Episode 2 Beneath the Lab Coat

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Oh, my goodness!

When I was at school, I was quite good at science

but I didn't really understand how it related to me.

I couldn't see myself working as a scientist, so I dropped it.

But now I've started to realise I was being a little naive.

Science relates to everything.

It's about life, how we look at things, make things, think about things.

And it's also got enormous career potential.

Learning science is not just for people who want to wear a lab coat to work,

so I'm excited to be meeting a bunch of brilliant people with

a whole range of fascinating careers to see where science plays a part in their job.

You'd be forgiven for thinking

that this is a catwalk show at London's Fashion Week. But it's not.

It's far more revolutionary.

The fashion on display is showcasing a trend

that could be about to change the way we manufacture for ever.

This is the London 3D Print Show and most of the designs have been

made using just a computer and printer.

It's called 3D printing.

One of the collections on that catwalk was

the work of international shoe designer Bryan Oknyansky,

an architect who makes shoes from his bedroom.

Instead of printing with ink,

3D printers print with a solid material.

And for his shoes, Bryan uses metals and high-grade plastics.

It looks great, but Bryan, as a woman, can I walk in it?

-Absolutely.

-Really?

It might be shocking that the shoes look different in the way that they're structured,

but actually, they follow the same principles as traditional shoes,

only I'm taking a lot more risks with the aesthetics

because of the opportunities that 3D printing allows me.

Are they comfortable, though?

All the models tell me they're comfortable

-and I don't even have to ask.

-Really?

-Yeah.

-They are brilliant.

It's a bit mind-blowing to think they actually come out of a printer,

hint-hint, hint-hint.

-How would you like me to make you a pair of heels?

-Let's do it!

-So this is it then, Bryan.

-This is the 3D printer.

-So, you are going to make me a shoe.

-It's going to be the coolest shoe.

-You can take it everywhere with you.

-How do you go about doing this?

How do you go about getting sizes for somebody

when you're making the perfect shoe?

What I prefer to do is really take a 3D scan of your foot

and then there's no guesswork

because I'm designing purely for the geometry of your specific foot.

-So it would be a perfect fit for me.

-Just for you.

It would be what I call a fingerprint shoe, just for you.

'Bryan's shoes are first fashioned'

in a computer-aided design package.

It's here he creates the look

and calculates the position and strength of the heel.

'Understanding structures is something Bryan brings to

'shoe design from his training as an architect.'

Looks nice. I could see myself wearing that shoe.

I can see you wearing it as well.

'But sadly, there's no chance I'm going to be able to wear it.'

And now we're ready to print.

'We don't have time to print a full size one, so this is just

'going to be a teeny-tiny scale model of one of his designs.'

Now how is this going to make the shoe?

These reels of plastic filament get fed through a feed tube,

all the way up to its respective extractor.

There are loads of different 3D printer machines

already on the market and essentially,

they all work by heating the desired material to melting point,

then depositing molten material

exactly where the computer design tells it to.

The material cools or is hardened by chemical reaction

and another is placed on top of it.

Through this continuous layering,

the final object is built from its bottom up.

3D printing allows complicated structures to now be

built as easily and cheaply as simple ones.

Every print can be 100% identical

and manufacturing can take place practically anywhere,

which for Bryan means he can make his range of shoes from home

and this is only the beginning of what 3D printing will be able to do.

Will there be a possibility that there won't just be three reels of plastic at the bottom?

There could be maybe fabric, rubber, breathable materials,

-so we could print off kind of a pair of trainers?

-Absolutely.

Not only the printing of multiple materials,

but multiple material strengths.

So your story is you started as an architect,

-so why did you get into shoes?

-Shoe design has been a big interest to me.

I am still making a building.

It's a building for you, it's a building to hold you up.

All those maths and physics apply to the making of the shoes as well.

Being a shoe designer, it gets kind of glamorous, then?

It's great to be included in the fashion shows and everything.

Of course, the aim in my career is to create things that will be used by other people.

But you do like the glamorous side now, though, don't you?

Is that what you're trying to tell me?

That's exactly what I'm trying to say.

-So is that ready? Is that my shoe?

-That's your shoe.

-Is it hot?

It's not too hot to the touch.

CRACKS

-Ooh, listen to that! Is that a proper shoe?

-Absolutely.

The way that this shoe is designed, if you scale it up,

-it will actually work.

-It's really lovely.

And so then on top of this, you would add the straps

-and whatever fabric?

-Absolutely, yeah.

-That is a very beautiful shoe, I have to say.

-I think it's your size.

The day when 3D printers are as common in the home as a TV

or computer may not be that far away.

To me, that sounds like a whole load of career opportunities

just opening up at this new interface of design and technology.

Scientists get everywhere and are involved in so much that

I bet right now, you're wearing something that they've made.

Deodorant, hair product, make-up... These are competitive industries,

all wanting you to buy their products.

So beavering away around the UK, there are hundreds of scientists,

vying to find the next breakthrough in beautifying Britain.

