Tuesday 8 October 2024
Ada Lovelace Day Live, our annual ‘science cabaret’ will return once again with another fantastic line-up of women in science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM), who will share their experiences, insights and expertise, inspiring and empowering the next generation of women in STEM.
We will again be hosted at the Royal Institution in London (venue details below) on the evening of Tuesday 8 October 2024. Doors will open at 18:30 for the bar, book stall and book signing with the performance running from 19:30 to around 21:30.
This year, our event will be compèred by the marvellous Dr Sally Le Page, and our speakers include:
- Dr Evgenia Ilyinskaya, a volcanologist who'll be talking about the Grindavík eruption in Iceland
- Mamta Singhal MBE, a design engineer who'll be looking at the science and engineering behind the humble rubber duck
- Takita Bartlett-Lashley, a mathematician who'll be talking about using crafts to introduce mathematical concepts to children
- Dr Samantha Terry, a radiobiologist who's going to be talking about the use of targeted radionuclide therapy in cancer treatments
- Joysy John MBE, software engineer, education entrepreneur and edtech advisor, who’ll be talking about the role of technology in education.
- Dr Sarah Bearchell, a science writer, presenter and trainer who’ll be creating clouds live on stage
- Prof Anjali Goswami, a palaeobiologist who will be talking about why cats are evolutionarily perfect
Read all about them below!
Tickets
Tickets are available now!
Theatre tickets cost £17.27 (£11.02 concession) for members of the public, or £7.90 for Ri Members or Ri Patrons. Carers can receive a free ticket by emailing events@ri.ac.uk. If you'd like to book a group larger than ten or are bringing a school group over ten, please email us and we'll provide you with a group rate.
Livestream tickets cost £11.02 (£5.82 concession) for members of the public, or £3.73 for members of the Ri Members or Ri Patrons. We have generous discounts for group bookings over ten, with 15% off for groups of 11 to 100, 50% off for groups of 101 to 500, and 70% off for groups of 501 to 1000. Please get in touch to arrange a group booking!
If you can't watch on the night, then livestream ticket holders will have two weeks to watch the recording, which gives you plenty of time to catch up at your leisure!
Organise your own event
If you can't join us to celebrate in London, why not organise your own event? Streaming tickets are available now, so you can join us from anywhere around the world and help us raise awareness of women’s accomplishments and inspiring girls to pursue careers in STEM, shaping a more inclusive future together.
Find out how to organise a watch party and don't forget to add it to our map!
Bar
The bar will be open from 18:30, so we encourage everyone to get there early, relax with a beverage, and enjoy perusing our book stall, perhaps get a book signed by our guest author, Lisa Rajan, or looking around the venerable Royal Institution, where so many momentous scientific discoveries have been announced. Please note, the bar takes only cashless payments.
Our talks and speakers
A volcano has woken up after an 800-year long slumber in the most densely populated part of Iceland, only a few miles from the nearest town and easily visible from the capital city. It has erupted lava every month since December 2023, caused repeated evacuations and destroyed roads, hot water pipes and several houses. Local communities have successfully fought back by building lava barriers that protect homes and a geothermal power plant, but how long will they be able to hold it back?
Dr Evgenia Ilyinskaya, a volcanologist at the University of Leeds and an Icelander, will explore the science of why volcanic systems in this part of the world awaken once a millennium and then apparently go on to erupt for decades or centuries. She will also delve into the impact and perception of this volcano in the local and international communities, and her professional and personal relationship with it.
About Evgenia
Dr Evgenia Ilyinskaya is an associate professor of volcanology at the University of Leeds. She researches volcanic emissions of gases and aerosols, and their impacts on air quality, the environment and people’s wellbeing. She has done fieldwork in Iceland, Hawaii, Montserrat, Nicaragua and Antarctica, to name just a few examples.
Evgenia has led large international and interdisciplinary research teams working on volcanoes and the people who live close to them – for example a project on building societal resilience to volcanic air pollution in Nicaragua combining physical and social sciences; history; and visual arts. She is also involved in the hazard management of volcanic eruptions in Iceland as a scientist on the Icelandic Civil Protection advisory groups. She is also involved in the hazard management of volcanic eruptions in Iceland as a scientist on the Icelandic Civil Protection advisory groups. She has recently appeared on BBC Breakfast, BBC Radio 4 Inside Science and Science in Action to discuss the ongoing volcanic activity in Iceland.
