Dean's Research Prize Winners
The Dean's Research awards celebrate the huge range of research carried out by undergraduates, postgraduates and PhD students across the faculty, with a range of presentations, posters, and prizes.
The event includes the Three Minute Thesis challenge (3MT®). The winner and runner-up progress to the UCL semi-final with the opportunity to progress to the UK National Vitae competition.
2023-24 Winners
Postgraduate Research Presentation
- Judges’ Choice: Emily Walsh (Division of Medicine) High Resolution Microscopy of Self-protection in the Immune Synapse
- People’s Choice: Emma Lucie Alice Touizer (Division of Infection & Immunity) The Impact of B Cell Phenotypes in HIV Infection on Antibody Responses
3MT® Presentation
- Judges’ Choice: Brittany Cucchiaro (Division of Medicine) Exploring Nutrition’s Vital Role in Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) T-cell Therapy - Nourishing Success.
- People’s Choice: Rhyla Mae Santiago (Cancer Institute) Dormant Cell: Radiotherapy's Worst Nightmare
Postgraduate Taught Poster
- Judges’ Choice: Urmi Shah (MSc Physical Therapy in Musculoskeletal Healthcare & Rehabilitation) Electromyography Biofeedback for People with Knee Osteoarthritis: A Systematic Review.
- People’s Choice: Sara Bin Shalhoub (MSc Musculoskeletal Science) Knowledge, Perceptions and Views of Occupational Therapists towards the use of Virtual Reality for the Management of Musculoskeletal Conditions: A Cross Sectional Survey
Undergraduate Poster
- Judges’ Choice: Sanchit Aapan (BSc (Intercal) Medical Sciences with Mathematics, Computers and Medicine) Preoperatively Predicting the Likelihood of Complications following Meningioma Resection - A Machine Learning Analysis
- People’s Choice: Diya Paras Shah (BSc [Intercal] Medical Sciences with Surgical Sciences) Optimising Gelatin Methacrylate for Corneal Regeneration
Postgraduate Research Presentation
- Judges' Choice: Auxtine Micalet (Division of Surgery & Interventional Science). Stiffness and Cancer Invasion Using 3D In Vitro Tumour Models.
- People's Choice: Fiona Verisqa (Eastman Dental Institute). The Best of Both Worlds: Can We Combine 3D Printable Materials for Joint Regeneration?
3MT® Presentation
- Judges' Choice: Puja Mehta (Division of Medicine). Post-COVID Interstitial Lung Disease (ILD): Finding the Smooth(ie) Criminals… & Custodians.
- People's Choice: Sandra Kuswandani (Eastman Dental Institute). Combination of Cell-based Engineering and Soft Tissue Substitutes (STS): a Future for Wound Healing in Tissue Engineering?
Postgraduate Taught Poster
- Judges' Choice: Selin Cankat (Division of Infection & Immunity). T cells that Abort SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Seronegative Healthcare Workers Persist up to 18-months After Exposure
- People's Choice: Hong Jin Tan (Eastman Dental Institute). Development and In Vitro Characterisation of Amoxicillin-Encapsulated PMPC-PDPA Polymersomes.
Undergraduate Poster
- Judges' Choice: Nadia Vloemans (Division of Surgery & Interventional Science). Investigation of Cobalt Bioactive Glass on a Diabetic Wound Model.
- People's Choice: Alexandre Woernle (Division of Medicine). The Impact of Second Reads in the One-Stop Prostate MRI Clinic
The 10th Dean's Research Prize took place online on Thursday 19 March 2022. For all categories, two prizes were awarded: a Judges' Award and a People's Choice award (by audience vote).
See the full 2022 event report
Postgraduate Research Presentation:
- Judges' Choice: Thomas Fox (Division of Infection & Immunity). Towards Gene Therapy for CTLA4 Insufficiency
- People's Choice: Kalliopi Bokea (Division of Surgery & Interventional Science). Tumouroids versus xenografts, as platforms for the prediction of treatment response of patients with kidney cancer.
3MT® Presentation:
- Judges' Choice: Kavina Shah (Division of Medicine). Coercing Cellular Co-operation into Conflict: a paradigm shift in treating autoimmune disease
- People's Choice: Fiona Verisqa (Eastman Dental Institute). The best of both worlds: Can we combine 3D printable materials for joint regeneration?
