The project will offer the public the opportunity to participate in the mission’s science endeavours and will also provide researchers with spectacular close-up colour images of Jupiter, including the first detailed glimpses of the planet’s poles.

Professor Stan Cowley FRS, of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, is co-investigator on the Juno mission and was invited to participate through the theoretical work the team at Leicester has done on Jupiter's environment.  The Leicester team has been principally Professor Cowley, Dr Emma Bunce (now Reader in the Space Research Centre), and Dr Jonathon Nichols (now STFC Advance Fellow in Physics & Astronomy).

Pole position

Professor Cowley explains the University's involvement in the mission below:

“One of the main goals of the mission is to investigate the origins of the Jupiter's auroras for the first time from a polar-orbiting spacecraft. 

“Jupiter is surrounded by a huge region dominated by the planet's magnetic field, the magnetosphere, and the auroras are produced by large-scale electric current systems flowing between the magnetosphere and Jupiter's upper atmosphere, the ionosphere.  These currents, up to 100 million amps in total, transfer the spin momentum of the planet from the atmosphere to the magnetosphere, and are therefore fundamental to the dynamics of the outer environment. 

“Currents flowing out of the atmosphere along the magnetic field lines correspond to energetic electrons flowing in, and where these particles hit the top of the atmosphere they excite the atoms there to produce light - the aurora that we can "see" in ultra-violet light. 

The Jupiter Aurora. Credit: NASA and J. Clarke, University of Michigan

“So Juno will firstly detect the currents flowing through the magnetic effects they produce, secondly it will measure the accelerated particles flowing down (and up) the field lines carrying the current, and thirdly it will observe the resulting auroras that light up Jupiter's polar region. 

“Our contribution, early in the mission planning, was to make a quite detailed mathematical model of these processes, thus allowing estimates to be made of the expected properties - how big are the fields to be measured?  - how energetic are the current-carrying particles? - and so on.  Having at least some idea of the conditions likely to be encountered helps instrument teams have confidence that their designs are optimised for the job in hand.

“Other principal goals of the mission in which we are not directly involved, concern the internal structure of the planet, and probing deeply into the atmosphere using infra red and microwave emissions.”

The spacecraft is expected to arrive at Jupiter in July 2016. The Juno spacecraft -- the first to operate around an outer planet using solar power -- will orbit Jupiter’s poles 33 times, investigating the gas giant’s origins, structure, atmosphere and magnetosphere.

Not only do the schoolchildren have a fun and educational time, the day is also very popular with their teachers. While the many hands-on activities are fun for the students, the teachers pick up good ideas that can be incorporated into their own teaching.

Dynamic DNA 2011 was held on Wednesday 14th and Thursday 15th September. A total of 610 students and 42 teachers visited GENIE and to facilitate and demonstrate all the display and hands-on activities a large team of some 50 GENIE helpers is needed. These include undergraduates, postgraduates, postdoctoral researchers and academic and support staff, not just from the Department of Genetics; this year the team welcomed GENIE demonstrators from Biochemistry, Geology, Infection, Immunity and Inflammation and the MRC Toxicology Unit.

If you would like more information about Dynamic DNA, please contact Dr Cas Kramer, GENIE Outreach and Public Engagement Coordinator (ck53@le.ac.uk). 

After working as a doctor in the UK and the Gaza Strip, Sir Iain was director of the National Perinatal Epidemiology Unit for 14 years before founding the UK Cochrane Centre, where he was director for a further decade. The Cochrane Centre promotes international collaboration within health research and in 1993 launched the Cochrane Collaboration, which the Lancet described as “an enterprise that rivals the Human Genome Project in its potential implications for modern medicine."

Since 2003, Sir Iain (who was knighted for services to healthcare in 2000) has co-ordinated the James Lind Initiative* which consists of three main units:

• The James Lind Library explains and illustrates the rationale for, and characteristics of, fair tests of healthcare interventions.
• The James Lind Alliance promotes research priority setting partnerships of patients, carers and clinicians.
• The UK Database of Uncertainties about the Effects of Treatments pretty much does what it says on the tin.

The public lecture, which is free and open to all, takes place at 5.30pm on Tuesday 4 October 2011 in the Frank and Katherine May Lecture Theatre in the Henry Wellcome Building.

*James Lind was an 18th century doctor who demonstrated through comparative studies that fresh fruit could prevent scurvy, one of the first examples of a properly conducted clinical trial.

One approach to take is a sociological perspective, which is why our Department of Sociology, in collaboration with the British Sociological Association’s Theory Study Group and the Social Theory Centre, University of Warwick, is convening a public symposium on the matter while it is still topical. The organisers are Dr Leah Bassel and Dr Ipek Demir from Leicester and Dr Gurminder K Bhambra from Warwick.

