The European Biotech Week of 2013 was highlighted at Finland’s Science Education Centre LUMA with a variety of activities including workshops, themed articles and an on-line competition.
LUMA offered plenty of activities during the Eruopean Biotech Week from September 30th to October 4th 2013.
Interactive workshops were organized every evening at Chemistry Lab Gadolin and the LUMARTS laboratory at LUMA Centre Aalto to introduce teachers to practical and engaging biotechnology experiments. Workshop topics included building a functional electrophoresis machinery from simple kitchenware, biochemical separation and filtering techniques for milk and microbiology approaches to enzyme production.
An on-line competition was launched with a multiple-choice question on biotechnology appearing daily. Questions were designed to engage young people into thinking about everyday applications of biotechnology.
In addition, biotechnology-themed articles were published in the Finnish-language LUMA-sanomat webmagazine to support teachers with up-to-date information and to provide source material for classroom use. Featured articles emphasized Finnish biotechnology know-how and innovations ranging from the dairy industry to cutting edge research on personalized cancer treatments based on gene sequencing and high-throughput screening of potential drug compounds.
Text: Maija Pollari.