Postgraduate Taught Poster:
- Judges' Choice: Roaa Al-Bedaery (UCL Medical School). A realist evaluation of undergraduate medical teaching with remote (telephone and video) consultations in primary care
- People's Choice: Iris Ee Jiunliew (Eastman Dental Institute). Orthodontic YouTubeTM videos made by patients for patients: What are they about and are they accurate?
Undergraduate Poster:
- Judges' Choice: Joseph Kettle (Cancer Institute). Single Centre Relevance of Predictive and Prognostic Biomarkers for Metastatic Urothelial Cancer
- People's Choice: Elsie Lucia Rodriguez Hernandez (Cancer Institute). Clinical and Molecular Characterisation of Early-Onset Colorectal Cancer Patients
The 9th Dean's Research Prize took place online on Thursday 27 May 2021. For all categories, two prizes were awarded: a Judges' Award and a People's Choice award (by audience vote).
See the full 2021 event report
Postgraduate Research Presentation:
- Judges' Choice: Rishi Kumar Gupta (Division of Infection and Immunity). Precision Targeting of Preventative Therapy for Tuberculosis
- People's Choice: Christopher Wincup (Division of Medicine). Investigating Abnormal Iron Metabolism and Mitochondrial Dysfunction as a Novel Mechanism for Fatigue in Systemic Lupus Erythematosus
3MT® Presentation:
- Judges' Choice: Eoin Dinneen (Division of Surgery and Interventional Science). Potent Stuff! Preserving Erections in Men Who Are Having Prostate Cancer Surgery
- People's Choice: Olivia Bracken (Division of Medicine). Lipid Mediators – A Drug Target for Autoimmunity?
Postgraduate Taught Poster:
- Judges' Choice: Lucie Rayner (MSc Performing Arts Medicine). Lumbar Flexicurve Apex Height Measurement: A New Spine Extension Screening Tool for Dancers
- People's Choice: Pinelopi Alexandropoulou (MSc Clinical and Public Health Nutrition). Inter-Individual Variability in Weight Loss Response to Dietary Interventions with Varying Macronutrient Distribution: A Systematic Review
Undergraduate Poster:
- Judges' Choice: Niraj Doshi (iBSc Medical Sciences with Clinical Sciences). A Genome-Wide Association Study of Non-Alcohol Related Fatty Liver Disease in India: Is there a Divergence in the Genetic Risk Profile?
- People's Choice: Abhinav Kumar (iBSc Medical Sciences with Oncology). Evaluating Potential Theranostic Agents that have an Application for Both Imaging and Radiosensitisation.
The 8th Dean's Research Prize took place at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead on 6 February 2020.
See the full 2020 event report
Postgraduate Research Presentation:
- Natalie Edner (Division of Infection & Immunity). Follicular helper T cells predict response to immunotherapy in type 1 diabetes
3MT® Presentation:
- Judges' Choice: Nekisa Zakeri (Division of Infection & Immunity). The New Cells on the Block: removing the brakes for liver cancer therapy. (Nekisa was also the winner of the UCL 3MT® Institutional Final held on 17 June 2020)
- People's Choice: Yingqi Hou (Division of Medicine). Pneumonia: Sticky Bacteria in Action
Postgraduate Taught Poster:
- Helena Pérez Peña (MSc Drug Design). Wild type and Analogue Sensitive (AS) homology models of Leishmania mexicana kinetochore kinases CLK1, KKT3 and KKT2
Undergraduate Poster:
- James Cai (iBSc Immunology, Infection & Cell Pathology). Lentiviral Accessory Protein Vpx is an NF-kB antagonist
The 7th annual Dean’s Research Prize Event took place on Thursday 14 February 2019.
Prize Winners:
Postgraduate Research Presentation:
- Lina Carmona Echeverria (Division of Surgical & Interventional Science). Objective assessment of the aggressive prostate cancer burden in PROMIS using digital pathology.
3MT® Presentation:
- Judges' Choice: Gianpaolo Manalastas (UCL Medical School). "Before I go into that, let me ask you a few questions first": How doctors use language to control the consultation structure
- Runner Up: Rikah Louie (Division of Medicine). Macrophage-IRF8 deficiency protects against Atherosclerosis
Postgraduate Taught Poster:
- Yuyan Duan (MRes Human Tissue Repair). Role of liver-resident natural killer cells in repair
Undergraduate Poster:
- Vittoria Stefanello (BSc Applied Medical Sciences). The Effects of Radiotherapy and Nanoparticles on 3D Cancer Models
A selection of images from the 2020 Dean's Research Prize event held at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead. It celebrated the success of students' research across the faculty, with a range of presentations, posters, and prizes.
