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On May 29th 2015, the Queen Square Student Committee hosted the 16th Annual Queen Square Symposium, an event for students of all disciplines based at Queen Square.
This year boasted the highest turnout of the Symposium yet – bringing together all niches of the Square, from cognitive neuroscience and functional neuroimaging to molecular neuroscience and electrophysiology.
The day began with a poster competition with four awards: best PhD student poster, awarded to Sarah Wiethoff; best MSc student poster, awarded to Xin You Tai; best BSc student poster, awarded to Verna Sarajarvi; and finally the 3Rs Recognition Award, awarded to Charlotte Lee-Reeves.
The afternoon’s talks were kicked off by research students Bimali Hapuarachchi and Walter Muruet, who spoke about their current work. Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow Gabriele Lignani gave this year’s Early Career Neuroscientist talk, giving insights into the use of CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing as a tool to manipulate ion channel expression and function. This year’s keynote speaker was the esteemed Professor Geoffrey Raisman, who has pioneered the field of spinal repair. He took us on a journey of his life as a scientist. He described how coining of the term plasticity in 1969 led to the use of olfactory ensheathing cells from the nasal mucosa and olfactory bulb to repair CNS injury – a task deemed impossible by most.
With the day’s successful events coming to an end, the 16th Annual Queen Square Symposium was rounded up – as any event should – with wine and cheese.