Science Beer Talks restart this Wednesday, with a talk about "Mushrooms in the City"

The interaction between scientists and the public, in informal conversations about science, while drinking craft beer, is the proposal of Science Beer Talks - Pontos nos iii (Dots on the iii), a program that comes back this Wednesday, February 2nd at the Exploratório - Centro Ciência Viva of UC. The project had a hiatus during the pandemic and resumes its face to face meetings this month, following the health guidelines defined by the Portuguese General Direction of Health (DGS).

In this first new season's meeting, the subject will be the urban biodiversity and conservation project "Mushrooms in the City", which has a Citizen Science component that calls the population for discovering and enjoying the fungi of Coimbra, mapping the diversity of mushrooms in the city. The guest researcher will be Susana C. Gonçalves, from the Centre for Functional Ecology - Science for People & the Planet, at the UC. Susana coordinates the MyCoLAB laboratory, whose mission is to actively contribute to the conservation of fungi and to disseminate their importance.

Susana mentions, in an interview for "Notícias de Coimbra", the milestone reached until now by the project in collaboration with the public: 92 people have already registered over 1300 observations of approximately 260 species of mushrooms. People can participate through the Biodiversity4All platform. In this Wednesday's gathering, the public will be able to understand more about the project and how to participate.

Science Beer Talks - "Dots on the iii"

The Science Beer Talks take place at Exploratório - Centro Ciência Viva de Coimbra, always on the first Wednesday of each month, bringing guest researchers from the research units linked to the UC's Institute for Interdisciplinary Research.

The entrance is free and the meetings take place from 6.30 pm to 7.30 pm. The event will be live-streamed via Facebook (Exploratório's page).

The Science Beer Talks - Dots on the iii programme will be announced monthly, together with the respective topic and guest speaker of each edition.