Outreach

On Friday, 29 March 2019, the "Matheroes: Supermaterials, the materials of the future" were presented for a school class of students aged 11-12 (6è Primària) from Sabadell in the Ponent Library in Sabadell (Biblioteca de Ponent). Núria Crivillers, Juan-Luís García-Pomar and Anna May Masnou, presented some of the supermaterials and their properties and applications.

The ICMAB research is present at the 10th International Postgraduate and Continuous Training Forum in Madrid in the CSIC stand (5E01). The forum opens its doors on 28-30 March from 10 am to 8 pm. If you are a student and/or a professional in the education field, here you will find endless options to expand your academic education: masters, doctorates, postgraduate studies, or language schools, in business schools, educational centers, universities, or research centers.

On Wednesday, 27 March 2019, we received the visit of Engineering Undergraduate students from the Escola Universitària Salesiana de Sarrià (EUSS) (Salesian University School of Sarrià). The EUSS is a center afiliated to the UAB created in 1994 and located in Barcelona. Xavier Obradors gave a first overview to the ICMAB research and then the students could visit some of our labs.

On Monday, 18 March, the meeting "Science and Research in the Agenda 2030" (Ciencia e Investigación en la Agenda 2030) took place in La Moncloa (Madrid), with the President of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sánchez, Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities, Pedro Duque, and the High Comissioner for the Agenda 2030, Cristina Gallach. The CSIC President, Rosa Menéndez, participated in the event, and Mariano Campoy-Quiles, from ICMAB-CSIC, attented the event, together with 150 representatives of the science, research and innovation field in Spain. 

On Friday, 15 March 2019, the secondary school INS Mercè Rodoreda (Hospitalet de Llobregat) celebrated their "V Scientific Day" (V Jornada Científica) with scientific activities for their students, from 1st ESO to 2nd BTX. José Vidal-Gancedo, Reseracher at ICMAB, was one of the invited speakers. He had the big challenge of talking about "Organic radicals for biomedical applications" to 3rd and 4th ESO students. 

The CSIC Delegation in Catalunya wants to contribute to the promotion of scientific vocations in young girls, and facilitate the contact between them and the scientists from the nearby research centers. For this reason, an educational action in the framework of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science (11 February) is organized, consisting on school visits by some CSIC researchers, who will explain their research projects and their life as a scientist to primary school students.

From 7 to 11 February, Barcelona will be the City of Science. The Biennal Ciència i Ciutat will fill the city with activities related with science: talks, debates, roundables, exhibitions, etc. The ICMAB will also participate by collaborating in two roundtables about Chemistry and Health, and Chemistry and Bateries (8 Feb, Cosmocaixa). You cannot miss it! Take a look at the extense programme, there is something for you, for sure!

Xavier Obradors, ICMAB Director, gave a talk to the CMES group (Col·lectiu per a un Nou Model Energètic i Social Sostenible) on February 4, 2019. You can watch here the entire conference, which is on Youtube:

On Friday, 1 February 2019, students from the Centre d'Estudis Roca school, in Barcelona, came to the ICMAB to discover the materials of the future in solar energy! The visit consisted in a first talk from Mariano Campoy-Quiles, researcher at the ICMAB, followed by a visit to four different labs: SEM, XRD, AFM and NANOPTO labs. The visit is in the framework of the ESCOLAB programme of the Ajuntament de Barcelona. 

A broad and comprehensive review on thermoelectric materials has been published in "Materials Science and Engineering: R: Reports", a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Elsevier established in 1993 with an impact factor of more than 25! The review, with 47 pages, includes the participation of Mariano Campoy-Quiles and Bernhard Dörling from the ICMAB-CSIC, and 12 more institutions around the world (Italy, USA, UK, Germany, Sweden and Spain). 

Jordi Faraudo, researcher at the Materials Simulation and Theory Department from ICMAB, is the Guest Editor of this Special Issue of the MDPI Entropy journal devoted to "Thermodynamics and Entropy for Self-Assembly and Self-Organization". The Deadline for manuscripts submissions is 31 July 2019. 

