• Question: do you use drugs in your experiments

    Asked by BristolLad2 to Anthea, Chloe, Kevin, Michel, Sean on 14 Nov 2014.
    • Photo: Chloe Kinsella

      Chloe Kinsella answered on 14 Nov 2014:

      No I don’t use drugs in my experiments but I use some chemicals like fertiliser and copper. These are two examples of pollutants that are washed off roads and gardens with rainwater and spill into the sea after a storm. We call this polluted water stormwater. By testing how seaweeds and animals like mussels and crabs react to these pollutants, I can inform the government what pollutants need to be taken out of stormwater so that we can keep the coastlines healthy. It sounds like I am being cruel because I am making some animals live in pollution so that I can study them. But the results I get from these experiments can help to save plants and million of animals all around the world.

    • Photo: Anthea Lacchia

      Anthea Lacchia answered on 16 Nov 2014:

      Hi there,
      No I don’t use any drugs in my experiments. Most of my research time in Trinity is spent looking down the microscope at my fossil ammonoids. But I do use whitening chemicals to photograph the nicest specimens. It helps show up features on the rocks. And I use acids to digest and break down rocks sometimes, or just to find out what they are: for example, if you pour a drop of HCl (hydrochloric acid) on a rock and it fizzes, then it is a carbonate, such as a limestone, which makes up most of Ireland’s rocks. 😉

    • Photo: Michel Dugon

      Michel Dugon answered on 17 Nov 2014:

      Mmm… it depends what you call “drugs”: I use a fair few chemicals / substances that are not very healthy if you breath them, swallow them or inject them in your body.

      Of course, there is the venom from centipedes and spiders, which can be quite dangerous if injected or if it spills in your eyes. Then we use quite a lot of chemical that can make you very sick (e.g. phenol). There are also the products we use to anesthetise bugs (e.g. chloroform): they can put you in a coma if you breath too much of them!

    • Photo: Kevin Healy

      Kevin Healy answered on 21 Nov 2014:

      While I dont use drugs on any of my animals I certanly use drugs during them. That is coffee of course :-P, very few scientists can function without the the worlds favorite drug (did you know that coffee makes more mony then oil in th world!)

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