Summary Soundscapes, like landscapes, have and important role in our lives. Just like a view from an office or bedroom window, a soundscape can help make us feel comfortable, productive and happy or make us feel uneasy and distracted. There will always be some noise in our environment, be it the rustle of leaves, humming PCs, noisy neighbours or the many other sounds we hear in our daily lives. Without soundscapes our lives would lack the contextual references that help contribute to the quality of our lives; though clearly there's fine line between welcome everyday bustle and noise nuisance. Getting the balance right is a challenge for planning, development and construction, and a challenge for how we as individuals choose to spend each day. Traditionally, professionals are used to measure and assess noise issues using expensive and dedicated equipment. It is the intention of this project to exploit mobile phones and computers to allow a large number of people to engage in noise measurement and assessment, and so give the public a more active role in how their soundscape is shaped. By giving the public the tools to enable them to make noise measurements, it is possible for upstream engagement to be carried out because the public can be more involved in the noise issues from the begining of, say, a development process. In corporation with SEPOINT Manchester, the technologies and procedures of the IMPRINtS project will be developed in schools by engaging students in Key Stage 4 activities relating to environmental science. Nowadays mobile phones can be quite a sophisticated sound sampling and analysing devices, and many people have access to PCs linked to the internet. The IMPRINtS project seeks to exploit these new technologies in a way that is both novel and capable of gathering an unprecedented amount of important environmental noise data. During the development, students will follow practical experiments that utilise IMPRINTs software on mobile phones alongside other sound recording devices to investigate their daily soundscape and their relationship with it. This stage will allow the formative evaluation of the software and website and so enable improvements to be made. Then, IMPRINtS will raise public awareness of soundscapes and our relationship to them by engaging people in a large national survey to measure and characterise the huge variety of soundscapes in Britain. A publicity campaign will be launched in the national media to get participants. Members of the public who come to the IMPRINtS web site will be able to download free software to install on their mobile phone and PCs. The software will allow participants to sample and analyse the variety of soundscapes that play an important role in their everyday lives. All IMPRINtS asks is that users make a series samples of different suggested soundscapes at some suggested times are upload to the IMPRINtS central server. IMPRINtS will ask, via some simple online questionnaires, about the participants own impressions of these soundscapes and the features of them that contribute or detract from the quality of their lives. The results of the national survey event will be published online and in the national media. Online material on issues of environment noise and also ways for the public to influence their environment e.g. via involvement with urban planning will be provided.

Today communications technology impacts on every aspect of everyday life. Within the UK, 84% of the population own a mobile phone and these are being used for sending and accessing information as well as making normal voice calls. The internet and digitial television is providing an increasing range of access to information and the concept of working 'on-line' is now commonplace with many technical terms now in common usage. However, the general awareness of the potential of today's communications technologies and their basic operation is much less well understood or appreciated. The story of communications and its impact on society is therefore a fascinating and exciting one that now forms the heart of a new gallery to be opened at the MSIM. Given the clear significance and impact of communications technology it is essential that the young are educated to understand such technology and how to exploit it and that the older generation too are reassured about the influence and operation of the technology. Our project addresses this challenge using a range of activities. On the one hand traditional engagement events such as lectures and schools events, where children gain hands on experience of how communications systems work by constructing small scale projects, are used to raise awareness and generate enthusiasm. However, on the other hand it is our intention to create an innovative application of communications systems within the Museum's Communications Gallery. Here visitors will be provided with portable devices onto which information will be sent that is automatically determined depending on where the visitor is presently located, where they have been and who they are. In this way it is possible to ensure that the information delivered is not only highly relevant to what the visitor is viewing but also what they have seen previously and where they are about to go. This unique environment will prove an extremely powerful educational tool that not only allows for improved multimedia demonstrations and explanations of how communications technology functions but also allows us to demonstrate the true potential of such technology and how EPSRC sponsored research is impacting the future.Using communications technology within the context of a communications gallery, to raise the awareness and understanding of communications technology itself will uniquely reinforce the public engagement messages being delivered.

Sound pervades much of our daily lives and is one of our primary means of communication. Its ubiquity motivates a wide variety of research / from environmental noise pollution and its resulting annoyance and stress, to more positive aspects such as the design of buildings, which can improve quality of life, and medical diagnosis by ultrasound, which can help improve health. So, sound is an ideal theme for connecting people to engineering, because it can be connected to their every day experiences. Sound features in the national curriculum at key stages 1-4 and on science curricula at AS/A level, and so this allows us to reach out to school pupils. Indeed, this award is mostly focussed on 10-19 year olds. This age group is emphasised because: (i) it contains vital ages where disengagement from science and engineering occurs, and (ii) it is important to counter the dropping of science and maths for post 16-education, as these subjects must be studied if pupils are to progress to engineering careers.Sound, and especially noise, is an important issue for policy makers and features often in the media, for example bad neighbours are often cited as noisy neighbours because the noise gives something tangible to complain about; this again giving possibilities for awareness work. Society implicitly or explicitly makes trade offs between the noise annoyance generated by activities and an individual's freedom to undertake these activities. Consequently, meaningful research in many areas of acoustics requires a dialogue to be established between researchers and the general public.Acoustic engineering is concerned with the production, transmission, manipulation and reception of sound, from unwanted industrial noise to beautiful music. Acoustics embodies both the physical properties of sound waves, and the psychological and physiological reaction of humans. Given the importance of perception to acoustics, it is possible to engage the public by getting them to participate in the experimental process, for instance in mass web-experiments. Acoustics naturally cuts across traditional discipline boundaries, which opens up opportunity for public communication work. For example, the stage will link acoustic engineering to music and the arts, giving a way of engaging pupils by drawing on their interests outside engineering. This link across traditional discipline boundaries is also exploited to show that engineering can be fun and creative.The activities proposed are:1. A craft project based on making musical instruments out of vegetables2. A project where pupils work with artists to create works exploiting acoustic engineering.3. A show entitled Sound at the Extremes which will examine extreme frequency ranges (ultrasound and infrasound), extreme volume levels (very quiet and very loud), and extreme environments (deep underwater or planetary acoustics).4. A dialogue activity for 14-19 years old and their parents to enable researchers to understand their attitudes to soundscapes.5. Employing a journalist to raise the awareness of acoustics.6. Web experiments on soundscapes (and maybe also on sexy voices).

