Ask a Laureate

On Friday May 7th 2010, the Chemistry Department will be hosting the first annual “Ask a Laureate/Lunch with a Laureate” event. This will be an opportunity for high school students across Ontario to both hear, and ask questions of, award-winning chemists (laureates) who are conducting exciting, ground-breaking research in different areas of Chemistry.

We strongly encourage teachers to bring their chemistry students to this event, which will be held in Convocation Hall on the main University of Toronto campus. The lectures and Q&A sessions will be broadcast live over the internet for the benefit of those unable to make the trip to Toronto. Students in remote locations will also be able to ask questions of the speakers via the internet.

Lunch with a Laureate

A select group of students and their mentors (up to 36 WINNERS) will be asked to have “Lunch with a Laureate”, giving those students and mentors who seriously engaged with the topics a chance to interact with one of the speakers over lunch. Student selection will be based on an essay competition, with a submission deadline of March 22nd, 2010. Numerous prizes for both students and mentors will also be awarded at the luncheon.

Essay topics were chosen to represent current trends in the various fields of chemistry addressed by the speakers, and were designed to relate to the high school curriculum.

This two stage engagement with chemistry will be an annual event, and in 2011, the International Year of Chemistry, our Laureates will be Nobel Laureates.

>> Essay contest entry form

Check out our Sumo Robots and an Explosive Demonstration on YouTube – Just two of the exciting groups of researchers you’ll meet at Science @ Ryerson.

Science @ Ryerson is Ryerson University’s portion of Science Rendezvous. On Saturday May 8, Ryerson University will be opening its doors to the public, showcasing some of the world-class scientific research that is taking place on our campus.

Ryerson is home to some incredibly cool, cutting-edge research and discovery, and Science @ Ryerson is your chance to be a part of it. This one-day-event will not only display the amazing research underway at Ryerson, but it will also explain how science plays a part in our everyday lives in everything from Google, to medical imaging to chocolate.

Explore the newest technology in search and rescue while you interact with the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) rescue dogs, discover flaming ice and flour torches, watch robots sumo-wrestle, see the amazing Emoti-Chair or just enjoy an educational and fun-filled Saturday afternoon with family and friends. Check out the full program.

Right here in the heart of Toronto, just a block from the Eaton’s Centre, lies a world of possibilities. Drop by and see for yourself on Saturday May 8, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Directions:

350 Victoria Street
Toronto, ON

www.ryerson.ca/maps/

Parking:

There are paid parking lots available at the following intersections: Yonge and Gerrard / Gould and Victoria / Gould and Mutual / Dundas and Bond.

TTC:

College Station
(South of College to Gerrard, east of Yonge to Victoria)
Dundas Station
(North of Dundas to Gould, east of Yonge to Victoria)

 

Meet Scientists and take a tour of the Research Institute!

If you’ve ever wondered what the laboratories of world-renowned scientists look like, here is your chance to find out!  Take our tours and learn about the groundbreaking work and discoveries of highly acclaimed researchers at UHN.

http://www.uhnresearch.ca/

Location    University Health Network, MaRS, 101 College Street

10:30am   Registration (sign up, MaRS Research Tower, limited in numbers)

11am, 12pm, 1pm   Laboratory Tours

Learn about the latest ways of seeing new medical compounds in 3-D, explore a novel method of causing immune tolerance without immuno- suppressive drugs – all through touring the laboratory of Dr. Lakshmi Kotra  link: http://www.uhnresearch.ca/researchers/profile.php?lookup=12130

Be amazed at how cells receive messages that cause them to change, and learn about stem cells and how they can help treat people with different diseases, including diabetes, spinal cord injuries, heart disease, and blood disorders.  To experience all this and more, visit the laboratory of Dr. Gordon Keller link:  http://www.uhnresearch.ca/researchers/profile.php?lookup=12091

Each gene in our body encodes a protein. The Ikura Lab will describe how we use bacteria as factories for translating these codes in the production of human protein; further, we will show you how we purify these proteins for state of the art nuclear magnetic resonance and x-ray crystallography experiments with the ultimate aim of revealing a 3D picture of the protein’s structure. These 3D pictures help us understand how proteins function in our body.  Tour the laboratory of Dr. Mitsuhiko Ikura link:  http://www.uhnresearch.ca/researchers/profile.php?lookup=2646

Location:  MaRS Discovery District

 

CALLING ALL JUNIOR SCIENTISTS!

