Citizen Science

Plants are able to produce a plethora of valuable chemicals that we use every day in food, fragrances and medicine. The secret to this ability lies in their genes. How are plants making these chemicals? How can we use the last advances in DNA sequencing and synthetic biology to uncover how they are made? In this talk, we’ll explore the answers to these questions, and discuss the implications for the future discovery of novel chemistries and medicines.

If someone answered your questions with short incoherent replies, attempts to change the topic, or just silence, they’d probably seem rude or stupid. A police officer might even think they were suspicious. But these are some features of communication with young people with developmental language disorder (DLD). Youth with DLD might even attempt to hide their needs, wanting to fit in. I’ll describe our investigations into how DLD affects our perceptions of young people, how youth with DLD camouflage their needs, and why this matters.

Light is a major environmental input for plants, controlling both growth and development. We can use something called "photobiology" to manipulate plant light responses and target desirable traits, especially within fully controlled environments found in Vertical Farms. Phoebe Sutton presents the need for this technology, evidence of the feasibility, and demonstrates how it can be distributed within cities of the near future.