Students from the American School of Doha (ASD) were wowed by a series of explosive lab experiments during a visit to the Medical College in February.

WCMC-Q professor of chemistry, Dr. Terrance Murphy, and professor of biology, Dr. Christopher Ogden, joined a group of pre-meds from the Class of 2011 in giving more than 50 high school students a taste of life at WCMC-Q.

Dr. Murphy undertook four experiments, involving fire, loud bangs and music to demonstrate rates of reaction. One involved the lecturer cleverly protecting a 100 Qatar riyal note he'd set alight, whilst another involved chemical reactions timed to the music of the William Tell Overture.

"I wanted to show students some fun things you can do in chemistry. They thought the experiments were pretty cool. If you engage them at an early enough age you can get them excited about science and also to consider studying medicine," Dr. Murphy said.

Dr. Ogden commented: "It's important to reach out to high school children as those who have the capacity to be good physicians (good anything, actually) need the opportunity to identify and realize their potential. There are so many aspects to medicine that you never know just what aspect might connect with some particular talent or interest in one individual.

The school students, who are currently studying biology and chemistry, received an introduction to the Medical College, learnt about the kinds of things the university is looking for in prospective students, and had an opportunity to question WCMC-Q medical students about the realities of studying medicine.

Dr. Murphy remarked: "It is a great opportunity to get students from the high schools to a place like WCMC-Q so they can see what higher education is like and what they might be doing if they came here. The facilities are so great. They haven't seen labs like this and so can't envision what they might be doing."

Some former ASD students are already studying at WCMC-Q, and the strong links with ASD look set to continue with some visiting students awaiting news on their applications to the Medical College.

Laura Tyson, Freelance Writer