OISF 2018

We had a new look for the Year of Young People. Generous support from the Year of Young People Event Fund gave the programme an added freshness and originality.

BUT OH MY LOVE! THE CHAIN OF TIME The story was that of the Irish mathematician Sir William Rowan Hamilton, and the music came from three Irish musicians – singer/composer Lorcán Mac Mathúna, fiddle player Daire Bracken and

One of the highlights was Nobel Laureate Sir Paul Nurse (2001, Physiology/Medicine) in conversation with Dave Gray of BBC Radio Orkney. Another one was a dramatised lecture about the life of Paul Dirac, pioneer of quantum theory and arguably,

How far can a model car run on hydrogen? You start by connecting up the leads and seeing the hydrogen come bubbling up out of water – and oxygen too. And it was a day when you could make

Are inspired by the selkie folklore, shape-shifting beings and their transformative powers. In order to shapeshift they had to cast off their sealskins. Within these magical skins lay the transformative power to return to seal form, and therefore to the sea.

Sung by Sheena Wellington and the composer, Lorcán Mac Mathúna, The Walls of Dublin rounded off Like the Corn Cut Down by the River, the story of the battle of Clontarf...

Orkney International Science Festival 2018 This was the year when the numbers took off further than ever. There were over 200 people to hear Rachel Dowse’s talk on starlings, and for the genetics day with Jim Wilson

Music from Ireland, astronomy from Uzbekistan, newly created art and design, and young people to the fore – these will all be features of this year’s Orkney International Science Festival in a special package for the Year of Young People 2018.

There’s an opening lunch of Orkney seafood to follow the session on sustainable fisheries research, and the afternoon looks at further aspects of the sea for the future.