Join us in the ‘lab’ at a mall near you on Saturday May 8, 2010 where you may*:

• Be a crime scene investigator and identify a mystery substance!
• Make the world’s largest bubble!
• Dig down and get dirty in earth materials and decaying organisms!
• Make your own fossil and classify a mystery mineral!
• Delve into the diet and digestion of an owl and see what it eats for breakfast!
• Design, build, test and destroy a bridge!
• Meet weird and wonderful pond creatures through the lens of magnifiers and microscopes!
• Uncover your inner Picasso and create abstract paintings using solar power!
• Create a scratch and sniff picture to learn about your sense of smell!
• Dare to drink a chemical concoction that you make!
* This is a sampling of potential activities. Activities will vary at each mall.

Since 2008, Malls of Science has sparked the minds of junior scientists, their families and their friends with fun, interactive activities focused on building awareness of, and igniting a passion for science and technology in youth. Drop in for a fun, free, family-focused Saturday for ‘kids’ of all ages!

Scientists in School will be at the following malls on Saturday May 8, 2010:

Malvern Town Centre
31 Tapscott Road, Scarborough, ON
Time: 10 am – 4 pm
Location: Labels Court

Stone Road Mall
435 Stone Road Ste #204 Guelph, ON
Time: 12pm-3pm
Location: Atrium

About Scientists in School:

Scientists in School (SiS) is a dynamic charitable organization dedicated to establishing a strong foundation of science and innovation amongst Canadian youth. Our mission is to ignite scientific curiosity in children so that they: question intelligently; learn through discovery; connect scientific knowledge to their world; and consider a career in science.  SiS is the ‘field trip that comes to the classroom’, providing over 60 half-day, curriculum-aligned, interactive workshop topics that enable elementary students to become scientists in their school. For more information, please visit www.scientistsinschool.ca

Location: MaRS Discovery District at 101 College Street, Main Atrium

Time: 11am to 4pm

Events will include:
• Public tours of cancer genomic laboratory

Location: Ryerson University

Kerr Hall East

340 Church Street

Room: KHE 119

See Ryerson Campus MAP

Time: 10 a.m. -4 p.m.

Events include:

Mini Science Olympics activities

1. Dante’s Peek

2. Slime

3. Penny Float

4. Heavy Engineering

5. Slow Balloon Race

Are you up for a challenge? Would you like to test your science and engineering skills and have fun at the same time?

Youth Science Ontario would like to invite families and groups of students to compete in 5 exciting, educational and hands-on Science Olympics challenges. Come, show us your skills!

For more information visit Youth Science Ontario website.

Location: Harbourfront Centre

Time: 12pm to 4pm

Events will include:

Inspired by the magnificent worldviews revealed by the lens of science, students from the Ontario College of Art and Design create art that responds to the microscopic realm of particle physics, through to the macroscopic realm of relativity.

up[side] down truth and beauty: charmed and strange

Students from the Ontario College of Art and Design respond to the magnificence of worldviews revealed by the lens of science, Inspired by processes that render the invisible world visible to the human eye, OCAD students explore our limited perceptions of matter, energy, time and space and examine the construct of knowledge and image as knowledge.

up[side] down truth and beauty: charmed and strange is part of the 3^rd annual Science Rendezvous, a Southern Ontario-wide festival of Science. OCAD is part of the art-science celebration at Harbourfront Centre. OCAD students present paintings, digital work, video and mixed media installations inspired by science, as well as a cosmic ray cake. Other participants at Harbourfront include the Too Cool for School Art-Science fair, family activities by the Ontario Science Centre and Xerox, and readings by science fiction authors.

Art and Science Come Together!
Too Cool for School

Location: 235 Queens Quay W., Toronto
Time: 12pm-4pm

Events include:
• Harbourfront Centre Fresh Ground commissioning
• Ontario Science Centre
• Ontario College of Art and Design
• Xerox Research Group

A peek into the Xerox Labs and the science inside Xerox products.

Learn about the innovative research being carried out at Xerox’s Canadian research centre.

Location: Harbourfront Centre

Time: 12pm to 4pm

Location: MaRS Discovery District at 101 College Street, Main Atrium

Time: 11 am to 4 pm

Event will include:

• Engaging displays and presentation

• Meet researchers from the University Health Network

• Tours the labs of the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research

• Check out the Giant Colon hosted by the Colorectal Cancer Association of Canada. It’s a 40-foot, inflatable, walk-through colon to teach people about nutrition and colorectal cancer prevention.