MORE than 300 North-East school students are attending a two-day event aimed at attracting more youngsters into science.

The event, staged yesterday and today, has been sponsored by the Royal Society of Chemistry.

It is geared to providing links between the classroom, science research and industry.

Representatives from several multi-national corporations, including Pfizer, BASF and Northumbrian Water, have been busy setting up experiments and interactive presentations for pupils from Durham, Sunderland, Newcastle and South Tyneside.

Among the highlights of the workshops will be a lecture by the University of Sunderland's Dr John Kilcoyne, who is renowned for entertaining pupils with novel experiments which feature ingredients including frozen fruit and which often go off with a bang.