A former toy development engineer, chartered design engineer Mamta Singhal MBE will explore the history, engineering, science and manufacturing of your favourite bath toy: the humble rubber duck!
She will explore the different types of plastics used for rubber ducks, as well as the engineering and scientific principles behind its development and some ingenious manufacturing methods, showcasing how creativity, engineering and technology come together to make the iconic little Ducky.
Mamta will also investigate why we have bath toys, delve into the surprising history of the rubber duck and explain how design engineers make sure that they are both safe, through rigorous testing, and fit for market.
About Mamta
Mamta Singhal MBE is a chartered design engineer and engineering board member whose 20 year career has spanned the toy, snack and drinks industries. She was awarded an MBE for services to engineering in 2022.
Mamta started her career at Dyson on a graduate engineering program before moving to Hasbro as a global design engineer where she worked on Playdoh, Monopoly and Action Man. She went on to join Mars as a senior scientist and project packaging manager, working on brands such as Galaxy, Twix, Bounty and M&Ms.
She has also worked for Mattel as a project quality engineer, working on the Barbie, Hot Wheel and Fisher Price brands. She then moved into the drinks industry, working for Coca-Cola European Partners and then Diageo plc.
A regular speaker on diversity in engineering, she’s appeared on BBC Breakfast, ITV News, as well as national and regional radio. A visiting professor at Middlesex University, she is also a Fellow of the Women’s Engineering Society and a fellow of the Institution of Engineering and Technology.
Delve into a fascinating exploration where mathematics fused with fashion and art not only result in unique designs but also opens up possibilities that make abstract theories engaging, tangible and even wearable!
Takita Bartlett-Lashley unravels the maths quite literally woven into the fabric of our society, highlighting cultural, historical and modern techniques in art and textiles fusing the intricacies of pattern, number and geometry to inspire her fashion creations and educational tools. There’s critical acknowledgement of a symbiotic exchange, whereby crafting extends beyond a canvas for mathematical design - it’s an enabler of interpretation, understanding and representation of complex mathematical concepts.
This talk invites attendees to rethink the possibilities at the convergence of maths, technology, and creative expression. Illustrating the profound and ongoing connection between these seemingly disparate fields remains a deep rooted passion of Takita, confounded by a desire to shift perspectives about maths, to preserve and celebrate the intricacies of crafting and share the importance of curating spaces to creatively engage with maths and experiential pedagogy in STEM education.
About Takita
Working at the intersection of STEM, fashion and education, Takita enjoys exploring creative applications of maths and technology across fashion and design. Her mathematical clothing/jewellery designs have doubled as educational tools gracing the red carpet and classrooms alike, in addition to launching STEM in Style, an initiative which has delivered STEAM events/workshops for over 2000 young people.
Persistence to blend these passions has fuelled Takita’s career leveraging AI and data science to launch scalable solutions for challenges within the fashion and retail sectors, most recently working for companies such as ASOS and Google.
Radiation, and especially radioactivity, does not have the best of reputations. It can be damaging and even increase a risk of cancer. And yet, as with everything in life, using just a little bit of it does not necessarily harm; in medicine, we actually harness the power of radiation for good. For example, half of all cancer patients are treated with X-ray radiation and people with thyroid cancer are administered radioactivity to help remove a tumour.
Dr Samantha Terry will explore the uses of radioactivity in cancer treatment so far and describe how her team at King’s College London and elsewhere are trying to fill in the missing scientific gaps in our understanding and knowledge to help make radioactive treatments more effective and mainstream. They aim to push radioactive therapies to their maximum potential, so that they are not only able to non-invasively remove cancers spread throughout the body, but are also considered by the scientific community to be preventative measures for cancer.
About Samantha
Dr Samantha Terry is a reader in radiation biology at King’s College London, where she teaches undergraduates and Master’s students about the use of radioactivity in imaging and treating disease, and runs a research group. She was inspired to work in radiobiology because she wanted to help patients with cancer, but was nervous around blood.