From earliest times, mankind has exploited the technology of the day to acquire, record and transmit information. Now in the 21st century our reliance on telecommunications technology has never been greater. Whether it is keeping in touch with family and friends using a mobile, browsing the Web or watching digital television, telecommunications drives society. Much of what is taken for granted today would not be possible without the scientists and engineers who exploited technology to transmit information ever further and ever faster. The rate of development has been tremendous. Two hundred years ago information was transmitted optically using mechanical devices. One hundred years ago those same messages could be transmitted much more quickly using the electrical telegraph and the telephone had just been invented. Fifty years ago the ability to transmit messages without wires using radio was well established, the telephone had overtaken the telegraph as the dominate communications system and computers were just emerging. Thirty years ago the Internet existed only in a few research and university laboratories. Twenty years ago the telephone went mobile and today it is the fastest growing telecommunications technology with well over one third of the world's population owning and using a mobile phone.We intend to raise public awareness of the exciting story of how telecommunications has transformed society. Here we want to explain how the technology works, how today's research is driving tomorrow's technology and to debate the impact of technology on society. We will do this as follows.First, we will extend the work we have already done with the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester where a new visitor information system, called mi-Guide, has been introduced to their Communications Gallery. This system allows Museum visitors to receive additional information about exhibits, delivered to a hand-held computer using telecommunications technology. Our system will now move out of the Gallery and into the classroom to help support key national curriculum subjects. New mi-Guide multimedia content will be developed in association with schools and educational centres. Teachers will then be able to plan lessons that bring added levels of interest, excitement and engagement to the subject and provide access to information at the Museum. If the lesson precedes a visit to the Gallery then the hand-held version of mi-Guide will automatically guide the teacher and group around the Gallery, pointing out exhibits of interest that were used during the lesson and provide a facility to record aspects of the visit for use on return to school.Second, we will run a series of Family Telecommunications Days and Lectures. The family days provide a mini-exhibition of artefacts and demonstrations that allow visitors to interact with telecommunications technology to learn how it works and to appreciate how it has developed over time. The lectures are designed to appeal to a general interest audience and involve members of the audience taking part in demonstrations. Lectures will be linked to relevant 'hot topics', celebrate relevant anniversaries and show how research is key to the future of telecommunications.Finally, there will be a series of events for schools that range from small scale projects and debate days to interactive learning sessions. Our telecommunications artefacts and demonstrations will be used to explain the underlying science and engineering and debate days will allow students to discuss an important aspect of telecommunications and its impact on their lives, for example the issues surrounding information security. In total, this project offers a broad range of engagement activities that build upon our proven track record and extend our work to provide specific projects and directly support the national curriculum in schools and provide opportunities for increased awareness amongst the general public.

Sound pervades much of our daily lives and is one of our primary means of communication. Its ubiquity motivates a wide variety of research / from environmental noise pollution and its resulting annoyance and stress, to more positive aspects such as the design of buildings, which can improve quality of life, and medical diagnosis by ultrasound, which can help improve health. So, sound is an ideal theme for connecting people to engineering, because it can be connected to their every day experiences. Sound features in the national curriculum at key stages 1-4 and on science curricula at AS/A level, and so this allows us to reach out to school pupils. Indeed, this award is mostly focussed on 10-19 year olds. This age group is emphasised because: (i) it contains vital ages where disengagement from science and engineering occurs, and (ii) it is important to counter the dropping of science and maths for post 16-education, as these subjects must be studied if pupils are to progress to engineering careers.Sound, and especially noise, is an important issue for policy makers and features often in the media, for example bad neighbours are often cited as noisy neighbours because the noise gives something tangible to complain about; this again giving possibilities for awareness work. Society implicitly or explicitly makes trade offs between the noise annoyance generated by activities and an individual's freedom to undertake these activities. Consequently, meaningful research in many areas of acoustics requires a dialogue to be established between researchers and the general public.Acoustic engineering is concerned with the production, transmission, manipulation and reception of sound, from unwanted industrial noise to beautiful music. Acoustics embodies both the physical properties of sound waves, and the psychological and physiological reaction of humans. Given the importance of perception to acoustics, it is possible to engage the public by getting them to participate in the experimental process, for instance in mass web-experiments. Acoustics naturally cuts across traditional discipline boundaries, which opens up opportunity for public communication work. For example, the stage will link acoustic engineering to music and the arts, giving a way of engaging pupils by drawing on their interests outside engineering. This link across traditional discipline boundaries is also exploited to show that engineering can be fun and creative.The activities proposed are:1. A craft project based on making musical instruments out of vegetables2. A project where pupils work with artists to create works exploiting acoustic engineering.3. A show entitled Sound at the Extremes which will examine extreme frequency ranges (ultrasound and infrasound), extreme volume levels (very quiet and very loud), and extreme environments (deep underwater or planetary acoustics).4. A dialogue activity for 14-19 years old and their parents to enable researchers to understand their attitudes to soundscapes.5. Employing a journalist to raise the awareness of acoustics.6. Web experiments on soundscapes (and maybe also on sexy voices).