And I'm lucky enough to be meeting one of them.

Born out of an interest in chemistry at school, Pauline Ayres has worked

at some of the top laboratories influencing the colours,

effects and illusions in the make-up that we wear.

And she's not alone, so I guess I'm getting a treat.

-Hi, ladies. Tell me, am I getting a makeover?

-You are.

This is great news! Is there a science to make-up?

Oh, yes. There's definitely a science to make-up.

I've worked in the cosmetics industry for a number of years

and I've worked with lots of brands to make the products,

but Amy's going to do the real work

because she's going to be the one who gives you the makeover.

It will be hard work!

So first of all, I'm going to start with the skin,

make sure you're all prepped and you look nice and flawless.

And then we're going to move on to the eyes.

OK, perfect. I like all that.

# Your beautiful daughter

# She may be the cure but for now she's the torture... #

I've got to admit, even though I use make-up,

I've never really thought about how you make make-up.

There's a lot of science about the ingredients that go into all types of make-up.

And you use that science when you're making the products to blend

the ingredients together to give the effects the customers want.

You have to understand how the skin works,

so you need to know about biology and skin biology and cell biology.

And you have to also understand about how light works.

-So that's physics as well.

-So how does that work?

It's all to do with reflection of light, how much it's reflected and how much it's absorbed.

Like this orange, I've been using it all over your face,

especially under the eyes, where it gets a bit darker,

and it doesn't look orange, as you can see.

Can I see the orange in the tub?

-This one.

-That's the orange you put on my face and that's super bright

and yet I don't look like a clown.

-Not yet, anyway!

-It's clever, isn't it?

-It is clever!

-So that's all about reflecting the light or absorbing the light?

-Both.

Some wavelengths will be reflected, some wavelengths will be absorbed.

I had no idea that something as simple as make-up could involve so many of the sciences.

But I guess when you deal in illusions, you need a lot of tricks up your sleeve.

So what I've done so far is just apply the eye-shadows

and now I'm going to go in with a shimmer.

Cos we're doing quite a sort of peacock inspired look,

we're now going in with a sort of turquoise eye-shadow,

so that's going to give a really glittery shimmery effect.

Would you say, then, make-up's inspired by nature?

-Oh, quite a lot, yes.

-One thing I'm very good at doing is panda eyes!

That's how I normally end up looking!

It's getting the effects

and looking at the effects that are in nature, like a kingfisher or

a peacock, and how you can change the ingredients

to give you those effects actually on the skin.

We use an ingredient called mica, which is a mineral,

and you can use that to give a nice shimmer,

so if you look at that, it's just some little clear, colourless flakes.

So you can grind this to lots of different sizes.

If you coat that mica with a white colour,

you end up with real sparkly eye-shadow.

-So this one's super sparkly.

-That one's super sparkly

because the particles of the mica are really large

and if you have very small particle size,

you'll get more of a shine, a bit like mother of pearl.

-That's something I'm more used to seeing, something that looks quite shimmery.

-A shimmer, a sheen.

The clever chemistry is to coat the mica particles

with different colours.

Because of the way the light first bounces off the surface

and sunlight travels through to the next layer and bounces

off the mica, the light itself is out of phase when it reaches the eye.

So it's all tricking the eye

into believing you're seeing one colour instead of another.

The colour we're seeing from different angles is different

-than the colour you're mixing to the mica.

-Yes. Absolutely.

-Is this all physics, then?

-Oh, yeah, this is physics.

Very much physics. But you use it with chemistry.

Pauline, for you, is it a love of science or was it a love of make-up

-that's got you doing the job you're doing now?

-It was a love of science.

I did science at school and then I went on to do a degree in chemistry.

-Did you ever foresee that you'd have a career in make-up?

-No, I didn't.

But I loved it as soon as I started working in it.

It's a very friendly industry, it's very interesting.

It's something that you can relate to because it's products you use all the time.

When we get a new ingredient,

we will go and play with it in the laboratory

and we will see what effects that we can make by using it.

So Amy, you've been set a challenge of doing my make-up today!

-Am I done?

-You are. You're pretty much done.

I like it. It's kind of... If I do this... oh!

You could hang me on a Christmas tree!

Can you see that?

You put on, you developed it. I like it.

Next time I'm at the make-up counter, I'm going to be thinking again about the science of sparkles

and serious thought that goes into every eye-shadow and lippy

because as I've discovered,

there's so much more to it than meets the eye.

Now, few of us have the physique

to become the next Jessica Ennis or Mo Farah,

myself included, but that doesn't mean a career at the highest level of sport is beyond any of us.

The success of British athletes at London 2012 was recognised as

being a team effort, and scientists, they were definitely part of it.

I've come to Southampton University Swimming Pool to see how varied

jobs in sports science can be

and the first person I'm meeting is senior lecturer

and aerospace engineer Alex Forrester.

Alex has a PhD in computational engineering and today, he's helping

a team of PhD student engineers on a sports science project.

-So, Alex, what's going on here?

