Lunch Hour Lectures - Spring 2011 - Video UCL

During a heart attack the cells that make up the muscle of the heart are subjected to a restricted blood supply, this is usually caused by a blood clot or a narrowing of the coronary arteries. If the blood supply is not restored quickly it will result in the death of the heart muscle, and to protect against this injury, blood clot prevention drugs, inflating balloons and artery bypass surgery are all used to restore blood flow as quickly as possible. Paradoxically, however, the very act of restoring such blood flow can also cause a significant amount of heart cells to die.

In this lecture, Professor Yellon will discuss why this injury occurs, how simple techniques such as inflating a blood pressure cuff on the arm can protect the heart against such injury, and how developments in UCL’s laboratories are already benefiting patients at risk.

Is Twitter an ephemeral technology, consisting of mundane chat about people's personal lives? Or can a study of its use help us to understand how we express our identities on and offline? Can Twitter be used for professional or academic activity, and should we try to separate our public and private digital personae? This lecture will address such questions, with the aid of slides of 140 characters and live tweets from the audience at UCL and on the internet.

Authors: Claire Warwick (UCLDH), @clhw1, Melissa Terras, @melissaterras, #melissaterras (UCLDH); Claire Ross, @clairey_ross (UCLDH); Anne Welsh, @AnneWelsh (UCLDH)

This lecture marks the 5th anniversary of Twitter on 21 March.

Since the 'decade of the brain' in the 1990s an increasing range of previously taboo subjects have been examined by neuroscientists. These include autobiographical memory, aesthetics, love and of course consciousness itself. The rise of imaging techniques which provide engaging pictures of brain activity have added to the appeal. Of course plenty of other discplines within the arts as well as science put the brain at the heart of their project. But how effectively has neuroscience integrated these other approaches into its work? And should the direction of brain research be left to scientists anyway?

This lecture marks Brain Awareness Week 14-20 March.

Is it true that juries rarely convict defendants in rape cases and are more likely to convict ethnic minority defendants than White defendants? And why can’t jurors resist going home at night and googling the defendant or tweeting about the case – against the express instructions of the judge. This lecture reveals the truth behind a number of widely held beliefs about juries in this country and examines why the internet may now be the biggest threat to our jury system.

In preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD), embryos are created by IVF and cells removed from these embryos for genetic analysis. Until recently, testing was solely for the disease the couple carried. The use of array-comparative genomic hybridisation and single nucleotide polymorphism arrays has entered the PGD arena. These techniques allow all chromosomes and many genes to be examined. The analysis of the whole genome prior to implantation brings ethical concerns. Will healthy couples opt for PGD to select their ‘best’ offspring?

This lecture marks International Women’s Day - 8 March

On 15 August 2007, six young men with origins in the Italian region of Calabria were ambushed and murdered in the German steel town of Duisburg. This was northern Europe’s St Valentine’s Day massacre, the worst ever mafia bloodbath outside Italy and the United States. Suddenly, journalists across the globe were struggling with what the New York Times called an ‘unpronounceable name’: ‘ndrangheta (en-drang-get-ah.) In the 1990s, the ‘ndrangheta placed itself in a leading position in the European wholesale cocaine market by dealing direct with South American producers. It is now thought to be the wealthiest and most powerful of Italy’s major criminal brotherhoods. But how, when, and why did it first emerge?