BS: Do you have any involvement with a science community?
ER: With science communication? Or what do you mean by science community?
BS: Well . . . with other science professionals perhaps or science communicators. Are there any other contacts outside of Techniquest's that you would feel that you associate with?
ER: For myself a great deal. I think it's important not to just be Techniquest, because there's a lot of people doing a lot of good work across the country and across the world. So I'm involved in and I'm a member of the British Association - for the Advancement of Science. I - I'm a member of BIG which is the British Interactive Group and have a lot of - colleagues and friends in the British Interactive Group. Also things like the British Association of Planetariums so - people who are involved in writing shows for planetarium. So that kind of thing. But also with people like - Parker Roach is working here one day a week but he - he's the national schools astronomer, so he's a very useful person to speak to about certain things. I'm talking mainly about planetaria here but not not solely.
People like - I'm I'm currently writing a show on Mars because Mars over the summer will be at its closest approach to the Earth for 6000 years or so. So - over the summer - there's a, a British Lander being sent to Mars, which is called Beagle 2. I'm in contact with Christopher Pillinger and his team. So trying to get information the latest information, about that lander reaching so that's that's real science, I suppose. Current. Very current. (pause) Links with the university. Very useful to have. So, we don't we don't tend to work in isolation here. I would say that we probably have or I personally probably have more links with people in the science communication field rather than the scientific community. But that's not to the - that's not solely. There are other links there as well. So if you feel that you want information or you want help then help is definitely around to get.