Dr Tracy Melvin is an Associate Professor in the Optoelectronics Research Centre at Southampton University.

The focus of her research is to create technologies to provide the potential to answer bioscience questions, such as how to repair damaged DNA, that are difficult or cannot be answered in any other way.

Her research crosses the medical science – micro-optical device interface and includes bionano-technology methods.

Hope you can come along and make it a stimulating evening.

Come along and hear her talk on Monday 12th June 2017 from 7pm.

Professor Claudia Maraston is an Astrophysicist in the Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation at Portsmouth University.

She studies galaxy formation and the evolution of galaxies.

Come along and hear her talk on Monday 10th April 2017 from 7pm.

On 13th June starting at 7pm

Colin Palmer who is one of our members and Chairman of ‘Wight Community Energy’ will be talking about how solar power is coming of age, “Solar Power: a Bright Future.”

Prices are falling rapidly and in many places power from the sun is cheaper than from fossil fuels. Investment in solar power is now much greater than in conventional power sources.

How has this happened and what challenges do we face in moving to a solar powered world?

Colin will explain how photovoltaics work, how the dramatic price reductions have happened and how the combination of solar power and storage could power the world.

On Monday 9th May 2016 starting at 7pm.

Dr Myron Christodoulides from the Division of Clinical and Experimental Sciences, Molecular Microbiology, Southampton University will be talking about bacteria.

He will give a definition of bacteria before talking about pathogenic bacteria and how they can defeat the immune system, so the need for antibiotics.

He will explain what antibiotics are, and hence how antibiotic resistance occurs, and will look particularly at antibiotic resistance in farming, which is a serious problem.

The third talk of the season is on Monday 9th November starting at 7pm.

Dr Martin Christlieb from the Oncology Department at Oxford University will give a talk on: “Modern Medical Imaging: getting the right treatment to the right patient”.

All talks are held in the Regency Suite at Shanklin Conservative Club. For those who do not know The Regency Suite, it is above the Conservative Club in Shanklin in Palmerston Road, just off The High Street. The nearest car parks are in Landguard Road and Orchardleigh Road, both only two or three minutes walk away. Parking is free after 6pm.

As we have to pay a rent for the facilities, we have to ask for a donation of at least £3 on the door to make sure we cover all our expenses. i.e. the rent, cost of speakers’ travel expenses and a meal, plus overnight accommodation if needed.

The second talk of the season us on Monday 12th October starting at 7pm.

Dr Jennifer Gupta is the Outreach Officer for the Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation at the University of Portsmouth. Her interest is in astrophysics and she will be talking about developments in “Radio Astronomy, Quasars and Black Holes”.

All talks are held in the Regency Suite at Shanklin Conservative Club. For those who do not know The Regency Suite, it is above the Conservative Club in Shanklin in Palmerston Road, just off The High Street. The nearest car parks are in Landguard Road and Orchardleigh Road, both only two or three minutes walk away. Parking is free after 6pm.

As we have to pay a rent for the facilities, we have to ask for a donation of at least £3 on the door to make sure we cover all our expenses. i.e. the rent, cost of speakers’ travel expenses and a meal, plus overnight accommodation if needed.

The autumn season begins on Monday 28th September starting at 7pm.

Professor John Coleman from the Phonetics Department at Oxford University will give a talk on: “Voices from the Past” How do present day languages sound compared to those spoken by our ancestors?

An audio journey into the spoken words of the past.

Discover the deep cultural connections we share with our linguistic cousins across Europe and Asia and hear reconstructions of ancient words, last spoken over 6,000 years ago.

All talks are held in the Regency Suite at Shanklin Conservative Club. For those who do not know The Regency Suite, it is above the Conservative Club in Shanklin in Palmerston Road, just off The High Street. The nearest car parks are in Landguard Road and Orchardleigh Road, both only two or three minutes walk away. Parking is free after 6pm.

As we have to pay a rent for the facilities, we have to ask for a donation of at least £3 on the door to make sure we cover all our expenses. i.e. the rent, cost of speakers’ travel expenses and a meal, plus overnight accommodation if needed.

Monday 8th June starting at 7pm.

Our sixth talk will be given by the Robert Hooke Society who will be talking about the significant experiments of Robert Hooke, including a demonstration of “Prince Rubert’s Drops” and about the physics of glass.

This will be our last talk for the season until Monday 28th September.

As we have to pay a rent for the facilities, we have to ask for a donation of at least £3 on the door to make sure we cover all our expenses. i.e. the rent, cost of speakers’ travel expenses and a meal, plus overnight accommodation if needed.

Monday 11th May 7pm

Our fifth speaker is Dr Elizabeth Falk who is a senior lecturer in Experimental Particle Physics in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Sussex University and a member of the neutrino research group.

She will be talking about ‘Intriguing Neutrinos’.

This is the second of the two talks on Particle Physics.

Change of room
This talk will be held in the Osborne room.

Directions: when you go up the stairs turn right through the double doors and the Osborne room is on the right. Drinks: If you want a drink before the meeting starts you may use the Regency Suite Bar.

In the break please use the Conservative Club Bar downstairs. (By mistake the Regency Suite was double booked)

As we have to pay a rent for the facilities, we have to ask for a donation of at least £3 on the door to make sure we cover all our expenses. i.e. the rent, cost of speakers’ travel expenses and a meal, plus overnight accommodation if needed.

Monday 13th April starting at 7pm

The fourth speaker for 2015 is Professor Steve F.King in the High Energy Physics theory group of the School of Physics and Astronomy at Southampton University.

He will be talking about ‘The Standard Models in Particle Physics’.

Here’s how Steve describes what he will be speaking about:

“In this talk we will discuss Standard Model of Particle Physics, the Standard Model of Cosmology, and their connection at the CERN Large Hadron Collider.

“The talk will assume no prior knowledge of either Particle Physics or Cosmology, and will take us on a voyage back in time across the Universe to start of the Big Bang and the innermost workings of the atom.

“We will take a tour of the CERN Large Hadron Collider which recreates the Big Bang conditions and present the very latest results on the Higgs Boson, before speculating about what might be discovered next, which would shape the future of physics for generations to come.

“The talk will be hopefully entertaining as well as informative, and will contain many audio-visual animations and movie clips.”