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

  • Light Harvesters

    Subject Env Bio

    Value the trees in your neighbourhood and see their environmental benefits using Treezilla.

    Time required 1-3 hours
    Open to the public

  • Using the digital microscope to count leukocytes in blood samples

    Subject Bio Health
    Time required
    Open to the public

All experiments (filtered; page 1 of 5)

  • Blue Planet II labcasts

    Subject Earth Env

    Catch-up recordings of live interactive broadcasts

    Time required
    Open to the public

  • Planets and moons labcasts (S283, Moons MOOC)

    Subject Astro

    Catch-up recordings of live interactive broadcasts

    Time required
    Open to the public

  • VOFT

    Subject Env Earth

    Virtual Oceanographic Field Trip

    Time required 3 - 4 hours
    Open to the public

  • Light Harvesters

    Subject Env Bio

    Value the trees in your neighbourhood and see their environmental benefits using Treezilla.

    Time required 1-3 hours
    Open to the public

  • A-level: virtual microscope

    Subject Bio

    A collection of slides covering animal and plant tissues in the school curriculum.

    Time required 1-2 hours 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

  • DNA quantitation

    Subject Bio Chem

    Spectrometry, micropipette, dilutions, quantitation, quality checks, controls.

    Time required 2 hours
    Open to the public

  • Mt Teide geology

    Subject Earth Astro

    Virtual microscope slides of thin sections

    Time required 10 min
    Open to the public

  • PIRATE facility

    Subject Astro Phys

    Remote-access astronomical observatory.

    Time required 10 h
    Open to the public
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