The James Hutton Institute welcomed students from Webster’s High School as part of the Daffodil DNA project
Students from Webster’s High School, Kirriemuir who are taking part in the Daffodil DNA project co-ordinated by The James Hutton Institute and The University of Dundee, visited the Hutton’s Invergowrie campus to learn more about the opportunities open to them in science.
The young people enjoyed a tour of the facilities at the Hutton, including visits to the potting shed, glasshouses and laboratory.
At each place, Hutton staff spoke about their roles and their journey from school to their present position. Later in the day, other staff also gave presentations about their work so that students could get an understanding of the breadth of work they are involved in.
Dr Louise Gamble, High Health Plant Production Manager at the Hutton, who organised the visit said, “We have such great diversity of science at the Hutton and are grateful that we can share that. This was a great opportunity to give young people the chance to see what jobs in science really look like.
“We wanted the students to understand the importance of everybody’s role here, how everybody is equally important and everybody’s contribution has its own impact.”
More than 20 school across the UK, from Orkney to Jersey, are taking part in the Daffodil DNA project, working to obtain genetic data on daffodils, a very understudied, yet valuable genus. Alongside professionals and academics, the students are growing various daffodil varieties, extracting DNA from their leaves and using state-of-the-art Nanopore DNA sequencing, followed by bioinformatic analysis to assemble the genome of the chloroplast – the structure within the cells of plants that is the site of photosynthesis.
Lewis Coull, biology teacher at Webster’s High School said, “It was phenomenal to see real life applications of what they are doing at the Hutton. We have covered a lot of it in class, particularly potato blight, but it was really good to hear from someone who actively researches that.”
“We have such great diversity of science at the Hutton and are grateful that we can share that. This was a great opportunity to give young people the chance to see what jobs in science really look like.”
Dr Louise Gamble, The James Hutton Institute
Pupils Michael Ross (left) and Menite Okoye-John with Alison Dobson, Plant Production Technician in one of the glasshouses with plants under controlled lighting. Picture Paul Reid
Pupils L to R: Derya Ersoy, Emily Moore and Isabella Durston with Tracy Torrance in the Media Kitchen. Picture Paul Reid
Clare Macaulay, Sequencing and Genotyping Services with pupils Michael Ross and Lucia Watson. Picture Paul Reid
The project allows schools to develop long lasting relationships with scientists. Those taking part now have ownership of equipment such as a thermocycler, most commonly used to amplify segments of DNA, to allow other practical work beyond and in addition to this project. Access to a thermocycler was identified as a key opportunity missing in practical work by the Royal Society of Biology’s Education Research Group.
More information on the Daffodil DNA Project can be found here: The Daffodil DNA Project | Growing people, growing places: an enquiry into decoding Scottish daffodils
