Welcome to Young Scientists

Young Scientists is a free online journal for scientists aged 12-20. We publish articles on a wide range of science and technology subjects. Whether you have done research or have an opinion on a major issue of the day we what to hear from you. Even if you don’t feel like writing for us why not make a video or talk with other young scientists on the forum. We look forward to hearing from you soon.

Young Scientists Team

How it all began...

In January of 2006 Professor Ghazwan Butrous (Head Scientist at Pfizer) approached Christina Astin (then Head of Science at King’s School Canterbury) with an idea. The idea was for a Journal that would be written by Young Scientists for Young scientists. A place where people could share ideas and the leading minds of tomorrow would sharpen their talents.
Shortly after Malcolm Morgan (then pupil at King’s) was brought onto the team and with a small group of students Young Scientists was formed.

Info for students

Our aims are to establish communication between pupils in schools across the world on issues about science which are relevant to us. At the moment, editing and web design has been done by a small group of pupils in the UK and Denmark. We started work commissioning and collating articles in January 2006, and this first issue was launched in June. We also hope that pupils in schools all around the world will see what we are doing and take part by contributing articles, reviews, etc about science they are interested in, or even research they are involved in at school.

Info for teachers and other facilitators

Hi – thanks for visiting! I'm very proud of the work that our team at King's has achieved, amid all their schoolwork, since starting with an idea in January 06. However, we feel we are only just at the beginning of something which could grow and grow and would love to tap into a wider source of pupil participation. We hope that we will inspire pupils elsewhere in the UK and beyond, to contribute. If you have pupils in your school, or contacts with schools, who would like to get involved in our project and would like to know more, please email me at cma@kings-school.co.uk. Email me too if you would like to get involved yourself as an advisory editor by helping the pupil editors with the science content of the articles. The project is supported by the Butrous Foundation and we hope that if we can widen participation across different schools and even different countries we might, with the Foundation’s help, be able to stage a Young Scientists conference in Canterbury in a couple of years’ time. If you are in a position to help promote this sort of science communication among young people please contact the Butrous Foundation, which is looking to appoint some senior fellows for this role. We owe much thanks to Ghazwan Butrous for his initial idea, his on-going suggestions and future support.

Christina Astin,
Chief Advisory Editor

Introduction from Professor Butrous

It gives us great pleasure to see this journal online. The beautiful way these young people wrote the first issue of Young Scientists is very rejuvenating. Sir Peter Medawar, the British biologist and Nobel Prize winner wrote in his book “Advice to a Young Scientist” that “no one actively engaged in scientific research ever thinks of himself as old”.

There is a lot to discover in nature, nature is an endless museum of art but not everyone sees all its beauties (to paraphrase Confucius). So there is a lot to discover. Richard Feynman, the well know American physicist, the writer of many books in physics like “Six easy pieces” and “Six not so easy Pieces” wrote: “The imagination of nature is far, far greater than the imagination of man”. So the horizon is open for more work in the field of science and to enjoy the beauty of nature. We hope for our young writers to endeavour in this journey of discovery and this new online journal will provide a platform of their creativity. Creativity does not know age, sex or colour. It is inherent in human being; it is equitably distributed to all human gifts. Creatively in science does not always need a previous knowledge; you only need to start looking for multiple solutions and give yourself permission to be playful and inquisitive, flexible and versatile. It is important to think clearly and logically, but even the latter can restrain many great ideas. Challenging the normal status quo is vital in today‘s science. Dalai Lama the spiritual leader of the Tibetan Buddhism and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize revealed that modern thinking can limit our ability to deal with certain realities. He said “It's a bit like you've lost something and you decide that the object is in this room. Once you have decided this, then you've already fixed your parameters; you've precluded the possibility of its being outside the room or in another room. You keep on searching and searching, but you are not finding it, yet you continue to assume that it is still hidden somewhere in the room!"Without creative vision, there would be no truly original ideas to verify in the laboratory. A hundred years ago the idea of relativity by Einstein challenged the way physicists think; time is not any more constant parameter. The essay of “Robert Watson” in this issue of YSOL makes us rethink of the importance of hydrogen bond, and how ignorant we have been in all these years as we took as a fact. The way Robert explained its importance trigger our thinking and may stimulate more researches. Today science is a very well organized discipline, we need facts, and facts have to be established by what we call “Scientific Method”, based on valid experiments and rigours observations. These are necessary to alleviate human bias and emotion. But even with these scientists have to use the process of speculation and thinking to interpret the results. Here is where a clear and creative mind will come. Millions of peoples have seen the apple falls, this is a well established observation but very few asks the obvious, why does it fall? One mind, Sir Isaac Newton aggressively pursued a solution to this simple “obvious” question. Thus asking simple questions can be more difficult to answer and very few people have the courage to ask them. We hope that this journal will be a forum for the young to have the courage to challenge and ask more questions that may lead to some form of hypothesis and even scientific advances. We don’t need high technical laboratories to reach great discoveries; you need persistence, common sense with an open mind. The discovery of the double helix of DNA is just an example of this notion. Despite all the findings with crystallography and protein analysis, creative thinking was the main tool for two young scientists sitting in a very low technical space to decipher one of the most important phenomenon of the modern biology. Another example can be found in an article by “Kate Roberts” in this issue of YSOL on the discovery of Penicillin which saved the lives of millions. We therefore should not underestimate creative young minds and their role in the advancement of science. We always have that vision in the Butrous Foundation and all that they need is a platform to nourish that. We believe that this journal will serve that mission and will help to show and enhance the scientific creativity and communication skills to inspire them to reach their full potential and to be role models for the next generation. We also aim to promote the ideals of co-operation, the interchange of knowledge and ideas and the application of science and its role in global society and culture. The foundation is therefore very committed to support and sustain the development of this journal not only for The King’s School pupils who started the project but also all local and worldwide pupils in other countries. We are convinced that the key to the future is to enable young people to have a genuine share in science where their imagination and their contributions are truly valued. This means building working partnerships between science in schools and the wider world of science, engineering and technology in the community. We would like to thank all the pupils who have been involved in the project from The King’s School Canterbury in the UK for their excellent contributions. Their enthusiasm, commitment and interest for publishing the first issue of the journal in a very short period of time. We cannot finish this note without the special thanks and gratitude to Miss Christina Astin, the Head of Science at King’s who shared our vision in this venture, her enthusiasm and hard work made this journal a reality. Christina has shown an exemplary leadership and infused the enthusiasm and commitments in her six former pupils to get this work started and to finish it before the end of this academic year. The outcome and success of this venture is her real testimony; and without Christina’s work this venture will not have been possible.

Ghazwan and Mouna Butrous
 

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