This is the journey zone of the Dome, which was unveiled yesterday. As visitors enter, they are greeted with a series of facts about travel and esoteric thoughts on the subject as well as a history from walking to space missions.
Periscopes allow visitors to sample the personal views about travel and transport from people all around the world.Visitors move along a narrow ramp with display cases for models of ships and Model T Ford cars (the company has sponsored the zone) on either side. THE SHOW starts with an assault on the senses. Loud music and banks of screens showing aircraft taking off, cars driving and people running. “The mind is a difficult concept for people to get their heads around.”Providing the last-minute glitches can be sorted out, and the ants and smoke can be encouraged to return, the mind zone might still work – as long as you use a little of that other cerebral attribute, imagination.. The problem, however, was there was little to explain the importance of language development, both in terms of evolutionary origins and the mental evolution of a speechless baby into a chattering child.Further on, a piece of clever software based on a neural network attempted to search the Internet by establishing its interconnections rather than merely drawing up a linear list of websites.Mark Broughton, the director of special projects at Marconi, a sponsor of the zone, acknowledged that trying to portray something as complex and amorphous as the mind – and yet still be entertaining – was a tall order. A cold Dome, however, played tricks on another character of the Mind Zone.

An “invisible” sculpture by Gavin Turk was supposed to have been shrouded in smoke, but the special effects had unfortunately condensed on to the figure’s cold glass cabinet.Walking through a corridor of voices, starting with a baby’s babble and ending with a handful of very adult languages, exemplified the unique ability to speak in many tongues. Born with an ability to carry out a limited number of tasks to perfection, ants have little room for mind expansion, however.A corridor of distorted mirrors and a set of infra-red cameras, which detect heat rather than visible light, emphasise the role of the senses in the perception of the exterior world.Crouching above the scene is a giant sculpture of an adolescent boy, a somewhat incongruous example of gilded, inquisitive youth at the end of the 20th century. THE HUMAN brain is the most complex structure in the universe – and that includes the Millennium Dome – so it was a tough assignment for anybody to try to portray its most intriguing creation, the mind. The mind zone makes a brave stab in the right direction by combining art and perception with intelligent hardware and a colony of leaf-cutting ants, which yesterday proved to have a mind of their own by keeping to their warm nest.
Visitors begin the tour with a trip to a “robot zoo”, a collection of intelligent machines programmed for survival.The ants, had they been running around their miniature Perspex pavements, were supposed to be example of programmed intelligence in nature. “We are asking for their help to ensure this never happens again,” she said.As the hospital began returning organs to parents for burial last month, public revulsion at the practice grew prompting Alan Milburn, the Secretary of State for Health, to announce an independent inquiry. The Government’s chief medical officer, Professor Liam Donaldson, is also chairing a national review of the practice; and the public inquiry into the Bristol heart babies disaster, which first revealed the practice last March, is due to produce an interim report in the spring.Since the scandal was revealed the hospital has imposed a ban on organ retention and set up a helpline to counsel shocked families.. The standard consent form allows “tissue” to be retained for diagnosis, teaching or research but there is dispute about whether this covers organs.

The remainder were coroners’ examinations for which parental consent is not required.Publishing the report yesterday, Hilary Rowland, chief executive of Alder Hey, said: “We agree with the report and welcome its findings. The Myrtle Street collection was clearly unacceptable and we apologise for any distress caused to parents.” She appealed to parents to help devise new consent forms for permission to retain tissue and organs for medical education and research. Dr Gould said consultants and managers at the hospital must have been aware of Mr Van Velzen’s practices.The inquiry also found that of the 845 children who had at least one organ retained, more than half (489) were hospital post-mortem examinations for which parental consent is required. His investigation had been hampered, he said, by the fact that many post-mortem examinations were not completed.Calling for an investigation of the department of foetal and infant pathology, responsible for carrying out the post-mortem examinations, he said it should examine how far shortage of resources played a part in the low completion rate.Professor Dick van Velzen, head of the department from 1988 to 1994, has defended his practice of removing organs on the grounds that he did not have the money to complete the post-mortem examinations and was saving the organs for later investigation. It launched an immediate inquiry chaired by Dr Stephen Gould, a consultant pathologist, which reported yesterday.

In his report, Dr Gould said the “extent of organ retention is far more than would normally be expected” but that since 1996 it had reverted to the level found elsewhere. Parents were kept in the dark and most had no idea they were burying their children without their hearts or brains.
Between 1988 and 1995, the period covered by the inquiry, a total of almost 3,000 organs were retained, including 767 brains, 611 hearts, 773 lungs and 787 abdominal organs. In 587 cases, a full set of organs was removed, the inquiry found.The scandal came to light in the autumn after the hospital reported it had discovered a cache of organs in the Myrtle Street laboratory of Liverpool University that it never knew it had. The hospital’s own inquiry, the first of four into the nationwide practice, found that at Alder Hey the removal of organs was so common it became standard. THE BODIES of children who died at Alder Hey hospital in Liverpool were subjected to routine stripping of their organs on a scale unequalled elsewhere, an investigation has revealed. The Department for Education said the Government had no intention of changing the arrangements in England and Wales.. The first opportunity to embarrass the Government in Westminster will be an inquiry into higher education planned by the House of Commons education select committee for the new year.The deal will cost pounds 62m a year, a figure that would rise tenfold if it was also applied to England, Wales and Northern Ireland, making it highly unlikely that it would be acceptable to David Blunkett, the Secretary of State for Education and Employment.