Experience

Speaker and Presenter

Andrew loves to use storytelling to engage with his audience about science. A key part of that is drawing on examples in history to see what we can learn about how we got to where we are today. He has spoken at schools across Cambridgeshire and the UK, and has given talks for interested groups and Science Festivals both locally and internationally. Organisations that have invited Andrew to speak include The Royal Institution in London.

If you wish to book Andrew to give a talk, please use the contact information found on the About page. Andrew also has a wide range of media experiance having worked with Horizon, Cambridge Presents and BBC World Service, and is happy to receive requests to talk on his research and science in general.

Event Organiser

Andrew founded Skeptics in the Pub, SciBar and Bright Club in Cambridge. Since then he has worked with a wide range of organisations, including the British Science Festival, the MRC and the Alan Turing Insitute to run highly successful events and to provide training on how to engage with the public.

If you want to run an event, or need bespoke training, please get in touch using the contact information on this website. If Andrew can't personally help, he is more than happy to put you in touch with others who can.

 


Tales From the Lab

As we grow up, the first way many of us meet science is as a series of amazing facts and figures. Rules that govern how the universe works. Exciting, vibrant and full of wonder. Yet, the first time anyone steps into the lab, the universe will immediately make clear it has other ideas. Basic and simple experiments, often inexplicably fail, while things that everyone thought impossible suddenly turn out to be possible.

Andrew developed the Tales from the Lab project to bring together scientists to promote their diverse set of backgrounds and to talk and laugh about the experiences that shaped us.

You can find the videos on YouTube in the Tales from the Lab playlist.

Funded by the Biochemical Society.

Tales from the Lab logo

Talks for Public Events


Turing

How AI is Evolving the Fight Against Cancer

Suitable for Year 6th Form and adults.
Running time: 45 minutes + Questions.

Based on the article of the same title published in Gizmodo UK, the talk discusses the limitations and opportunities for AI in the fight against cancer.


Gas Attack

Alchemy and Air

Suitable for Year 9, 10 & 11, 6th Form and adults.
Running time: 45 minutes + Questions.
This talk can include several demonstrations if facilities are available.

In the summer of 1909 a German scientist, Fritz Haber, demonstrated a single chemical reaction that changed the world forever. His experiment showed for the first time that it was possible to convert the endless supply of nitrogen from the air into an invaluable resource that would define the first half of the 20th century.


Terra Nova

Why Limes Don't Cure Scurvy, and Everything Else Does

Suitable for Year 9, 10 & 11, 6th Form and adults.
Running time: 45 minutes + Questions.

Of all the slang names for the British, none is more iconic than 'Limey'. While the the term provokes majestic images of the Golden Age of Sail, scurvy cost countless sailors and seamen their lives. It was once not unheard of for nine out of every ten members of a ship's crew to have succumbed to scurvy by the time it returned to port. It is often said that results of James Lind's work on the HMS Salisbury in 1747 led to a cure and saved innumerable lives. Yet, 100 years later, in Cherry-Garrard's account of Robert Falcon Scott's 1911 expedition to the South Pole, he writes: "There was little scurvy in Nelson's days; but the reason is not clear, since, according to modern research, lime-juice only helps to prevent it". So what happened, how is it that scientific research showed limes didn't cure scurvy when once they were a miracle cure?

Published Work

Print Media

Cyborgs

What if we could all become cyborgs...

BBC World Service

  1. How AI is Evolving the Fight Against Cancer
    • Andrew Holding
    • Gizmodo – 7th June 2018
  2. Why Are We So Tribal About Tech?
    • Andrew Holding
    • Gizmodo – 5th Jan 2017
  3. SATs won't teach British children the skills they really need
  4. Science evolves, and so should we
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Science Blogs – 17th July 2015
  5. Why we shouldn't sneer at Ashya King's parents
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Science Blogs – 5th September 2014
  6. Academics would love to be in the 'squeezed middle'
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Science Blogs – 8th May 2014
  7. Can one #nomakeupselfie make a difference?
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Science Blogs – 27th March 2014
  8. My best science lesson: why history is essential to engage students
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Professional – 25th March 2014
  9. Does UK science have a fetish for the short-term?
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Professional – 21st Oct 2013
  10. A scientist's view: equality, feminism and men's rights
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Science Blogs – 16th July 2013
  11. Why science and engineering toys aren't for girls
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Science Blogs – 12th October 2012
  12. The LMB at 50
  13. Evolution and divine creation: where's the contradiction?
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Comment is Free – Belief – 29th Febuary 2012
  14. ThinkCon at the Cambridge Science Festival – Can you make a difference?
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Science Blogs – 22nd Febuary 2011
  15. Opening up climate science can cut off the skeptics
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Science Blogs – 25th November 2010
  16. Forgotten knowledge: the discovery and loss of a cure for scurvy
    • Andrew Holding
    • BlueSci – October 2010
  17. Truth and consolation
    • Andrew Holding
    • Guardian – Comment is Free – Belief – 8th September 2010

Broadcast Media

Boffins telling jokes

Some Boffins with jokes

BBC Four

Breaking Bad

The Science of Breaking Bad

Head Squeeze TV

  1. Solving This Scientific Hitch
  2. How Can AI Help Us Understand Breast Cancer
  3. Cosmic Shambles Q&A
  4. Richard 'Spanners' Ready's Afternoon Show
  5. Unbottling the Past
  6. Oestrogens and Breast Cancer
  7. Discussing our latest research in to Brain Cancer
  8. Why Bother Going to the Moon?
  9. How Old is the Average Atom?
  10. Personalised Medicine: Dose By Design
  11. Cancer Research UK – The Grand Challenge
  12. The Science of Fiction — Medicine
  13. Breast Cancer
  14. The Science of Fiction — Future
  15. Compound — RNA
  16. Scientific Publishing
  17. Compound — Tamoxifen
  18. Compound — Titin
  19. The Science of Breaking Bad
  20. Some Boffins with Jokes
  21. What If... We could all become cyborgs?
  22. Sir Tom Blundell
  23. The Future of the Space Race
  24. The Haber Process
  25. How Does Laser Eye Surgery Work?

Awards

CRUK Rising Star Prize

Cancer Research UK Rising Star Prize

Andrew recieving his award from Iain Foulkes

January 2023

Appointed Member of UK Young Academy | Royal Society

November 2020

Biochemical Society Scientific Outreach Grant

July 2019

Turing Events and Engagement Funding awarded for Bright Club at the Turing.

June 2016

Nominated for inaugural Vice-Chancellor’s Impact Awards and Public Engagement with Research Awards.

July 2015

Cancer Research UK's 'Rising Star in Research Engagement Prize'.

March 2014

Unltd Try It Award to produce 12 videos for ThinkOutreach.

November 2013

Finalist for Royal Society of Chemistry's Take 1... Minute for Chemistry in Health Video Competition.

November 2012

Awarded an RSC Public Actities Small Grant.

July 2012

The Royal Society of Chemistry North West Trust sponsored speaker at Wrexham Science Festival.

April 2012

Finialist in the British Science Association 'Prove it' competition.

British Science Association Media Fellowship.

January 2012

Wellcome Trust People Award

October 2011

FameLab South of England Finalist

June 2011

Shortlisted for UnLtd / HEFCE Recognition Award – Outstanding Non Teaching Staff Social Entrepreneur.

May 2011

Shortlisted for British Science Association Media Fellowship.

January 2011

UnLtd Catalyst grant for Social Entrepreneurship.

October 2010

Nominated for Society of Biology Science Communication award by the Medical Research Council.