Biospectroscopy and Interfaces Research Group

European Researchers Night 2021

As in previous editions, BSIRG participated in the European Researchers Night (NEI) 2021 activities. This year, our participation was split between Lisbon (Museu de História Natural) and Oeiras (Marina de Oeiras). In Lisbon we presented the activity "Absorption and emission: From solar radiation to luminescence". The importance and dangers of the greenhouse effect were explained and related to absorption of solar radiation. Also, different experiments were presented to kids and their parents, focused in the properties of light and its interaction with day life materials (fluorescence and phosphorescence). In Oeiras we presented CHEMTOUCH, a new software to teach organic chemistry using virtual reality, developed at IST in a collaboration between the departments of Informatics (Rui Prada and Daniel Simões), Chemical Engineering (Dulce Simão) and Bioengineering (Vasco Bonifácio, BSIRG). Gonçalo Gaspar and João Lopes (IST MSc Students and CHEMTOUCH game developers), helped the young visitors to have fun testing the software, and with great success! CHEMTOUCH will be soon available to IST students in the organic chemistry classes.

NEI 2021