Public Engagement

My foremost motivation for pursuing a career in science was (and still is) to understand the world in new and unexpected ways, and to share with everybody the beauty of a world that is rarely as it appears to be. Here is an overview of my foray into this adventure with all the scientists out there who didn't know they were scientists.

I designed a stall (with help from Sarah Finnegan, Cristian Vagnoni, and Adrian Gray) to showcase a few of the fundamental computational principles of brain function through the use of visual, audio, and tactile illusions. We covered topics such as adaptation, motion detection, sound localisation, and saccades. We also demonstrated the electrical nature of nerve signals using a Human-to-Human Interface (from Backyard Brains).
The SSS superseded the Wow! How? events at OU MNH, and I designed another activity session on stereo vision and depth perception. I made an anaglyphic 3D tour of the museum using homemade footage from 3 simultaneously mounted cameras. Museum visitors could navigate through the tour, increasing/decreasing their sense of depth by selecting which pairs of cameras to look through. We also had a cyclops cup-and-ball game (tricky to do with just one eye!), a Pullfrich effect demo, 3D digital models of various animal brains, accompanied by skulls for the same animals that were part of the Museum's collections. Done in collaboration with Betina Ip, Sarah Finnegan and Ivan Alvarez.