Professor Val O'Shea:

I am a technologist. My interest is in developing technology not just for high-energy physics but for a range of applications. I work with Professor McClean on aspects of medical imaging. I would like to stress, which has not arisen enough in our discussion, the hit rate of CERN for EU funding. They get 35% versus an average of 12%. I am a vice-chairman on the physics evaluation panel for a number of different funding instruments and I see these projects that come. They have access to the best expertise because they know all of the people. This is an international process. They have expertise in putting together proposals and they achieve a hit rate of three times more. If Ireland was a member of CERN, it would have similar access to funding. This would increase EU funding to this country considerably.

On technology, I worked at CERN for six years and then went to Glasgow, but I was still able to access technologies through the organisation that I cannot find anywhere else in the world. It is about networking, being able to access expertise and to use stuff that one would not be able to get even in the Tyndall National Institute, which has a high level of expertise, but it does not have it all together. That enables me to dream up new innovations such as Medipix. Medipix is a toy for looking at X-rays in colour. All of the big computed tomography, CT, companies are now working on what is known as full spectral CT, which is a new way of taking CT images - they are vital diagnostic tools for cancer - with full colour resolution. This enables one to take better images with lower dose. Philips, Siemens, GE and Hitachi are all working on this technology and it was all invented at CERN.