'The Brain Scoop' host comes to Fermilab Jan. 15

The Fermilab Lecture Series continues with "The Brain Scoop: Communicating Science Through Museums and YouTube" by Emily Graslie, Chief Curiosity Correspondent at The Field Museum, at 8 p.m. Friday, Jan. 15. Tickets are $7. For tickets, visit www.fnal.gov/culture or call (630) 840-ARTS (2787) from 8:30 to 4 p.m. weekdays.

YouTube sees more than 1 billion unique visitors to its website every month. It's impossible to ignore a significant percentage of the world's population congregating around an aggregate of online videos, but are people watching more than just music and cat videos?

"The Brain Scoop" is an educational YouTube channel based at The Field Museum in Chicago that aims to bring its global audience behind the closed doors of the museum's collection. The Field houses more than 26 million specimens and artifacts within its stores, but these are only a fraction of the natural world's treasures. The stories of researchers and their work exceed the capacity of any general on-site attendee. Join Emily Graslie as she discusses how the museum uses new digital media to expand the outreach and impact of its scientists' ongoing research.

Emily Graslie's relationship with science began as an internship with The University of Montana Zoological Museum while earning her bachelor in fine arts in painting. What started off as a means to practice scientific illustration developed into a love of skeletal preparation and an interest in the inner workings of natural history museums. In January 2013, Graslie and YouTube educator Hank Green launched a YouTube channel, "The Brain Scoop," which aims to share the inner and outer workings of natural history museums. Graslie now hosts the show at The Field Museum in Chicago and is their first Chief Curiosity Correspondent, where she and producer Tom McNamara use a variety of new and digital media to share the Field's stories with passionate learners from all over the world.

Ramsey Auditorium is located in Wilson Hall, the central building of Fermilab. Wilson Hall, a high-rise, is accessible from the west on Kirk Road at Pine Street or from the east on Batavia Road in Warrenville. At this time both the Pine Street entrance (from Kirk Road in Batavia) and the Batavia Road entrance, west of Route 59 in Warrenville, are open. Visit www.fnal.gov/culture.