The Open University

No simple fix to climate variation extremes – just better management

25 July 2023

As southern Europe and parts of the USA and Asia sizzle in unbearable record-breaking heat, Dr Kevin Collins, senior lecturer in the environment and systems, from The Open University gives a stark warning – there’s no simple fix to the variation in climate change, only improved management. While the UK isn’t frying it’s just a […]

New OU / BBC programme explores how we can make our cars and heating greener

21 July 2023

Tuesday 25th July sees the first of two brand new programmes from The Open University (OU) and BBC titled What They Really Mean For You, beginning on BBC One at 20:00, presented by BBC’s Climate Editor, Justin Rowlatt. The first episode, Electric Cars: What They Really Mean For You, investigates people’s frustrations with electric cars […]

Kenyan minister visits OU on fact-finding mission to potentially adopt elements of distance learning education

20 July 2023

The OU recently played host to Kenya’s Principal Secretary for Higher Education on a visit to Walton Hall to see how the country could develop supported distance learning. The Kenyan government has prioritised digital learning to improve equity, quality and access to Higher Education and since President William Ruto was elected in August 2022, he […]

Stunning new OU/BBC series relives our Earth’s fascinating history

14 July 2023

Join us on a journey through some of our home planet’s most epic moments in a new OU/BBC series, Earth, presented by legendary naturalist and nature photographer, Chris Packham. The series will begin this evening (17 July 2023) on BBC Two at 9.00pm, kicking off five incredible episodes tracking the origins of Earth to the […]

OU Analyse Team wins top prize for educational dataset

14 July 2023

The OU Analyse team, which works to identify students at the university who may need extra support, has been awarded the prestigious Educational Dataset Prize by the Educational Data Mining Society for their remarkable work with the ‘OULAD’ dataset. OU Analyse is a system powered by machine learning methods for early identification of students at […]

OU space researcher selected to shape the future of Venus space-mission research

11 July 2023

James Holmes, an atmospheric scientist at The Open University (OU), has been selected as one of six European scientists to represent the science interests of the European Space Agency (ESA) in an international coordination of Venus science to be performed by three missions in the 2030s. The Venus Science Coordination group ‘VeSCoor’ is a newly […]

Physicist who found spherical meteor fragments claims they may come from an alien spaceship – here’s what to make of it

7 July 2023

Monica Grady is a professor of planetary and space sciences at The Open University. Here she reveals what she thinks of the view we may have fragments from an alien spaceship. Avi Loeb, a physicist from Harvard University in the US, has recovered 50 tiny spherical iron fragments from the bottom of the Pacific Ocean […]

Euclid Dark Energy Satellite Mission to Map the Universe Prepares for Launch, supported by OU scientists

30 June 2023

The European Space Agency’s (ESA) Euclid flagship Dark Energy Satellite Mission is due to Launch from Cape Canaveral in Florida at 11:11 a.m. EDT (4:11 p.m. BST) on Saturday 1st July 2023, on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Euclid’s 6-year mission is to map the dark Universe, using the positions of galaxies and images of […]

A trio of images highlight BepiColombo’s third Mercury flyby

20 June 2023

The ESA/JAXA BepiColombo mission has made its third of six gravity assist flybys at Mercury, snapping images of a newly named impact crater as well as tectonic and volcanic curiosities as it adjusts its trajectory for entering Mercury orbit in 2025. The closest approach took place at 19:34 UTC (21:34 CEST) on 19 June 2023, […]

Mission accomplished! Scientist’s joy at being handpicked for European Space Agency role

20 June 2023

An Open University scientist has been handpicked by the European Space Agency (ESA) and offered a Fellowship to continue her studies into how the surface of Mars is shaped by wind. Dr Elena Favaro is a postdoctoral research assistant at the OU who specialises in aeolian geomorphology – the process by which wind contributes to […]

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Category: Science, maths, computing and technology