UWS School of Creative & Cultural Industries will host an 'inspired by 2012' event at the CCA in Glasgow. It will bring together a scientist, an artist and a philosopher in conversation about the upcoming London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, focusing on the future of sport and the role of technologies of the body.

Going beyond the familiar debate about doping and anti-doping, this event will consider how far biology has been pushed by technological culture. Our key speakers are Dr Yannis Pitsiladis, who works with the World Anti-Doping Agency on genetic technologies and live artist Francesca Steele, who became a body builder as part of her most recent performance work. Along with UWS Professor Andy Miah, they will consider how we ought to regard the future of sport and how it might function in an era of transhuman enhancements.

Today, elite sports find themselves in increasingly unchartered waters. More than ever before, athletes are using technology to optimize their biology for performance and many of their methods are not even tested for by the authorities. From genetic tests for sport performance to the use of superhuman prosthetic enhancements, this subject reaches parts that present-day anti-doping rules cannot reach. These technologies have changed elite sports, as we know them, but the next decade promises even more of an overhaul og what we think "being good at sport" means. As we approach the London 2012 Games, this debate will consider the ethical implications of new technology in sport, asking what distinguishes the cheat from the innovator. We will ask whether the debate about the ethics of athletic performance is all but over, as the winning podium makes way for the transhuman athlete.

• Professor Andy Miah, Chair of Ethics and Emerging Technologies in the Faculty of Business & Creative Industries at University of the West of Scotland.
• Dr Yannis Pitsiladis, Reader in Exercise Physiology at the Institute of Cardiovascular & Medical Sciences in the College of Medicine, Veterinary & Life Sciences at the University of Glasgow.
• Francesca Steele, live artist who has performed and exhibited work nationally and internationally since graduating with a BA in Fine Art from Northumbria University.

For more information on this event, please visit the dedicated website by clicking here

This topic is a critical issue leading up to London 2012 and extends across various specialisms in sport science. The Paralympian Oscar Pistorius promises to transform the Olympic and Paralympic Games by lobbying to compete in both competitions, transforming what may be seen as able-­bodied or disabled. Debates about doping always have currency and attract attention, but they are rarely accessible and always concern athlete welfare. This event will bring leading experts in the field of sports medicine and bioethics to articulate the landscape of sport technologies and the impact they will have on the future of sport.

The University of the West of Scotland, working with the Glasgow Centre for Contemporary Art, was selected to be part of the 'Knowing Sport' public engagement programme linked to the International Convention on Science, Education and Medicine in Sport (ICSEMIS 2012). ICSEMIS 2012 will bring together the worlds leading scientists, academics and researchers in disciplines related to sport in advance of the 2012 Games. The pilot programme, being run by Research Councils UK and Podium, aims to engage the public with science, reasearch and the academic desciplines related to sport using the excitement and interest generated by the Games.