Dr Michael Stebbins delivered the annual Outreach Lecture during Science Week at RCSI on Tuesday, 13 November.

In his lecture entitled ‘Mopping up the mess: Bringing US science policy back from the brink of insanity’, Dr Stebbins addressed the controversial issue of embryonic stem cells during his talk – simply presenting the facts of how the cells are obtained.

Dr Stebbins is the Director of the Biology Policy for the Federation of American Scientists (FAS). Prior to joining FAS, Dr Stebbins was a congressional fellow in the US Senate. Before coming to Washington, Dr Stebbins was a senior editor at Nature Genetics. He has written for Reuters and numerous scientific journals and is a science advisor for ScienCentral a television production company that produces stories for the ABC and NBC affiliates. He has a BS in Biology from SUNY at Stony Brook and received his PhD in genetics while working at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. Sex, Drugs & DNA is his first book.

The Annual Outreach Lecture is one of the key events in the RCSI calendar organised by the RCSI Outreach Officer Dr Kate Johnston. Dr Johnston said: “This lecture promotes awareness of and an interest in research, science and technology to the wider community. The speaker talks about their subject with passion, and they are able to inform, inspire and entertain any audience. The feedback to this year’s lecture has been extremely positive.”