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Stories of this world: communicating research

Communicating simply and innovatively research supported by Fondazione Cariplo through its Scientific Research program area and helping the scientists receiving a Foundation’s grant  do so and deepen the relationship between science and society: these are the goals pursued by Stories of this world a project developed in collaboration with Milan’s Leonardo da Vinci National Museum of Science and Technology and Meet the Media Guru. 

The ingredients of Stories of this world are animated interactive infographics about the activities carried out by Fondazione Cariplo through its Scientific Research Area since 2000, and sixteen short video-interviews with the researchers who won a Foundation’s grant under its calls launched in 2015. 

In the 16 years since it established its Scientific Research Program Area, Fondazione Cariplo has backed projects in 5 macro-areas, Agro-food; Environmental Science and Biotechnologies; Science & Society; Physics, Chemistry & Engineering; Biomedicine with €250 million in aggregate. The interactive infographics of Stories of this world transforms these numbers into narratives that can be explored at will.

Scientists are storytellers says the UE

The heart of the infographics is the animated timeline by year and theme area. The projects conducted in each year are graphically represented by micro-particles. Their size is a function of the amounts of funds granted, their color is the color attributed to the respective macro-area. Navigation is interactive: clicking inside each particle people can learn more about each research work, and in some instances enjoy a video-interview with the scientist who conducted that project. We’ve asked researchers to be storytellers in relating their work in the interviews, all of which can be viewed on  Fondazione Cariplo’s YouTube profile.  As indicated in a recent EU directive, those engaged in research need to communicate their work to society, providing information about their research and listening to public needs in a continuous osmotic flow.  The first in Italy to do so, Fondazione Cariplo in its Scientific Research program area has embraced this EU direction, tying its funding to research communication. In this direction has gone the training workshop titled Communicating Science for researchers who won a Foundation’s grant under its 2015 calls, conceived and hosted by the Leonardo da Vinci National Museum of Science and Technology.

Stories of this world is an endeavor characterized by direct, empathic communication and use of innovative visual design, i.e. Interactive Infographics, whose concept was developed in collaboration with Meet the Media Guru and a large  team of visual designers, content curators and video-makers. IOn November 12/13, November 26/27 and December 3/4 Stories of this world was  at the Face to face with research workshops promoted by the Leonardo da Vinci National Museum of Science and Technology, and open to the public. Featured speakers at these workshops were the researchers who won a Foundation’s grant under its 2015 Scientific Research calls as communicators of their projects.

The project’s official hashtag is #CariploScienza.