English ‘Riots’: Civic Responses and Sociological Perspectives will be held at the Birmingham and Midland Institute in the centre of Birmingham on 15 October 2011. The line-up of speakers includes:

• Rob Berkeley, The Runnymede Trust
• Sam Farooq, University of Gloucester
• Maxie Hayles, Maxie Hayles International Consultancy
• Ajmal Hussain, London School of Economics
• Malcolm James, London School of Economics
• Alana Lentin, University of Sussex
• Sajida Madni, Birmingham Citizens
• Heidi Safia Mirza, Institute of Education
• Karim Murji, The Open University
• Nina Power, University of Roehampton
• John Solomos, City University London

The event runs from 10.30am to 5.30pm. Attendance costs £10 (concessions £5, plus a few free places for those unable to pay) to be paid on the door by cash or cheque. The symposium is open to anyone but places are limited so please contact birmingham15october2011@gmail.com to reserve your place.

He also explored the relevance of hate crime scholarship and policy in the context of the recessional climate and cuts to public spending, calling for a re-evaluation of the way in which hate crime has come to be stringently associated with specific forms of victimisation based upon one-dimensional interpretations of identity.

The event on the 26-28 September was held as part of a broader project – entitled ‘When Law and Hate Collide’ – which is designed to provide the European Parliament with a working definition of hate crime and accompanying policy guidance to ensure legislative consistency across all member states of the European Union.

It brought together a collective of international hate crime experts from the disciplines of criminology, law, psychology and philosophy, and was part of a series funded by the Daphne III Programme of the European Union and led by the University of Gothenburg, the Goethe Institute Frankfurt, and the University of Central Lancashire. 

On the positive side the vast majority of people now believe cancer is curable. There was, however, widespread over-emphasis on environmental pollution, stress and injury as triggers for cancer, and a lack of awareness about the roles diet, obesity and lack of exercise play in the development of the disease.

Views of the impact of religious beliefs, alternative medicine and surgery were also assessed. Professor Paul Symonds and PhD student Karen Lord of the Department for Cancer Studies and Molecular Medicine explain that the way patients understand cancer can have a major impact on how they cope with it psychologically and stress the importance of continual education into the causes of cancer.

• University Press Release

They go on to argue that in response to this crisis people have started to disentangle their social reproduction from the dynamics of the reproduction of capital.

Dr David Harvie is a Senior Lecturer in Finance and Political Economy and Dr Keir Milburn is a Lecturer in Political Economy and Organisation in our School of Management.

The researchers surveyed over 2,000 people through an online YouGov survey and made a further estimate that over 1 million people personally know someone who has been scammed.

Romance scams have become increasingly reported in the media; criminals will set up fake identities using stolen photographs (often of models or army officers) and pretend to develop a romantic relationship with their victim. This is often done using online dating sites and social networking sites.

At some point during the relationship they pretend to be in urgent need of money and ask for help. Investigations by the Serious Organised Crime Agency have seen financial losses experienced by victims of online romance scams of between £50 and £240,000.   Scammers’ victims also suffer what is effectively a bereavement, from the loss of a relationship they believed to be genuine. Law enforcement agencies have long believed that victims often do not report being scammed and this research adds weight to that argument.

The study is believed to be the first formal academic analysis to measure the scale of this growing problem.

• University Press Release

It’s timely then that Peter Davies has published his book Museums and the Disposal Debate, bringing together experts from leading museums and heritage organisations with their thoughts on managing collections responsibly.

Peter Davies is the Cultural Policy Advisor for Canterbury City Council, and you’ll find him very active on Twitter. He also studied with our School of Museum Studies by distance learning, receiving a PGdip in 2009.

Programme Director for Art Museum and Gallery Studies Dr Janet Marstine has also contributed a quote for cover jacket:

Museums and the Disposal Debate is published by MuseumsEtc in October, priced at £49.95 or £89.95 in hardback.

Beethoven wrote four different overtures for Fidelio, his only opera, and although many people consider the third one (known as Lenore Overture No.3) to be the best musically, it was so powerful that it overwhelmed the subsequent opening scene. So a fourth overture was premiered in 1814, at a performance which famously included among its audience an utterly enthralled teenager named Franz Schubert. It is this fourth overture which the KCO will perform.

Mozart’s Symphony No.25 in G Minor, K 183, was one of six symphonies which Wolfgang knocked out in 1773, allegedly completed just two days after the Symphony No.24. In fact the complete Kochel catalogue of Mozart’s works lists 31 compositions for 1773. The man was a machine!

Finally there is Brahms’ only violin concerto which dates from 1878 and was premiered on New Year’s Day 1879 in Leipzig with the composer conducting. This work is always a challenge for any soloist. Indeed, the legendary Polish violinist Henryk Wieniawski called it “unplayable” – but Tamsin Waley-Cohen will prove him wrong!

Waley-Cohen last performed with the KCO back in July and it’s a pleasure to welcome her back to the Fraser Noble Hall. The orchestra will be conducted as ever by Dr Paul Jenkins, Senior Lecturer in Organic Chemistry.

