This week at the Progress Educational Trust (13 June 2013)

The Progress Educational Trust (PET) is pleased to announce the title of its forthcoming Annual Conference, which will take place on Wednesday 4 December 2013 at University College London's Institute of Child Health. The conference is entitled 'Double Take: Twins in Genetics and Fertility Treatment', and as the title suggests, its focus will be multiple pregnancies and multiple births in relation to genetics, fertility treatment and early development. Details of the programme and how to book will be announced shortly (watch this space), but in the meantime, you're more than welcome like to register your interest in the conference by emailing Sandy Starr at

In other news, PET Director Sarah Norcross (pictured right) has been busy this week. To begin with, she went to Manchester to participate in a conference entitled 'Motherhood All Change: Surrogacy Revisited', organised by the University of Manchester and supported by the Wellcome Trust as part of the research programme 'The Human Body, Its Scope, Limits and Future'. Also present at the conference was Dr Kirsty Horsey (pictured right beside Sarah), Adviser to PET and Contributing Editor at its BioNews publication, as well as BioNews writers Professor Eric Blyth and Nishat Hyder. Kirsty is due to write a piece about the conference for BioNews - if you don't subscribe to its email newsletter already, you can do so for free here.

Closer to PET's London office, Sarah also attended an event at the Nuffield Foundation to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Donor Conception Network (DCN). This charity (pictured left) has been in existence for almost as long as PET, and is made up of a network of around 1,600 families based mainly in the UK. It provides invaluable support to donor-conceived people, their families and people considering or undergoing donor conception treatment, and it has contributed to many of PET's events and initiatives (most recently the project 'When It Takes More Than Two'). PET would like to congratulate DCN on reaching this milestone, and wish it every success for the next 20 years.

Finally, PET/BioNews Legal Editor Antony Blackburn-Starza (pictured right) has also been busy this week, going to the Arts Catalyst venue to participate in a conference entitled 'Breaking Down Barriers: Law, Technoscience and Society'. This event was organised by the University of Kent and the Arts and Humanities Research Council, as part of the research programme 'Technoscience, Law and Society: Interrogating the Nexus'.