GPlantS & society

Public understanding of science is essential to promote science literacy, creativity and critical analysis. At GPlantS, we have been strongly engaged in science communication to the society, not only to inform about the research we conduct, but also to help demystifying wrong concepts about scientific issues (e.g.: GMOs). In these initiatives we have been counting with the involvement of several of our team members.

Some of the activities include:

• Open days of ITQB and other ITQB initiatives for science dissemination (demonstrations, debates, seminars)
• Science in schools and “Ciência Viva” initiatives (seminars, debates, projects and simple experiments, easy to organize using school facilities)
• Science dissemination for various associations and town halls (debates/seminars)
• Summer training periods for high school students, and other regular activities with the local community such as visits to GPlantS lab.
• Regular contacts with journalists from newspapers and TV (which allows spreading, in a simple way, information about our research. As it has happened for some other labs of ITQB, several news about the research we conduct in our team have already been published in newspapers and a few were presented in TV programs).
• Activities for very specific public, such as the organization of easy scientific activities for young students with disabilities.
• Publication of simplified text versions describing our work and future perspectives (e.g.: Newsletter of COTArroz, Technological and Operational Rice Center, “Gazeta da Várzea”, etc.), and contributions in science dissemination books