On Wednesday, 12 June 2019, a new session on the "Quantum" exhibition at the CCCB. A session in which the lines of research of the ALBA Synchrotron that use quantum principles, and two experiments carried out, are presented as an example of the possibilities it has in this field. With Salvador Ferrer (ALBA), Gervasi Herranz (ICMAB), and Jordi Fraxedas (ICN2).

This year, the 17th edition of the "Fira Recerca en Directe", organized by the Parc Científic de Barcelona (PCB) in collaboration with Obra Social "la Caixa", will count with the participation of the "Superconducting and Large Scale Nanostructures" group (SUMAN), which will show, among others, the levitating superconducting train. The science fair will take place at CosmoCaixa on 6-9 March 2019.

The next edition of Pint of Science will take place on 20-22 May in many cities around Spain, including Barcelona.

Within the programme "A researcher in your classroom" (Un investigador a la teva aula), researchers from the ICMAB can spend a class at one secondary or primary school and show the students what it is like to be a scientist and the research in nanomaterials performed at our Institute. 

On Friday, 14 December 2018, 25 secondary school students from the "Escola Vedruna Gràcia" visited the ICMAB thanks to the ESCOLAB programme. The students, all from the scientific branch, could enjoy a talk on "Nanomaterials for nanomedicine" by Anna Laromaine, from the NN group, and then visiti some of our Scientific Services.

On Tuesday, 27 November 2018, we had a very special visit in our Institute: "the scientists" class formed by 24 six-year old students from "La Trama" school in Sabadell visited us. It was a fantastic visit. All the kids were very happy to become real scientists for a day, and to visit the laboratories, the clean room, the glove boxes, the microscopes and even to perform an X-ray diffraction experiment to discover what is sand made of. 

During two mornings, 12 and 13 November 2018, the ICMAB hosted the workshop for secondary school students "Become a materials detective" (Converteix-te en un detectiu de materials) to celebrate the Science Week 2018. Four classes of 2nd ESO from the IES Vallès (Sabadell) came to ICMAB by train and became scientists for a day. 

On Thursday 25 October, the students from 2n BTX from the "Col·legi Maristes de Montserrat" (Lleida) took the bus and came to our center to spend an afternoon learning about nanotechnology and supermaterials! They could enjoy the visit of the "Matheroes" exhibition, a talk from one of our researchers, and a visit to our installations.

Arántzazu González, Ramon y Cajal researcher at ICMAB and participant of the program "A Researcher in your classroom" was at two primary schools in November, in the framework of the "Science Week" to show the students what is a scientist and what type of research we do at the ICMAB.

On 26 October 2018, Anna Laromaine participated in the project "Ciencia y Tecnología en femenino", organized by the Asociación de Parques Científicos y Tecnológicos de España (APTE) and with the support of Bayer, which took place at the Barcelona Science Park (PCB). The project consisted of a whole morning of science talks, workshops and a visit to the exhibition "Women that changed the world" for secondary school students. 

A new book has just been released to the market. It is a science book about light, but not just that, it is a book about experiments to play with light "Descubriendo la luz: experimentos divertidos de óptica". Juan Luís García Pomar, researcher at ICMAB, is co-author of the book.. We have interviewed him to know more about the book and the interesting optical phenomena associated, such as invisibility! If you want to know more, continue reading!

On 15-16 November 2018, the members of the ICMAB Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) visited our Institute to scientifically evaluate the research lines and the overall performance of the Institute. In this year's visit, three research lines were evaluated: RL2: Superconductors for power applications; RL4: Molecular electronics; and RL5: Multifunctional nanostructured biomaterials.

The 4th conference on "Business Women" repeated enue in Vilanova i la Geltrú, on Friday, 26 October. Imma Ratera, researcher at the NANOMOL group at ICMAB, participated in a roundtable about the role of women in the modern society. 

The programme A researcher in your classroom "Un investigador a la teva aula" brought Imma Ratera, researcher at the NANOMOL group, to the secondary highschool INS Alba del Vallès, in Sant Fost de Campsentelles (Vallès Oriental) on 18 October 2018.

