now why we need an International Women’s Day?

Recently, my colleague Kate Hannah and I did an exercise with our new class of first year undergraduates. Almost two-thirds of our class are young women, excited to be starting their science degrees. We asked our class to clear their minds and then think of a scientist. It could be a person, or characteristics of a person, or they could draw a person. Who do you think they named or drew? Albert Einstein and Ernest Rutherford, that’s who. They were the scientists who first sprang to mind for almost half our class. Others named Isaac Newton, Jacques Cousteau, Tim Berners-Lee, Alan Turing, Oliver Sacks, Alexander Fleming, Robert Hooke and Richard Feynman. Thankfully, it wasn’t all men. Marie Curie and Rosalind Franklin got a mention too.

But reading the names the students had scribbled on their Post-it notes, it did feel as though women are invisible. How many people know that Einstein met his first wife, Mileva Maric, while studying and that she got better grades than he did? But at the oral exam, she was awarded less than half the marks of Einstein and the other male students. Despite not being awarded her degree, she and Einstein worked together on special relativity. At some point, though, Maric became what was expected of women in those days, a mother who looked after the children while her husband the genius was off doing science and having affairs.

Clockwise from left: Kathleen Curtis, Edith Farkas, Pérrine Moncrieff, Rosemary Askin

The exercise with our class got me Googling for some of New Zealand’s invisible scientists. Have you heard of geologist Rosemary Askin? In 1970, she became the first New Zealand woman to have her own research programme in Antarctica. She even has a mountain named after her (Mount Askin in the Darwin Mountains). How about Edith Farkas, another Antarctic researcher, whose work helped find the hole in the ozone layer? Our first field guide for identifying New Zealand birds was written by ornithologist Pérrine Moncrieff. Without her we wouldn’t have the Abel Tasman National Park either. Mycologist (fungi expert) Kathleen Curtis was a founding member of the Cawthron Institute in Nelson and the first woman fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand. And Joan Dingley, another mycologist, had about 30 species of fungi named dingleyae after her.

The story that saddened me the most though, was of bacteriologist and pathologist Constance Helen Frost. She graduated from the University of Otago Medical School in 1900 and was offered an honorary position at Auckland Hospital, an appointment that was renewed each year when no man could be found to replace her. It wasn’t until 1918 that the position became full time and she was paid £500 a year. Alas, she died of flu in 1920. Within two years the position became the second highest paid at the hospital and the man who replaced her was earning £1,000 a year.

Rosemary, Edith, Pérrine, Kathleen, Joan, Constance. We see you and we salute you.

The Spinoff’s science content is made possible thanks to the support of The MacDiarmid Institute for Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology, a national institute devoted to scientific research.

We know you know it’s tough out there. We are writing regularly about the economy, the price of butter, local business closures, and the cost of being a person in Aotearoa in 2025. We’ve seen the price of everything go up, cinemas are using off-brand Jaffas, and Hayden Donnell says everything is “rooted”. Sometimes it feels like things are hopeless, but there is still a meeting place for like-minded New Zealanders and a home for local stories, well-researched journalism, humour and hot takes. That place is The Spinoff.

If you’ve read this far, then you appreciate what we’re trying to achieve. Maybe you come back for our clear-sighted commentary on politics, or maybe it’s for our cultural offering of books, TV, film, theatre and live event reviews and recommendations. Whatever the reason, we appreciate your company. But it comes at a cost. For every 100 Spinoff readers, only 3.2 support us financially.

We need this to be higher to confidently plan for the future, continue to take the government to task, back the cultural sector in Aotearoa, and bring the unique perspectives you love to the biggest stories of the week. If you haven’t already, please consider making a regular donation today. Thank you.