Join us for the Cambridge Festival family weekend opening!
Join us for the Cambridge Festival Family Weekend and explore the history of science through our collection of microscopes, telescopes, and globes. Take part in family trails and visit our Learning Gallery, where you can engage with interactive handling boxes to discover topics such as Light & Sound, the Human Body, and Earth & Space.
Events happenings:
Join us for a special Saturday workshop on 15 March led by artist James Tunnard, where we'll dive into the magic of colour and light.
As you may have heard, we’re creating a new art installation for the Learning Gallery ceiling and the activities in this workshop will inspire and contribute to this exciting piece!
Get creative with these hands-on activities:
Legumes like peas and beans have developed a clever way to overcome the lack of nitrogen in the soil. They form special structures on their roots, called nodules, which act as tiny homes for nitrogen-fixing bacteria. These bacteria help convert nitrogen from the air into a form the plant can use to grow. The process begins when the plant’s root hairs recognise the bacteria and allow them to infect the root. The nodules then form below this site, deep within the root tissues.
Nature has provided us with many beautiful patterns and forms to admire—for example, patterns on butterfly wings, stripes on a zebra, striking arrangements of leaves and flowers in plants, and diverse leaf shapes. A fundamental question in biology is how living forms are generated and diversified during evolution. Plants offer an attractive system to study this problem as they continue to develop their organs post-embryonically, allowing us to investigate organ initiation and follow their development over time.
You may have heard talk of plants flowering earlier as a result of our warming climate. Phenology, the study of seasonal cycles, can help us to understand the effects of climate change on plants. We would like to know how seasonal weather changes are affecting the trees at CUBG, and if they can adapt, survive and even thrive.
Join Margeaux Apple, Assistant Curator, as she discusses the exciting work to bring wild collected plants into CUBG’s collection. Learn about what drives these expeditions, who our partners are and what a day in the life of expedition looks like.
A small number of plants attract pollinators not by providing a food reward, but by mimicking females of the pollinating animal species. Male animals are attracted to these mimics and may attempt to mate with them. In the process, pollen is transferred to and from the animal’s body and can be carried to other flowers. The plant gets pollinated and has not had to provide any nectar in exchange! We will discuss how these sexually deceptive flowers work and how plants are able to construct these brilliant models of female insects.
Giant deer, fossil fish teeth, the rocks that built Cambridge... just some of the specimens on display that our staff can't wait to discuss with you. Beware, their enthusiasm is infectious!
Giant deer, fossil fish teeth, the rocks that built Cambridge... just some of the specimens on display that our staff can't wait to discuss with you. Beware, their enthusiasm is infectious!
Drop into our shop to reserve your free place on the tour.
