The OpenScience Laboratory

An initiative of The Open University and The Wolfson Foundation

This online laboratory brings interactive practical science to students anywhere and anytime the internet is available. The laboratory features investigations based on on-screen instruments, remote access experiments and virtual scenarios using real data. Several activities are available to all, while others are available only to registered users.

Come in and look around.

Lab tour

If you close this box, you can still see it at any time by clicking About from the main header above.

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Popular experiments

  • Hominid skull evolution

    Subject Bio Earth Env

    Explore the features of a collection of hominid skulls and take measurements that will enable you to determine the evolutionary relationships between them, investigating the march of bipedalism through the fossil record.

    Time required
    Open to the public

  • Graph plotter

    Subject Gen

    Import your own data to create graphs.

    Time required 30 mins or more
    Open to the public

  • The OpenScience Laboratory

    Subject Gen

    Time required
    Open to the public

All experiments (filtered; page 1 of 5)

  • Optical Microscope

    Subject Gen Bio Earth Env

    Remote access to microscope loaded with demonstration slides: rock thin-section, beetle, plant stem (x2) and fruit fly's wing.

    Time required 5 min - 1 h
    Open to the public

  • Igneous & metamorphic rock

    Subject Earth

    Hand specimens and slabs of rocks and minerals found in the Lake District.

    Time required 1-2 hours
    Open to the public

  • Graph plotter

    Subject Gen

    Import your own data to create graphs.

    Time required 30 mins or more
    Open to the public

  • t-Test

    Subject Maths Bio

    Determine if two sets of data are significantly different from each other.

    Time required 1-3 hours
    Open to the public

  • Eating for energy

    Subject Env Bio

    An investigation into why greater horseshoe bats are so rare in Britain today.

    Time required 1 hour
    Open to the public

  • Campus Weather Station

    Subject Env Gen

    Live data from The OpenStem Labs weather station on the Open University campus

    Time required
    Open to the public

  • Motors experiments (T212)

    Subject Elec Eng

    Welcome to the actuators board in the OpenEngineering Laboratory.

    Time required 55 minutes
    Open to the public

  • Mt Teide geology

    Subject Earth Astro

    Virtual microscope slides of thin sections

    Time required 10 min
    Open to the public

  • Compton scattering

    Subject Phys

    Remotely controlled Compton scattering: relativistic dynamics and the electron mass.

    Time required 4-5 hours
    Open to the public
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