FRIENDS of a missing Russian student have sparked a massive search in the Highlands and Islands, with ferry, rail and bus terminals carrying her image and a touring cinema also broadcasting the message to its patrons.

Some 5260 people have joined the Facebook campaign to help find Yulia Solodyankina and thousands of posters have been printed and put up since the 22-year-old Russian, a physics graduate from Edinburgh University, disappeared.

The last confirmed sighting was at Buchanan Bus Station in Glasgow on June 7. However, the northern appeal comes after a possible sighting in Fionnphort on Mull and other potential leads in Campbeltown, Ardrishaig, Oban and Fort William.

As well as libraries and shops, a mobile cinema, the Screen Machine, that tours the Highlands and festivals, is to carry posters of the appeal in the hope patrons can help find the student.

One online supporter made a Gaelic translation of the appeal poster to be downloaded.

Another friend, Sara Rasmussen, said "most ferry terminals, main shops, ferries and some hostels and libraries have been flyered from Barra to Stornoway". She said she was heading to Shetland via Inverness and Aberdeen and would post more of the appeal leaflets in those locations.

Ms Solodyankina had been due to attend her graduation ceremony earlier this month and her absence was marked by Sir Timothy O'Shea, principal and vice-chancellor of the university, who expressed his concerns for her safety.

Her father Dmitry travelled from Russia to Edinburgh to help plan his daughter's graduation celebration but instead has been involved in the missing person appeal. Her mother Ekaterina issued an appeal through police, reassuring her daughter that there are "no hopeless situations in life", adding: "Come back, if you hear us. We love you very much".

The online campaign has been repeated among students in Ms Solodyankina's home city of Moscow.