This Catalyst article investigates carefully designed polymer materials that can repair themselves when mechanically damaged. The article is from Catalyst: Secondary Science Review 2015, Volume 26, Issue 2.

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This Catalyst article investigates materials that are used in space travel. It discovers that they must be designed and tested to ensure they will protect astronauts from radiation and the vacuum of space. 

The...

This STEMNET resource describes the background and career of STEM Ambassador Heather Williams, a senior medical physicist in a hospital nuclear medicine department.

Heather found that studying physics at school sparked a particular interest in radiation and its applications in medicine. A key part of her...

The Institute of Physics' 'MODEL Project: Practical Physics at Work' provides engaging and relevant practical physics activities, student instructions and worksheets plus guidance for teacher and technicians.

The practical activities are supported by video sequences showing how some people use physics in the...

The Inventive podcast uses storytelling to encourage listeners to find out more about engineers and what they do.  In each episode, Professor Trevor Cox interviews an engineer, and then a writer uses that interview as inspiration for a piece of fiction. The podcast brings...

These resources were created as part of the North East Collaborative Outreach Programme funded by HEFCE. The work sheets use companies based in the North East of England as a context for science questions.  Each worksheet has the same structure of ‘know, apply, extend’ to support young people to apply and develop...

About one-fifth of the electricity generated in the UK comes from nuclear power plants, like the one operated by EDF Energy near Hartlepool. These plants use nuclear fuel - such as uranium - to boil water which is used to drive steam turbines. 

This activity sheet checks students' knowledge of nuclear...

Daniel is a nuclear medicine technologist at Addenbrookes hospital.  He uses radioactive tracers to image the path of the material through the body.  He studied a short course with the Open University and spent four years training on the job at the hospital.

Curriculum links include n...

Opening Doors is co-funded by the IOP and Government Equalities Office, running from 2014 to 2015. The project is not specific to physics, or even science, but focuses on developing a whole-school approach to addressing gender imbalance.

The project has involved two regional networks, each made up of five...

Mechanical engineer, Tom Hunt, shows how precision machines are used to produce the PanCam instrument, which will be sent to the European Space Agency to be integrated on to the ExoMars rover.  Electronics engineer, Barry Hancock, shows the filter wheel being tested within the labs, at the Mullard Space Science...

These resources are from the Institute of Physics and consist of a range of posters that illustrate physics-related careers. The posters cover a wide range of careers and include:

Physicists Predict, Protect, Inspire and Save: Nicola Lang - geophysicist, Emma Sowter - medical physicist,  ...

Kelly is a radiographer at Addenbrookes hospital.  She produces X-rays for doctors to use in the diagnoses.  She was a parent at a young age and decided to follow an access course for two evenings a week over two years.  She aims to specialise in an area of radiography and progress to becoming a senior member of...

Dr. Lewis Dartnell takes a sample from the Atacama desert, to the Open University, to be analysed by a Raman spectrometer.  The spectrometer shows the organic compounds that Lewis found on the quartz, as well as the composition of the quartz itself.

This video is part of a series of ten which look at the one...