The concert takes place at Fraser Noble Hall on London Road on Saturday 8 October 2011; tickets are £8/£6, eyes down for a full house at 7.30pm. If you’re busy on Saturday night, the KCO and Waley-Cohen are performing the same programme the previous evening at Enderby Parish Church.

Now Professor Tobin has led a second study with the University of Nottingham and U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences that identified genetic variants associated with the health of the human lung.  They were part of an international consortium of 175 scientists from 126 centres in Europe, the USA and Australia.

Their discovery of sixteen new sections of the genetic code that relate to lung health sheds new light on the molecular basis of lung diseases like Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD).

Earlier in the week saw the discovery of five new genes that affect risk of developing coronary artery disease (CAD) and heart attacks by another international team. Professor Nilesh Samani, British Heart Foundation Professor of Cardiology in our Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, was the co-principal investigator for this study with the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge.

• University press releases:

New discoveries in genetics of lung health  

New genes identified for coronary artery disease and heart attacks

There is an edited audio recording of the debate which runs about 73 minutes and this is also available to download as an MP3. The multi-camera video recording runs about an hour and there are four separate, short ‘talking head’ video clips of our distinguished experts.

Or you can read journalist Liz Lightfoot’s report on the event, to which are attached all the above. One of our panellist, Dr Philip Cook, has also posted his own Reflections on an exciting and enlightening debate.

Wtahc out for news of our next Leicester Exchanges event, coming soon.

Bali Rai, author of (Un)arranged Marriage, Booker Prize-winning Alan Hollinghurst and poet/journalist/novelist Colm Tóibín are among the authors who will be discussing their work at the event.

Biographer Hermione Lee will chair a panel on literary biography featuring Professor Martin Stannard from our School of English, author of acclaimed biographies of Evelyn Waugh and Muriel Spark. Sarah Graham, who has written extensively on JD Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye, will discuss that book which is celebrating its 60th anniversary, while three other academics will look at how the lives of writers such as Byron, Wordsworth and Jane Austen have been depicted in films.

For poetry fans there’s Alan Jenkins, Ian Parks and the extraordinary ‘Sunris’/’Man to Pan’ in which Caribbean poets Grace Nichols and John Agard weave their separate works together into a single performance.

One of the most unusual events we have run since the launch of Literary Leicester in 2008 is ‘The future of the history of slang.’ Professor Julie Coleman is an expert on slang and has recently completed A History of Slang for OUP. She will be joined by lexicographer Jonathan Green whose three-volume Dictionary of Slang contains 110,000 words and phrases.

And for the younger readers, we are delighted to welcome the current Children’s Laureate Julia Donaldson – author of The Gruffalo – who will be reading from her work including her latest book Freddie and the Fairy. Rumour has it that the Gruffalo himself might make an appearance. (This event will be signed for the hearing impaired.)

All events are free but some require tickets which can be obtained in advance from Embrace Arts. Some of the authors will also be doing book signings.

Communication Matters National Conference

Day 2 of three-day conference on augmented and alternative communication (AAC).

• University of Leicester, More information

Tuesday 27 September 2011

Communication Matters National Conference

Day 3 - see above

Wednesday 28 September 2011

New Results in X-ray Astronomy

One-day workshop organised by the X-ray and Observational Astronomy Group.

• Charles Wilson Building, 10.00am, free (registration required), More information

Thursday 29 September 2011

Discovering Men's Sheds

One-day men's health conference organised by NIACE, Age UK, Men's Health Forum and the Institute of Lifelong Learning.

• Ramada Jarvis Hotel, Leicester, £75, 10.00am, More information

Friday 30 September 2011

Gwilym Simcock Trio

Leicester Jazz House presents.

• Embrace Arts, 8.00pm, £15, More information

Ongoing exhibitions

An(other) Story: Folk and tribal arts in India

Explores the diversity of Indian folk and tribal art styles and techniques, including Madhubani/Mithila, Gond, Warli, Patua scrolls and folk embroidery. 18 July - 30 September 2011

• Embrace Arts, free, More information

A Decade of Sculpture in the Garden

78 works by 64 artists, curated by Dr John Sydney Carter. 26 June - 30 October 2011.

• Botanic Garden, free (except on event days), More information

Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland University College was founded in 1921, changing its name formally to University College Leicester in 1927 and eventually becoming a full university in 1957. It is quite possible that Mr Draper is the last remaining graduate from our first decade, when the college was small with just a few hundred students.

Mr Draper taught Chemistry at Banbury Grammar School for 27 years before retiring in 1967. He is well known in the town for his paintings of local views, some of which are on show in Banbury Museum. Mr Draper has two sons, four grandchildren and two great grandchildren and now lives at Lake House, an Order of St John Care Trust home in Adderbury.

The University of Leicester sends a belated happy birthday to Mr Draper who gave this advice two years ago on reaching the age of 102: