Explore our cutting edge toxicology research through fun science comics
Our comics are a new addition to our public engagement programme and are making our research accessible to a wide range of audiences around the world. We are developing a series of comics with comic book author and illustrator Claudia Flandoli.
Why use comics?
Comics are accessible and appealing to a range of audiences, from young children to adults. Their visual impact draws in the reader, and complex scientific concepts can be simplified and illustrated in a straightforward manner. The use of narratives and storytelling is also a powerful component of comics, and research has shown that using storytelling can be an effective way to engage an audience with science. The comics enable the reader to visualise the mechanistic research that we do, and understand why we carry out our research. Our comics link what we do every day in our labs, to everyday life. This is what makes them so powerful.
Our comics
The first comic, entitled 'What's wrong with this DNA?', launched in April 2024. This story follows Pol the polymerase as they find some unexpected damage on the DNA they are replicating and the consequences of this damage. It is based on the research of the Aitken lab and introduces the topics of DNA duplication, DNA damage, lesion segregation and multiallelism. The production of this comic was supported by Dr Claudia Arnedo Pac & Dr Sarah Aitken.
Two more comics will be launched throughout 2024.
Click on the covers below to download your comic now (digital and printable versions).
If you want to print your comics at home, then we have a handy guide here about how to do just that.
Comic translations
We want to make our research and our science comics accessible across the world, so we are translating them into other languages. Below you can download versions that we currently have, with more on the way soon. If you can help us with translations, or would like to request a language, please get in touch with communications@mrc-tox.cam.ac.uk.