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The Life Scientific: Episode 128: Julia Higgins on polymers

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Factual: Science & Nature: Science & Technology

Julia Higgins on Polymers

Episode 128

Episode 128: Julia Higgins on polymers

Julia Higgins on polymers

BBC Radio 4 - The Life Scientific, Julia Higgins on polymers

Professor Dame Julia Higgins shares her passion for polymers with Jim Al-Khalili.

Professor Dame Julia Higgins talks about her passion for polymers, very long molecules that occur naturally in our bodies and synthetically as polythene, perspex and polystyrene.

Plastic Bags and the DNA in our cells are both polymers, very long molecules ubiquitous in nature and in their synthetic form, in materials like polythene, perspex and polystyrene. Professor Dame Julia Higgins has spent a lifetime researching the structure and movement of polymeric material. 
Trained as a physicist, Dame Julia was one of the early researchers in polymer science and throughout her career worked alongside chemists and engineers. No surprise then that she was the first woman to become both a Fellow of the Royal Society and of the Royal Academy of Engineering. 
In the 1960s with other young researchers she worked at the Harwell Atomic Energy Research Centre in Oxfordshire, one of the first people to use neutron scattering as a technique to investigate how polymer molecules move.
Emeritus Professor of Polymer Science and former Principal at the Faculty of Engineering at Imperial College, London, Professor Higgins tells Jim Al-Khalili how she used her influence as a leading academic to improve representation of women in top posts in science and medicine.

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

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Professor Jim Al-Khalili talks to leading scientists about their life and work.

Professor Jim Al-Khalili talks to leading scientists about their life and work, finding out what inspires them and asking what their discoveries might do for us in the future.

Professor Jim Al-Khalili talks to leading scientists about their life and work, finding out what inspires and motivates them and asking what their discoveries might do for us in the future

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Episode 128: Julia Higgins on polymers

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