The Future of Genomics

On Thursday evening I was in Bristol for a public debate on The Future of Genomics at Expore@Bristol. It was a special event to mark the opening of the new 'Inside DNA' exhibition they have there, and since I've always been interested in genetics I thought I'd go along.

Sir John Sulston kicked-off with a half hour or so talk about the state of play in genetics research, then the floor was opened. The lovely Alice Roberts (yes, her from off the telly) handled the session. The audience was filled with several experts on genetics and the ethics behind it, and some of the questions were quite good considering that it was a public event. Given current events there was some interest in biometrics and ID cards (which are all pointless as well as scary) and databases, plus genuinely interesting tidbits.

Interesting tidbit example - they think they now know why we're seeing a rise in peanut allergies, something that concerns me as I have one. It's possibly because creams containing peanut oil were used to treat eczema in the 70's and 80's, and the proteins being absorbed through the broken skin provoked the intolerance. This explains a lot - I had eczema as a child, so it all fits. They discovered this through the 'child of the 90's' study which is taking place in Bristol. It's the most detailed study of its kind in the world and has provided a lot of information so far, so yay for Bristol.

The exhibition is well worth checking out, as it all of @Bristol, of course. It's a shame that they closed the iMax though - hopefully it will reopen one day.

Routemasters and Shibboleth

I was in London over the weekend for a birthday party. A friend was 30 and hired a Routemaster bus to take us (along with a large amount of champagne) to watch the fireworks at Blackheath, then back to Victoria again for a slap-up feed at a Mexican restaurant. Much fun was had, and I don't think I've had quite so much champagne for some time!

Thankfully champagne doesn't seem to give me much of a hangover, so I didn't feel too bad on Sunday. I took the opportunity to catch-up with some friends while at the same time check out Shibboleth by Doris Salcedo at the Tate Modern. I must say that we were slightly underwhelmed - I expected something a bit wider and deeper I suppose, and while it was certainly long and looked strange in such a large space, it was less impressive than I thought it might be. Still, it was pretty busy so lots of people were obviously interested. In fact the whole place was probably about the busiest I've seen it.


After looking around at a few other things that were new since I was last there we headed off for lunch at Tas at The Cut. It's the second time that we've tried to get in to The Anchor And Hope (which is meant to be one of the best gastropubs in London) but had to go to Tas instead, but hopefully I'll get to try it one day...

Bath Film Festival

Today is the start of the 2007 Bath Film Festival, and for the next eleven days there are some quality films. Some caught my eye.

Beautiful Young Minds, an interesting looking documentary about a maths competition (well, I think it sounds interesting!) on Saturday. Rescue Dawn is another film about Vietnam, but most importantly it has Christian Bale in it. Has he ever been in a bad film? I don't think so. The Yacoubian Building is a film about life in central Cairo that looks good and is being shown on Sunday. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Monday) is the story of a man who suffers a stroke - sad, but it looks quite inspiring. Taxidermia appeals to my surreal side (just look at plot outline!) and is on Monday. The Killing Of John Lennon looks interesting, as do The Band's Visit and The Aura. I'd also like to catch Hearts and Minds, an Oscar-winning documentary about the Vietnam war which is still pretty relevant. There's also an evening of locally made short films on the 11th which looks good.

So, lots of films to see, or potentially see anyway. There are some others that I wanted to list but I don't want to just reel-off films as much as bring attention to the festival. It's all good!