Letters: September 2025

Safer on paper

I read with interest the recent articles by Derek Lowe and Andrea Sella.

Lowe writes on the obsoletion of technologies and makes suggestions as to what might last until 2060. Yet, as we advance towards a more online, digital world, Sella questions if our accumulated knowledge is as secure as that of the ancients. Take an example such as the BBC Domesday Project published in 1986 to recognise the 900th anniversary of the original Domesday Book – a multimedia resource that is all but gone now and a prime example of digital obsolescence. Many PhD students will be sorely lamenting the loss of the British Library Ethos database as a result of a cyber attack in October 2023, which is still not fully reinstated nearly two years later.

The fact that the original Domesday manuscript still exists today in the National Archives at Kew (an example of what Lowe would refer to as a ‘stubbornly persistent’ technology) does rather underpin Sella’s request to ‘keep as many books as you can’. I, for one, look forward to receiving my hardcopy of Chemistry World in the post (in addition to being able to look online) and I hope this tradition continues until 2060 and beyond.

Adrian Ford CChem MRSC
Via email

Negative space

I was interested to read ‘The art of failing forward’ by Rupali Dabas.

I studied medicine at the Royal Free hospital in London as a second degree having read Natural Sciences at Cambridge. However I did not have a chemistry A-level so had to take the first Bachelor of Medicine course. Noticing that I had time on my hands a lecturer asked me if I would assist him with some research into the effects of radiation on blood supply to the brain (in rats). Suffice it to say that the technique used in 1972 showed no significant effect.

However, we jointly published a paper writing up the hypothesis, method and outcome in The Journal of Negative Results. Perhaps there is an archive somewhere? I can however reassure Dabas that ‘failure’ (negative findings) were being documented and shared more than 50 years ago!

Katherine Bradnock
London, UK 

Frozen out

Julia Robinson’s identification of southern East Anglia as a ‘chemistry cold spot’ came as no surprise to me as this trend already exists for part-time courses in this region. Twenty years ago as a laboratory manager in Ipswich I looked for an HNC chemistry course to help a staff member’s development. The nearest was in Cambridge – nearly 60 miles away.

The general decline in day release courses seems like a backward step. For people who screwed up their A-levels (like me) or came to chemistry later, these courses were a godsend. They allowed you to take a different route to your qualification while earning and gaining valuable work experience. The scientists they produced were not inferior in any way to those emerging from normal degree courses.

Gerry Buddle FRSC
Via email

Surviving on stage

Florian Bay’s article ‘How to excel at public speaking’ is useful but many of us are more worried about presentational survival, not excellence. Unless you have experienced ‘stage-fright’ – as I have – then you will not understand how it feels when your brain suddenly shuts down completely in front of a room full of people. And once it’s happened, you know that it could happen again.

I have learned four remedies:

1. Know my material – not just ‘I understand the principles of X’ but ‘I can explain the principles of X.’ I rehearse – even if only mentally – until the flow of words comes fairly naturally. This reduces mental workload on the day and makes the presentation more assured.

2. Have a ‘parachute’ – something to save me if I lose my thread (or worse, get the dreaded mind block). I carry a bulleted summary on A5 paper or cards. I don’t use a full script so it’s easy to navigate while providing enough of a prompt to get me back on track. Nowadays, I rarely need it – but it’s there just in case.

3. Think of the audience as individuals. While speaking, I scan the audience members to see who is responding positively (for example, by nodding) or at least neutrally. I talk to them rather than focus on those fiddling with their phone or sitting with their arms crossed.

4. Use visual aids as if they are a co-presenter – that way, the audience’s attention moves clearly from me to the slide then back again. For example, ‘My colleague/slide will now show the experimental apparatus’ – pause while they do that – ‘and now I’ll explain the procedure’. My slides are not my script – I already have a bullet point parachute for that.

Remedies one and two are the most important – they free-up mental capacity and provide reassurance. Remedies three and four are about using the environment to my advantage. This all works best when there is time to prepare and the objective is clear. Otherwise it’s a different ball-game – thinking on my feet – which is another topic altogether.

Good luck, or as they say in the theatre – break a leg!

Nick Gudde MRSC
Surrey, UK

Tariff turmoil

The US and EU have struck what is being billed as the largest trade deal in history. EU goods exported to the US will face a 15% tariff.

The divergence in tariffs between Northern Ireland and Ireland (10% versus 15%) will create cost differentials in areas such as food and drink, playing out in areas unforeseeable at this stage. Top-selling drugs such as AbbVie’s Humira (adalimumab), MSD’s Keytruda (pembrolizumab), Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic (semaglutide) Pfizer’s Viagra are all made in Europe and dispatched to the US, representing billion-dollar markets.

The European pharma industry denounced the 15% tariff as a blunt instrument that would harm patients on both sides of the Atlantic. Before the pharma tariff deal, most pharmaceutical products traded between the EU and the US benefited from a zero tariff rate under the most-favoured nation framework.

The deal will need to be signed off by all 27 members of the EU. Expectantly, the increased cost of Europe trading with the US will not outweigh the attraction of Europe’s economy for US business. A whipsawed frenzy of tariffs has jolted businesses and consumers alike.

Gerry Coughlan MRSC
Dublin, Ireland

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