Pirbright’s Student Day returned on Wednesday 18 May 2022, for the first time since 2019. This event was a great opportunity for students to share their projects with peers at the Institute.
Student Day celebrates the success of our students and allows them to share their progress and achievements throughout their PhD projects.
The day opened with a welcome from Professor Bryan Charleston, Director and CEO at the Institute. This was followed by a series of talks from third year PhD students. Second year students displayed their research in a poster with viewing sessions scheduled throughout the day. First year students also attended to give them a flavour of the journey ahead.
The event was well attended by researchers, PhD, masters, and placement students, and offered a platform for questions and suggestions of further work considerations to enhance the projects. An invite was also extended to the Institute’s Science Advisory Board who attended virtually.
The day was closed with an awards ceremony led by Bryan, celebrating the excellent presentations, posters, and significant contributions made by students at the Institute.
Presentation Prizes
1st place: Abigail Hay ‘Investigating the function of diversified Natural Killer Cell receptors in cattle’
2nd Place: John Clarke ‘Structural analysis of the bovine antibody repertoire; individual chain contributions to antigen recognition’
3rd Place: Megan Cole ‘Bacterial compounds enhance bluetongue virus infection in blood derived purified bovine monocytes’
Posters Prizes
1st place: Patrick Philips ‘Correlative cryo-bioimaging to study avian coronavirus replication organelles’
2nd place: Mehnaz Qureshi ‘Generating anti-influenza nanobodies (nAb) using phage display’
3rd place: Moeez Khan ‘Fine-tuning Cas9 half-life for efficient gene drive in the Malaria mosquito’
Sian Wells, PhD student at the University of Surrey and member of the African Swine Fever Vaccinology group, was given an award for her dedication to improving the student experience at the Institute. Sian has consistently taken on additional responsibilities such as organising the monthly Student Club and volunteering to help the transition of new and current placement students.
Nazia Thakur, DPhil student at the University of Oxford and member of the Viral Glycoproteins group, was awarded a prize to celebrate her numerous achievements throughout her PhD studies. These include winning the Journal of General Virology poster prize at the Microbiology Society Annual Conference 2022; receiving £10,000 from UK-ICN to work on her own SARS-CoV-2 project; and winning the University of Oxford’s (St Cross College) Ralph A Lewin Prize in Biological, Environmental and Medical Sciences the University of Oxford (St Cross College) for her research successes.
Abigail Hay, final year PhD student at the University of Southampton and member of the Immunogenetics group, was awarded a prize for Public Engagement. This award was given in recognition of the tremendous contribution she has made to Public Engagement events, from supporting careers fairs, Brownie and Guide workshops, and Pirbright’s presence at various science festivals.
Professor Bryan Charleston said: “The student day was very enjoyable, students are a very important part of the Institute and the wider research community. The standard of the presentations was excellent and the science described important and interesting. The future of scientific research is in good hands.”
Congratulations to all the winners, as well as all the students who presented their research!