After completing a BSc in Cell Biology at the University of St Andrews, Samantha did a PhD in how X-rays can be used to treat cancer, followed by two years at the University of Oxford working on radioactive, injectable therapies and three years in Nijmegen in the Netherlands using radioactive compounds to image cancer. In 2015, she started her own lab group that works on determining how different types of radioactivity can be best used in the clinic.
Questions her group aims to answer include: “Are radioactive compounds used for imaging safe for healthy tissues?”, “How can we make this radioactive compound only irradiate cancer cells?”, and “How much radioactivity can we safely inject?”.
Artificial Intelligence is changing our world. It offers unique opportunities to tackle some of the most pressing challenges in education, such as teacher shortages and educational inequalities. But rather than replacing quality teaching, AI can serve as a powerful tool to enhance learning experiences, reduce teacher workload, and improve social mobility. This talk will delve into how AI can evolve the future of teaching, creating a more engaging, adaptive, and inclusive educational landscape.
Despite technology being the fastest-growing sector, only 17 per cent of tech employees are women, and a mere 9 per cent come from disadvantaged backgrounds. Addressing the digital skills gap, especially among women and individuals from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, is crucial. Drawing on her experience in bridging the digital skills gap in the UK, Joysy John MBE will discuss strategies to equip both teachers and students with the necessary skills to thrive in the future.
About Joysy
Joysy John MBE is a software engineer, education entrepreneur and edtech advisor. Previously she was the Strategy and Transformation Director at Trinity College London. She is the former Director of Education at Nesta, UK’s innovation agency and ex-Chief Industry Officer of Ada, the National College for Digital Skills. Joysy was the youngest person selected into the Future Leader Development Programme at JP Morgan Chase.
She left her banking career to change education after spending a decade across Singapore, US and UK. She helped launch three non-profits focused on education. She actively shaped edtech policy as part of the Department of Education’s Edtech Leadership Group and Welsh Government’s expert panel on Schooling Reimagined. Her commitment to innovation in education earned her an MBE in the King’s birthday honours. The Financial Times recognised her as the Top 100 Most Influential Black Asian Minority Ethnic leaders in UK Tech in 2019.
Joysy holds a Computer Engineering (Honours) degree from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, and an MBA (with Distinction) from London Business School. She contributes to various educational committees and organisations, including The Royal Society, BCS (The Chartered Institute for IT), and Foundation for Education Development. Joysy serves as a Governor at Coventry University and St George’s Primary School and is a Trustee at Voice 21. She is also the founder of the Startup Leadership Program in the UK.
For over a decade, Dr Sarah Bearchell has been working to make science more accessible to students with special educational needs and disabilities. The key to Inclusive Science lies in making activities multi-sensory and hands-on, which means everyone can access them on their own terms.
When Sarah takes these activities to science festivals, they help her to make connections with her audience, and suddenly, science feels more welcoming.
In The Cloud Factory, Sarah will give a small group of volunteers from the audience a chance to use all their senses to touch, see and hear clouds as they are made from dry ice. These tiny clouds will even smell and taste interesting when we add in some unusual laboratory reagents!
About Sarah
Dr Sarah Bearchell is a freelance science writer, presenter and trainer based in Oxfordshire. She creates multi-sensory science activities, aiming to engage the whole audience at schools and festivals.
This Inclusive Science earned her the 2014 Joshua Phillips Award for Innovation in Science Engagement and the 2024 Beetlestone Award for Leadership and Legacy in Informal Science Learning. Sarah also writes about science for adults and children – encouraging everyone to get involved with science.
Why do animals look the way they do? Why are some groups of animals so diverse, like birds and insects, while other closely related groups, like crocodiles, have very few species that all look quite similar? Anjali Goswami’s team uses 3D images of thousands of diverse living and extinct animals to reconstruct the changes in their skeletons over hundreds of millions of years and identify the major factors that shape their evolution.
