News

Student trip to Honduran paradise

In the wake of the tragic explosion in a Bali nightclub last summer and increased tension surrounding international terrorism, this year's Biological Sciences field trip to the Indonesian coral reefs was reorganised at the last minute by marine biologist Dr Dave Smith.

For the last two years Dr Smith has led a group of undergraduate marine and environmental biology students to the remote islands of Indonesia where they were able to step straight out of lectures into the forest and coral reef to apply theory to the real environment. At the last moment however, this year's trip was cancelled due to Foreign Office advice and Dr Smith hurriedly had to find a new location.

Dr Smith said: 'It was definitely a tough job. By January 2003 we still hadn't found anywhere for the students to go and the trip was supposed to be in March! I checked out a site in Cuba, then, we discovered Honduras.'

The 28 students who went to Honduras

The group of 28 students and four members of staff jetted off to the Caribbean on 12 March. After a brief stop in Miami they arrived at El Paraiso on the border between Honduras and Guatemala where they spent a week studying in the rainforest. From the rainforest they went on to Cusuco, to visit a 2000m high 'cloud' forest. The students then spent a night in the port of La Ceiba before sailing to Cayos Cochinos, a group of two idyllic islands and 11 sandy cays, in the Caribbean. Five days of compulsory dive training set them up for a week of lectures, practicals and research studies both in and out of the clear blue waters.

Dive training

Dr Smith said: 'It was really sad not to be able to return to Indonesia where we had got to know so many of the scientists and local people, but Honduras more than lived up to expectations.'

An exciting new relationship between Essex and the Honduran scientists is now flourishing, and the Cayos Cochinos marine port will be sponsoring two MSc students to carry out field work in Honduras on turtle biology and coral reef ecology.

Dr Smith added: 'We'll be returning to Honduras next year, but after that, who knows. As soon as the Foreign Office lifts the recommendation that travellers should avoid Indonesia, we hope to return. The marine environment in Indonesia is the most diverse in the world but the terrestrial environment in Honduras is also fantastic, so we may even look into two separate trips in the future.'

Students studying the rainforest 

He added: 'Because of the nature of the Caribbean, as a holiday destination, the environment has seen some damage due to human activity, something we hadn't seen in the remote Indonesian islands. Therefore our work in Honduras is likely to have a much more immediate, positive affect as we help tackle the everyday problems the local scientists face.'

Dr Smith continued: 'Thanks to these field trips Essex has a growing reputation for its expertise in marine and terrestrial tropical biology. We now have ten graduates working in tropical marine bases around the world which is great considering this is only the third year we've offered this trip.'

Recycle your pots and pans!

This is the plea from the Green Alternative Society who are appealing to all final-year students to donate any of their unwanted items to new students.

The 'No waste graduation project' was started last year by the Society to collect unwanted items such as stationary, crockery and cutlery from final-year students. These items were then cleaned and stored so they could be given out free to new students during the Fresher's Fair – saving them money and stopping these items from ultimately ending up in landfill sites.

This year the society has enlisted the help of the Students' Union and Clubs and Societies Officer, Charlotte King, to make the project even bigger. However due to the lack of storage and the popularity of the project last year the Society has had to find alternative storage space and thanks to a University-wide appeal a member of staff has kindly agreed to lend their garage as storage space during the summer.

If you have any unwanted items, the Society will be collecting any unwanted items in Square 3 on the following dates: 29 May, 5, 12, 19 and 26 June. During the following dates the Society will be collect items near Keynes Tower and Harwich and Alresford Court: 4, 11, 18 and 25 September. Please contact Yoshimoto Ishida, e-mail yishid@essex.ac.uk for more information.

Experts explain intellectual property

Experienced patent agents highlighted ways of protecting and exploiting intellectual property at a seminar organised by the Research and Business Development Office (RBDO).

Speakers at the IP seminar. Photographed by Michael Sansom

An audience of more than 35 staff and students from the University attended the seminar last month, which was sponsored by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC).

Delegates were introduced to the different types of intellectual property and some issues specific to the fields of biotechnology, software and databases. The speakers were Alan Eklid and Peter Wilson from i.p.21 Ltd and Miles Holmes from Novagraaf.

Recognising that protecting intellectual property is only one stage in the process of commercialising research, Hugh Parnell, financial advisor to the ICENI seedcorn fund (www.iceni.com), outlined how funding can be sought to support the commercial exploitation of research.

David Richer, the former global Head of Intellectual Property for Aventis CropScience, assured delegates that a win:win relationship between university and industry can be achieved to exploit knowledge and research, if some basic principles are followed.

The final speaker, Donald Mair, from the BBSRC, provided an overview of the some of the government initiatives supporting the exploitation of research and stressed the government's increasing desire to see a return on investment in publicly funded science research.
Janice Pittis, from the RBDO, said plans are underway to organise a similar event in collaboration with Business Link Essex in the autumn.

Also in the printed June edition of Wyvern:

• 'Legal Eagle' elected Chancellor
• New focus on Mathematical Sciences
• Around Essex