How to unify/strengthen your lab the right way

With winter fast approaching and the early onset of seasonal affective disorder just round the corner it was concluded that in order to raise the groups’ spirits an outing should be prescribed. Since lab rats do not get out the lab often we decided to organise a self-guided mystery tour of our wonderful base city of Glasgow. With countless free museums in Glasgow (http://www.glasgowlife.org.uk/museums/) throughout hiding some of the best collections in the world, along with a simple easy-to-use underground system (www.spt.co.uk/subway/) a trail was set up to take three teams from a secret location to a secret location covering the entire city. A great way to not only show-off some of the spectacular sights of the Commonwealth games host city to the new students from further afield but it was also a chance for the students who are residents to revisit some well-loved trips and tourist hot spots.

After splitting the lab up into competing teams and then each selecting a leader, they were given a pack with a list of predetermined clues and questions about each location, as well as some teamwork photo opportunities built in. The three teams set off from the department (SIPBS) building to find the books from the library that will give them their first clue knowing that they were going to have a fun packed day exploring the city.

Some of the stops for the teams were:

• The Medieval Glasgow Cathedral, which was built in the late 12th century (www.glasgowcathedral.org.uk/).

• The Lighthouse in Glasgow's city centre, which is Scotland's Centre for Design and Architecture (www.thelighthouse.co.uk/).

• Scotland Street School designed by the world renowned Charles Rennie Mackintosh and has classrooms set up through different eras.

• The Riverside museum, which is home to some of the world’s finest cars, bicycles, trams and locomotives and the hugely popular historic Glasgow street scene bring the objects and stories to life.

• Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, which houses one of Europe's great art collections. It is amongst the top three free-to-enter visitor attractions in Scotland and one of the most visited museums in the United Kingdom outside of London.

• The Hunterian museum at Glasgow University which is Scotland's oldest public museum and home to one of the largest collections outside the National Museums. The Hunterian is one of the leading university museums in the world and its collections have been recognised as a Collection of National Significance.

The photo opportunities ranged from getting a photo on the iconic green chairs outside the Riverside museum, getting a photo on a statue and copying any art work that you can find on the day to seeing how many members for the group can fit in a telephone box and having the spell out SIPBS (Strathclyde Institute of Pharmacy and Biomedical Sciences) with their bodies.

To conclude the day the teams had to work out the final clue that would lead them at a restaurant for some well-deserved food and a relaxing drink, which turned out to be one of the biggest challenges of the day to get a restaurant to sit 18 people.

If you would like to see more photos from the group day out please click here

About the Author / Event Organiser:

David Keers  after studying his undergraduate degree in Biomedical Science and MRes in Toxicology at Strathclyde, became part of the research group in September 2014 as a Research Assistant.