Some of the most fascinating comparisons in evolution come not from natural selection but from artificial selection, or breeding, and that is the comparison between cats and dogs. Both species have been living alongside humans for thousands of years, and have been under heavy selection for different traits. Yet, cats have changed relatively little from their wildcat ancestor, while dogs have exploded into a huge range of forms.
Does this mean that dogs are better than cats? Anjali argues that one reason why cats have stayed the same for so long, despite the best efforts of breeders, is because they are simply so well evolved as ideal hypercarnivores.
Sure, dogs might be your best friend, but deep down inside, we all know that cats are perfect.
About Anjali
Prof Anjali Goswami is a research leader in evolutionary biology at the Natural History Museum, London and an honorary professor of palaeobiology at University College London. She is also president of The Linnean Society of London, where Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution was first presented in 1858.
Anjali grew up around Detroit, Michigan (USA), but spent long periods of her life in India, where her love of nature was first sparked by seeing a tiger when she was 4 years old. She studied biology at the University of Michigan and conducted her PhD research on mammal evolution at the University of Chicago and the Field Museum of Natural History before moving to London to take up a research fellowship at the Natural History Museum. Before coming back to the Natural History Museum as a research leader, she lectured at the University of Cambridge and University College London.
Anjali specialises in the evolution of animal shape, especially skulls, and develops new mathematical approaches for reconstructing how and why animals look the way they do, now and in the past. She has led expeditions to search for fossils all over the world, especially India, Argentina, and Svalbard. She has won numerous awards for her work, including the Palaeontological Association’s President’s Medal, the Linnean Society’s Bicentenary Medal, the Zoological Society of London’s Scientific Medal, and HumanistUK’s Darwin Day Medal. She was elected to the fellowship of the Royal Society in 2024.
She is passionate about inspiring people around the world to explore, study, and protect nature and hopes everyone will get out and get their hands and feet dirty while learning more about this amazing planet we live on.
Dr Sally Le Page is a science presenter and producer who takes any opportunity to talk about biology, nature and the climate with her typical infectious enthusiasm. Her mission is to enrich everyone's lives with science stories whether or not they're scientists, in much the same way non-musicians still enjoy pop music.
Sally started her career over a decade ago making fun videos on YouTube about evolutionary biology from her shed. Since then she's made videos and documentaries all over the world, from talking about resilience while scuba diving over a Polynesian coral reef to explaining the science behind movies from a red carpet premiere in LA.
Moving into audio, she presented and produced BBC 5 Live Science and more recently was the host of the award-winning Hormones: The Inside Story and Genetics Unzipped podcasts. She also gives public lectures, delivers communication training and once threw 280 bananas into an audience as part of a stand-up routine. As a recovered academic, she has a PhD in watching fruit flies having sex and cannibalising each other (not at the same time, she hastens to add).
Newham Bookshop will be on hand from 18:30 to provide you with the very best books by, for or about women in STEM, along with books to inspire children, including some of the Tara Binns series. You'll be able to browse the books whilst enjoying a drink from the bar, so make sure you come along early!
Author Lisa Rajan will also be available to sign copies of her children's book, Tara Binns - Bright Spark Scientist.
When Tara Binns opens up her dressing up box something exciting happens…
Tara Binns finds herself in a science lab – and she’s one of the scientists! The team are working against the clock to complete and submit research for a competition that will, if they win, allow them to remain open. But where has the lead scientist disappeared to, and will they be able to complete the experiment in time without her?
Lisa Rajan wrote the Tara Binns books to inspire more girls to channel their curiosity and imagination into STEM careers. Scientist, engineer, palaeontologist, astrona
ut, coder, vet, volcanologist, marine biologist, inventor... Tara Binns gives them all a go and has fantastic adventures while doing so. She tackles current challenges in AI, robotics, biodiversity, climate change, habitat conservation, renewable energy, plastic biodegradation, maglev and deep sea exploration - and learns teamwork and persistence at the same time.
There are 18 books, published in the HarperCollins Big Cat reading scheme, helping 7-10 yos with literacy and reading progression. The mission behind the books is to broaden horizons and show as many girls as possible that STEM is most definitely for them. Available from tarabinns.com, bookshops or on Amazon.