03/2014

This March, over a years worth of planning came to fruition with the inaugural Atlanta Science Festival. A week long celebration of the science and scientists from all over the Georgia region.

The Festival was founded by Emory University, Georgia Institute of Technology and the Metro Atlanta Chamber. Two of the Centers for Chemical Innovation were integral to the success of the Festival. Meisa Salatia, EOD Director of the Center for Chemical Evolution was a founding member and Monya Ruffin, our own EOD Director, was the Chair for the Exploration Expo. We also had a visit from Andy Bedingfield, EOD Director of the Center for Sustainable Materials Chemistry, who participated in a Meet-A-Scientist Panel discussion.

From robots to frogs, from frogs to dinosaur bones, from dinosaur bones to how wine and beer are made and how tissue engineering allows meat to be made in vitro, the Atlanta Science Festival had a huge scope of exciting and engaging scientific presentations. Scientists were excited to be given the opportunity to talk about their science and the attendance to all of these events demonstrated how excited the public was to find out.

The Festival finished off the week with the Exploration Expo that brought many of these scientific perspectives together under one roof. Many participants from Emory and GA Tech and the two Centers were involved. The CCHF ran a Science Café, bringing together talks and demonstrations to show the excitement possible with Chemisty. With over 10,000 attendees to the Expo the excitement and enthusiasm was fantastic and all of the performers, scientists and experimenters put on a great show.

We look forward to next years Atlanta Science Festival!