Egg racers and paint makers get SET

Instrument makers and circus performers are among 61 winners this week of Royal Society grants for activities during the 1997 National Week of Science, Engineering and Technology.

In total Pounds 80,000 was awarded to support projects to make science more accessible during the science extravaganza next March.

Mervyn Farrell at Queen's University Belfast, gets Pounds 2,000 for a play about Northern Ireland's scientists and inventors.

Lesley Glass from the Marischal College in Aberdeen will use his Pounds 675 to run an evening "science circus", complete with egg race.

Martyn Gorman of the University of Aberdeen receives Pounds 2,000 for an interactive exhibition about how satellites track wildlife.

Bob Chapin, from Lancaster University, will use his Pounds 1,350 grant to teach teenagers and parents to make and play instruments.

Rebecca Crawford at the University of Glasgow, gets Pounds 1,000 to run a circuit-building workshop for children in her city.

John Nicholson, from the University of East Anglia, will use his Pounds 1,500 grant to teach people to make their own natural paints.

A series of events looking at the relationship between science and religion will be backed by a Pounds 735 grant to Helen O'Sullivan at Liverpool Hope University College.