The dramatised reading "Madame Châtelet and her Instagram followers" will open this STEAM day, full of science and technology activities for girls, that will take place on Saturday, 17 November, in the "Biblioteca Vapor Badia" in Sabadell. After the "Châtelet" play, which features some female scientists of our history, a bunch of workshops will be hapenning. From ICMAB, Andrés Gómez will bring the "3D printing bridges" activity. 

This year, ICMAB will be present at EXPOMINER (9-11 November, Palau 1, Fira Barcelona), with more activities than ever! Come and listen to the amazing talks by our researchers on the color of minerals, boron for nanomedicine, quarts along our history, synchrotron radiation and magnetism! And in our stand, you will have the opportunity to play with cyrstals and diffraction, and visit the exhibiton "Matheroes: Supermaterials, the heroes of the future". Don't miss it!

From Monday 22 October the exhibition MATHEROES: Supermaterials, the hereos of the future will be at the ICMAB hall. During the days that the five Matheros will be here with us, some activities are organized: we will present the project to the UAB students, we will carry out a roundtable about the image of women in audiovisual content, and some of our researchers will offer guided visits for our support staff. 

On Saturday 29 September, the dramatised reading "Madame Châtelet and her Instagram followers", which features the life and discoveries of several women scientists throughout history, was represented in the Library "Biblioteca Sagrada Família", Barcelona, at 1 pm, in the framework of the activities of the European Researchers' Night (Nit Europea de la Recerca), organised in Catalonia. 

On Friday, 28 September 2018, the ICMAB and most of the research centers in Catalonia, Spain and Europe, celebrated the 2018 European Researchers' Night (named "Nit Europea de la Recerca" in Catalonia). The ICMAB was at CosmoCaixa Barcelona from 7 pm until 11 pm for a night of nanoscience and nanotechnology workshops and a talk on spin currents! 

On Wednesday, 5 September, the ICMAB staff could bring their children, their grandchildren, and even their nephews and nieces to spend a morning at our centre full of scientific activities for another edition of the Kids Day!

In the end, more than 75 kids of ages between 1 and 17 joined us! Many volunteers from the ICMAB helped out during the day, organizing the activities and taking care of the kids. Thank you all for your great collaboration and participation!

The European Researchers' Night (Nit Europea de la Recerca) is celebrated throughout Europe on the last Friday of September, with the aim of bringing science, research and technology closer to the public. In Catalonia, under the theme "Research, heritage of all", outreach activities will take place on Friday 28 and Saturday 29 September in Barcelona, ​​Tarragona, Lleida, Girona, Blanes and Vic, among other places.

The ICMAB will participate with some highschool talks on Friday morning, with a nanoscience workshop and a Speaker's Cornet talk in CosmoCaixa on Friday evening, and in the Biblioteca Sagrada Família on Saturday morning with "Madame Châtelet and her Instagram followers".

The "Societat Catalana de Química" (SCQ-IEC) organizes every year the contest on the best research chemistry projects for secondary school students (Premis als Treballs de Recerca de Batxillerat dins l'Àmbit de la Química). The award for the finalist students is a two-week scientific internship in a Catalan research center or university during July 2018. 

This year the ICMAB hosted seven (7) students from the program "Joves i Ciència" from Fundació Catalunya La Pedrera: Roger, Pilar, Antoni, Pere, Mariona, Anastasia and Arnau. They came to our Institute to do some research stays with some of our researchers, in the fields of spintronics, solar cells, superconducting materials, porous materials for energy, sustainable chemistry and crystallography. 

On Thursday, 5 July, the students participating at the ICFO School on Emerging Photovoltaics (2-6 July 2018) came to ICMAB from 3 to 6 pm to visit our research labs. The ICMAB researchers and PhD fellows guided the participants through the different labs and explained them the research performed in our Institute on photovoltaics, including organic solar cells, photonic crystals, perovskites, and oxide photovoltaic materials, and the equipment and facilities for materials characterization.