Southampton University’s contribution to this year’s British Science Festival emphasises enjoyment and real-world experimentation to showcase how new developments are transforming chemistry, explains Matthew Partridge.

This September, the School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at the University of Southampton will open its doors for the Future Chemistry Hub, a two-day public event bringing together hands-on activities, talks, tours and demonstrations as part of the British Science Festival 2026.

Taking place on 16 and 17 September, the Hub will turn the school into a lively showcase of modern chemistry and chemical engineering. The focus is not just on what chemistry can do, but how it is changing through data, AI, photonics, sustainability and the people who make the subject work in the real world.

The event’s lead sponsor is Shimadzu, with further support from Definition IP, Technically Social and Laboratory News. Together, this support is helping the Hub build a programme that connects public engagement with the tools, companies, questions and careers that shape chemistry beyond the university.

The theme for the Future Chemistry Hub is ‘From Bench to AI: The Bright World of Sustainable Reactions’. That might sound ambitious, but the event itself is designed to be very practical. Visitors will be able to handle equipment, test samples, follow experiments, explore data and speak directly with researchers, technicians, students and industry guests.

One of the strengths of the programme is that it does not treat chemistry as a single thing. The Hub will show chemistry as a set of connected practices: making and measuring materials, using light to identify molecules, building better batteries, improving data quality, designing sustainable processes and translating research into real products and services.

Among the hands-on activities, ReproducibiliTEA is likely to be one of the most memorable. Visitors will follow their own protocol for making tea, measure the result with a spectrophotometer, and contribute data that can be used to explore how reproducible experiments really are. All the data generated by the public will be used to develop a machine learning model around how to make a cup of tea (which will be published later with the contributing public). It is a simple idea, but it opens up a surprisingly rich conversation about protocols, measurement, human variation and machine learning.

Another highlight will be Coral Detectives: shining a light on microplastics. This activity uses a 3D printed coral reef model where hidden microplastics illuminate under blue light. It offers a direct and visual way into the chemistry of detection, pollution and environmental monitoring. It also makes clear why analytical science matters: not as an abstract process, but as a way of finding things that are otherwise easy to miss.

Not every chemistry demonstration needs to start with a flask or a fume hood. At the Electrochemical Circus, visitors will see how a simple fingerprint can become the starting point for exploring electricity, metals and surface chemistry. One of the most eye-catching examples will be making gold fingerprints, using electrodeposition to coat the fine ridges of a fingerprint with a thin layer of metal.

Visitors will be able to handle equipment, test samples, follow experiments, explore data and speak directly with researchers, technicians, students and industry guests

It is a neat demonstration because it starts with something familiar and turns it into a visible example of electrochemistry, materials science and chemical change in action.

Alongside the activities, the Hub will include bookable tours through teaching and research spaces. These will give visitors a chance to see more of the School’s facilities, including teaching laboratories and chemical engineering spaces. The tours are intended to show how chemistry is taught, tested and scaled, as well as how students and researchers move between practical laboratory work, instrumentation, data and process design.

There will also be a series of ‘Meet the..’ talks focused on career journeys. These sessions are being shaped around the varied routes people take into chemistry and chemical engineering, rather than presenting careers as a single neat pathway. The Hub is looking forward to talks from a diverse range of people working across the chemistry world, including the incoming head of IChemE and the stand-up comedian Freya McGhee, who will be showing off her new children’s book about the periodic table.

The Hub will also include creative elements, including cyanotype-inspired artwork linked to the School’s activities supported by the visual artists Eileen White. Cyanotype is a useful visual language for this event because it sits naturally between light, chemistry, materials and image- making. It also gives the Hub a strong visual identity while helping connect research with something more interpretive and creative.

Although the Future Chemistry Hub is designed to be enjoyable, it is not intended to be a simplified version of chemistry.

The aim is to give visitors access to real ideas, real tools and real challenges. AI, sustainability, spectroscopy, data quality, microplastics and batteries are not distant themes. They are already part of how laboratories, companies and universities work.

At its best, public engagement does not rely on gimmicks. It gives people a reason to care, a way to take part and a chance to meet the people behind the work. The Future Chemistry Hub is being built around that idea: cutting-edge science, shown through hands-on experience, firmly grounded in real applications and industry.

• More details are available via the British Science Festival website (bit.ly/FCHdeets) or by joining our public mailing list (bit.ly/FCHmail)

• Dr Matthew Partridge is senior enterprise fellow and director of outreach at the University of Southampton School of Chemistry and Engineering, and writes the Laboratology column for Laboratory News

References:

https://www.linkedin. com/company/school-of-chemistry- university-of- southampton/
https://mailchi.mp/ soton/yhj401mhjw