Imperial student wins national science communication competion

Imperial College’s Leon Vanstone has been crowned the UK’s FameLab champion 2013. In this annual hunt for the nation’s best science communicators, each contestant has exactly three minutes to impress a panel of three judges. They may explain any scientific concept but cannot use assisting slides or large props. This year the standard was very high and Leon didn’t expect to beat the other ten finalists. However he won over the judges with his truly genuine enthusiasm when describing the landing of NASA’s Mars Curiosity Rover.

Leon’s early interest in rockets and engines led him to study Aeronautical Engineering. His PhD is on hypersonics, which involves studying how fluids (including air) travel over objects at high speed. He has use of a wind gun on campus which fires air at an incredible 1.5km/s albeit for only 6milliseconds at a time.

But Leon hasn’t always been a scientist; he spent an unfulfilling year in financial services and has three suits to show for it. However it was in an orange skull-and-cross-bones t-shirt, jeans and “skaties”, that he triumphed in London last month.

As an Outreach Postgraduate Ambassador for Imperial College, Leon has extensive science communication experience garnered from a diverse range of presentations and demonstrations (in one such demo he set his hand on fire which was exciting but something he wouldn’t want to repeat). He believes that you must always explain science to the best of your knowledge. You must always think of your audience. And if you reach the edge of your understanding, admit it. He also stresses that science communication isn’t just about the big stage. It’s about talking to friends and family about what you do. It’s about explaining climate change to the person in the street. But wanting to do it and taking the time and effort to do it well-- that’s what makes the difference.

For more information visit http://famelab.org/