By Emily Williams
The SIAM-IMA Student Chapter at Cardiff University recently held its "Three Minute Thesis" competition within the School of Mathematics. The event, which took place on March 26th, follows the same principles as the competition of the same name developed by the University of Queensland; participants must present their research in three minutes or less. This poses quite the challenge to Ph.D. students — not only in terms of condensing their extensive work into three minutes, but also in accessibly presenting this research to an audience ranging from undergraduate students to academic staff.
This year, 12 contestants bravely took on this challenge and battled it out for a great selection of prizes, including Bluetooth headphones, a Bluetooth speaker, Amazon gift vouchers, 50 Visions of Mathematics books (provided by the Institute for Mathematics and its Applications) and SIAM T-shirts and merchandise (provided by SIAM). Our participants offered an entertaining and inspiring afternoon, resulting in a very difficult decision for our expert judging panel: Mark Tuson, Katerina Kaouri, Ulrich Pennig, and David McConnell. After much deliberation, the panel reached the following final verdict:
- First Place: Chris Seaman
- Second Place: Joe Bishop
- Third Place: Nikoleta Glynatsi
- Crowd Favourite: Sam Richardson
Congratulations to our winners, and thank you to all who took part and delivered excellent presentations. I would like to offer thanks on behalf of all chapter members to both SIAM and the IMA for providing financial support and prizes and helping to make this event possible. I would also like to extend my personal thanks to the judges for their expert opinions and time, and the Cardiff School of Mathematics for supporting the event and supplying refreshments afterwards. Finally, I would like to offer a special thank you to Danny Groves, the competition’s brilliant host and president of the SIAM-IMA Student Chapter at Cardiff University, for his enthusiasm and passion for the event as well as his support throughout its organisation.
Judging from both the atmosphere on the day and subsequent feedback from the audience, this year’s Three Minute Thesis was another success. We hope to continue this event in the future.
Emily Williams is a research student in the School of Mathematics at Cardiff University.