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The scheme, which has been running since 2001 in partnership with the Government Office for Science, aims to help build relationships between scientists and politicians, ensuring that policymakers can make decisions based on the best scientific evidence. Previous participants include the Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, Greg Clark, former Chair of the Commons Science and Technology Committee, Nick Clegg, former Deputy Prime Minister, and Caroline Lucas MP, former leader of the Green Party.

The 30 scientists taking part this year are drawn from universities and research institutes across the UK. They are shadowing a range of parliamentarians and civil servants.

Over the course of a week, scientists get a behind the scenes insight into how policy is formed, shadowing a policy maker to learn about their work and how they can best share their expertise. The scheme will continue later in the year when parliamentarians visit their scientist pairs at their home institutions.

Dr Isaac Siu-Shing Wong is a postdoc at the Dunn School (Raff lab), a Max Planck-Croucher Fellow at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG) in Dresden and a Junior Research Fellow at Wadham College. His current research investigates the unique architecture of centrosomes, which exhibit both solid-like and liquid-like properties. His research at Oxford primarily focuses on in vivo experiments, whereas his work in Dresden emphasizes biophysical studies and in vitro reconstitution methods.

Adam Thompson is the MP for Erewash. He is the Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary University Group, and part of the Science Innovation and Technology Commons Select Committee.