Boatanist

Have you ever wondered what happens to all the plastic we use in our day to day lives after we throw it away? Recently scientists have started to realise quite how much of it is getting into our seas and oceans. Thanks to Adventurers and Scientists for Conservation all of the teams in the Great Pacific Race will be collecting a few samples of Pacific Ocean water so that researcher in the Marine Environment Research Institute, Maine (USA) can test how much plastic has made it'

When I'm teaching Leaving Certificate river studies we do an experiment to measure the river's velocity. It's very simple: just time how long a tennis ball takes to float 10m (and repeat a few times to improve the accuracy of the result). Here's what happened when I used a #GoPro to get a 'tennis ball's eye view' of the river bed! It's the River Liffey up in its middle course on Kippure Estate. Here the river is shallow and it's safe to get in and do the experiment, but you c

Sure, nothing to do with boats or rowing, but pretty damn cool science all the same! This is my friend Erin Jo, who works in the Botany Department here at TCD, talking about her research on bees. She's looking in to the effects of toxins in the nectar of the flowering plant Rhoodendron on insect pollinators. Rhododendron in an invasive species in Ireland - you may well have seen it in parks, gardens and wild landscapes with it's very distinctive purple flowers. Did you know t