THE Hunter Medical Research Institute’s biggest ever Open Day will be held on Friday, 7 October.

As a free school holiday event we’re expecting 3000-4000 people of all ages to attend.

Highlights are a heart chamber bathed in red light and pumping with activities – children get to make edible blood, build a stethoscope to hear their own heartbeat, and explode a baking soda heart (called ‘Don’t go baking my Heart!’).

There’s also a creepy crawly Bugs exhibit, highlighting the microscopic bacteria that live in the human body,

Kids have to climb through slime, armed with a torch.

Mark Rothfield from HMRI said, “We have a Crazy Inventions Laboratory, Making Neurons activity, and Healthy Kids Football Clinic, sneakers required.”

Five Q&A-style Discovery Seminars will cover healthy ageing, stroke, cancer, heart health and the future of medicine.

People can book and see details at hmri.org.au/open-day