The ATOM Science Festival was on today and included about twenty interactive stalls on Abingdon Market Place.

The Science Market included many companies with local facilities. This company was demonstrating how some chemicals grow into crystals. They research and develop chemical compounds that treat disease.

This company was demonstrating how the PH or acidity of a liquid could be changed by adding dry ice.

One Planet Abingdon was there, warning of the climate crisis and giving people practical steps to help. They had a pledge bag where people could pick out a pledge somebody had left and then leave another for somebody else.

This stall was a Science education company and had lots of interactive activities.

There were also activities in the museum and talks at the Guildhall.

A two-part talk was at the Amey Theatre at Abingdon School in the evening. David Miles spoke about some of the forgotten heroes in the development of vaccines.

Then Professor Frank Close spoke on the discovery of the Higgs field and the Higgs Boson particle. Peter Higgs (and others) proposed the existence of the field and particle in 1964, which was demonstrated by the CERN particle accelerator in 2012.  Professor Close has written a book, Elusive, which details the elusive Higgs Boson particle that is behind the Higgs field, and the elusive character of Peter Higgs, who went missing when it was announced he had won the Nobel Prize in 2013. (As I understand it, the movement of elementary particles, such as electrons and quarks, through the Higgs field gives such particles mass, without which they could not combine to make atoms. Higgs Boson particles are behind the Higgs field and have been detetected by smashing particles at CERN to produce very high temperatures.)

There is a further talk on Wednesday by Professor Jim Al Khalili. See https://www.atomfestival.org.uk/2023-programme/.