-We're researching swimming.

We're looking into how we can analyse what's happening when people are swimming

and finally, how we can hopefully make people swim faster.

We're looking at what's going on between the traction

between the water and the athlete.

As engineers, Alex and his PhD students

were able to help the British Olympic swimming team

by building a series of bespoke machines and computer systems.

This particular one measures a swimmer's drag through the water

to help perfect their efficiency.

This is essentially a winch

and we attach the other end of that line to the athlete.

We pull them through the water and then we measure the force

that's trying to pull this bit of kit back into the pool.

To put it in its simplest form, we pull somebody through the water

and measure how hard we have to pull them.

Three, two, one...go.

The machine measures hydrodynamic drag,

water's equivalent of aerodynamics,

and it's the amount an object is affected by water resistance.

The better an object's hydrodynamics,

the faster it can travel in water using the same amount of energy.

It's really the shape of the swimmer as they go through the water.

As the swimmers get better and better,

there's bits of fine-tuning that are needed to improve their shape.

Engineers have been working on making ships go through the water better for a very long time.

It's the same kind of thing, you've got the force needed to push a ship through the water,

which is similar to the force needed to pull a swimmer through

the water, and then the propulsion from the propeller,

which is similar to the propulsion from the arms and the legs.

Now, what's the difference between using something like this and just videoing a swimmer?

If we video the swimmer, a coach could look at their stroke

and based on the coach's experience, they could say,

"Oh, I think you need to do this,"

and they can vary it until the coach is happy, but using this

bit of equipment, we know when they've made an improvement.

We're actually measuring how good they are.

It doesn't look like the most hi-tech machine.

I can see what you mean by that but if the top athletes come to us

and say, "We need a bit of kit," we've got a very short timescale

with which to get performance gains for the Olympics.

We didn't worry about making it look pretty. This is it.

This is what we need to do the job.

That's what engineering's really all about.

You have a requirement and then you make something to fulfil that need

and we've had great success with this bit of kit.

So when you started out as an engineer,

where were you thinking that you wanted to work?

I'm really interested in the process of engineering,

so whether it's making an aircraft lighter or a swimmer go faster,

they're the same kinds of process.

You've got a way of testing them, a way of analysing them

and you use that information to get to the best possible solution.

The field of sports science is in its infancy in the UK,

but after heavy investment in the 2012 Olympic team, it's been growing

fast and could be a fascinating career to be involved in.

So for somebody who wants to be involved in this field, what should they be studying in school?

For what we're doing, certainly maths and physics are a very important part.

It's good to have a feeling about engineering

or being great with computers.

These are all things that you can get into at an early stage and are great things to do.

The role of the engineer is just one cog in the larger sports science team.

Once they've made the technology that creates the data,

it needs to be translated into results.

And that is the highly scientific job of the biomechanist.

Australian Jodi Cossor has been helping British swimmers

improve for ten years.

She has a Science Masters degree in swimming biomechanism.

Jodi combines her knowledge of how the body works with

an understanding of engineering and the physics of movement when applied to swimming.

-So, Jodi, is your job to make people go faster?

-That's the idea of it.

My specific area is biomechanics, so I look at the skills,

particularly starts and turns, and how can improve those,

but we also look at how they move through the water.

So, are they pulling too wide,

are they taking too long to breathe to one side,

what are the small differences that we can make to their technique to get them going faster?

Here, they're going on the pulley and they're being pulled along.

Is this any use to you to help people improve their stroke?

It's really good because it gives me numbers to work with.

We use the research that they're doing and apply it to the swimmers.

The coaches don't need to spend as much time having a look

at the video and the numbers, we can explain it to them more quickly.

When I was speaking to Alex, he kept talking about swimmers being like ships.

When you see a swimmer, how do you visualise them?

I do see them as a shape, but I'm more interested in how the body moves through the water,

trying to balance out everything, from your arms to your breathing,

the left-right coordination as you're going through,

there's a lot of things involved

that make swimmers unique to be able to propel themselves efficiently.

So you, as a biomechanist,

you're working alongside different members of the team?

Everyone comes from a science background, but we're all

looking at it from something that particularly interests us.

I love the body and how it moves, so the biology was the science I really enjoyed at school

and university, so I've developed as I've gone through

and I just love what I do.

So looking at him, Jodi, how do you think he's doing?

He's OK, but you can tell that he's not going to make it right to

the top. He's going more for power rather than technique

-and that's more of a male thing to do.

-Oh-ho!

-I know.

So if he just slightly changed his technique, he will go faster?

-That's what he wants to do.

-Yes.

-You're quite harsh.

-I know. I'm terrible.

Jodi, it's been an absolute pleasure talking to you and listening

to you and I feel I've learned something about improving my stroke.

-I'm just going to put my swimming hat on now!

-See how you go.

Cheeky!

The more that athletes

and sports people use science to get faster, stronger

and more skilful, the more that science itself needs to improve.

In this race for physical perfection,

it's the scientists and engineers that are sure to be the winners.

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