Quentin Cooper

Science journalist, facilitator and veteran presenter of BBC Radio 4’s Material World

portrait
Quentin Cooper photographed during Cape Farewell’s 2008 Disko Bay Expedition. Photo by Nathan Gallagher.

Quentin Cooper is a science journalist and facilitator, best known as the veteran presenter of BBC Radio 4’s The Material World. He speaks at science festivals and lectures, and works regularly with science and educational organisations such as the Royal Society and the British Council.

Quentin joined Cape Farewell on the 2004 Art/Science Expedition, circumnavigating Spitsbergen, the main island of the Svalbard archipelago, and sailing almost as far North as possible aboard the Noorderlicht. He returned to the Arctic with Cape Farewell in 2008, joining the Disko Bay Expedition. Since the expeditions Quentin has joined Cape Farewell at a series of events including the Cheltenham Science Festival and Uummannaq Day at Southbank Centre.

BBC Radio 4 – Arctic Special

From interviews and recordings made during the 2004 voyage Quentin Cooper presented a programme following the expedition for BBC Radio 4’s The Material World. The 30 minute show broadcast on the 30 December 2004.
More about the programme

Guardian article: Postcards from the Edge

“Svalbard is Norwegian for ‘cold edge’. We’re just off that cold edge in a two-masted schooner, the Noorderlicht, almost as far north as it is possible to sail. Between here and the north pole it’s largely ice floes and solid ice. We are here because there is significantly less than there once was…” Following the 2004 expedition Quentin Cooper also wrote an article published in the Guardian. The Guardian featured Postcards from the Edge as the cover story for the Life lift-out on the 2nd December 2004.

BBC Radio 4 – Disko Bay feature

Following the Disko Bay expedition Quentin hosted a special Material World Cape Farewell show on New Year’s Day 2009, with a programme billed as a “science-meets-art-meets-a-fair-bit-of-music special from the cold but not quite as cold as they used to be waters off the west coast of Greenland”.
Listen again online

“For me science isn’t a subject, it’s a perspective. There are fascinating scientific aspects to everything from ancient history to the latest gadgets, outer space to interior decorating; and each week on The Material World we try to reflect the excitement, ideas, uncertainties, collisions and collaborations as science continues its never-ending voyage into the unknown.”

Quentin Cooper on BBC Radio 4’s The Material World

Follow Quentin’s blog from the Disko Bay Expedition
BBC Radio 4 – Arctic Special
About the 2004 Art/Science Expedition


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