CANCELLED
Please note: due to the Tube strikes scheduled for this week, we have made the difficult decision to cancel the Natural Sciences Showcase, scheduled to take place on Thursday 11 September. With many of our attendees and participants relying on public transport, we felt this was the most responsible course of action to avoid significant disruption. We would like to extend our sincere thanks to all the presenters who prepared posters and oral presentations, and to everyone who were planning to attend the showcase. Your enthusiasm and support are what make the showcase such a special event. We were thrilled to see over 400 registrations, a testament to how popular and valued the showcase has become.
Join a full day of presentations and stimulating discussions with the academics and prize-winning PhD students in the Faculty of Natural Sciences and find out about our innovative work. Everybody is welcome! Please register as soon as possible (deadline is 17.00 on 9 September 2025).
Watch some of our PhD presenters promoting the Showcase:
10.00 – 18.00, SAFB G16 LT (Sir Alexander Fleming Building)
Welcome coffee from 09.30 in the concourse level 1
- Departmental talks sessions: 10.00 – 16.10 in SAFB G16 LT (coffee breaks in the concourse level 1).
- PhD students poster competition: 12.30 – 13.40 in SAFB 120-122 (lunch will be provided) – Imperial staff and students will be able to vote for their favourite poster by Thursday 11th September, 15:00 – view the posters and submit your VOTE!
- Panel session: 16.10 – 17.10 in SAFB 120-122.
- Awards from 17.15 with canapés and drinks reception in the concourse level 1.
Don’t miss this great opportunity to engage with our academics and postgraduate students. Please see the full programme below:
Programme
10.00 – 10.05 Welcome
Welcome and opening remarks by the Dean Professor Richard Craster.
10.05 – 10.35 Centre for Environmental Policy Showcase
- 10.05 – 10.20: Dr Caroline Howe (Associate Professor) – Beyond the Silos: Why Restoring Biodiversity and Tackling Climate Together Matters
- 10.20 – 10.35: Karl Scheifinger (PhD student) – Seeding Collective Climate Action: Co-creating Climate Mitigation Scenarios with the Public
10.35 – 11.20 Department of Mathematics Showcase
- 10.35 – 10.50: Dr Ed Cohen (Reader in Statistics) – Spatial statistics on manifolds: new mathematical tools for microbial and cell biology.
- 10.50 – 11.05: Jose Giral Barajas (PhD student) – Modelling cellular resource accumulation using queuing theory
- 11.05 – 11.20: Bethany Clarke (PhD student) – Generating Cilia-like Dynamics through Structural Anisotropy
Coffee break (11.20 – 11.30)
11.30 – 12.30 Department of Life Sciences Showcase
- 11.30 – 11.45: Dr Claudia Contini (Assistant Professor in Biotechnology and Engineering Biology) – Synthetic Cells: from Soft Matter to Life-Like Behaviours
- 11.45 – 12.00: Martina Demurtas (PhD student) – Neural crest induction requires SALL4-mediated BAF recruitment to lineage specific enhancers
- 12.00 – 12.15: Theodore Brook (PhD student) – The genomic basis of drought tolerance in coconut palms
- 12.15 – 12.30: Ambre Bexter (PhD student) – A Novel Molecular Mechanism for Effector Protein Wrapping and Delivery by the Bacterial Type VI Secretion System
12.30 – 13.40 Lunch and Poster session
13.40 – 14.40 Department of Chemistry Showcase
- 13.40 – 13.55: Dr David Ayuso Molinero (Royal Society URF – Associate Professor) – Why chiral light can barely tell left from right – and how to fix it by shaping it in 3D
- 13.55 – 14.10: Georgina Rai (PhD student) – A combined kinetic and computational analysis of the palladium-catalysed formylation of aryl bromides
- 14.10 – 14.25: Gem Flint (PhD student) – G-quadruplex structures mediate transcriptional reprogramming in drug-resistant ovarian cancer
- 14.25 – 14.40: Xixian Yi (PhD student) – Ultrasensitive Multiplexed Detection of Human Papillomavirus (HPV) induced Cancer Biomarker
Coffee break (14.40 – 14.50)
14.50 – 15.50 Department of Physics Showcase
- 14.50 – 15.05: Dr Frank Schindler (Assistant Professor in Condensed Matter Theory) – Symmetry and Topology in Quantum Matter
- 15.05 – 15.20: Bryony Lanigan (PhD student) – Atom interferometry for fundamental physics
- 15.20 – 15.35: Anthony Harwood (PhD student) – Making Objects Travel Faster than the Speed of Light
- 15.35 – 15.50: Edward Binns (PhD student) – Bridging the gap between the chiral and achiral. Imprinting chirality on achiral matter
15.50 – 15.55 Closing
Closing remarks by Professor Richard Craster.
Coffee break (15.55 – 16.10)
16.10 – 17.10 Why Should We Support Curiosity-Driven Research?
Panel discussion.
Chair: Professor Erhard Hohenester (Professor of Structural Matrix Biology, Department of Life Sciences).
This year’s panel will focus on Curiosity-Driven Research, highlighting how fundamental science can lead to unexpected and transformative breakthroughs. Four academic members have been invited, each presenting a compelling example of such research:
- Dr Niladri Banerjee (Dept. of Physics): Quantum Mechanics → Semiconductors and Modern Electronics
- Professor Jason Micklefield (Dept. of Chemistry): CRISPR → Gene-editing Technology
- Dr Julie McDonald (Dept. of Life Sciences): Gut Microbiome research → Clinical applications and Disease prevention and management
- Professor Kevin Buzzard (Dept. of Mathematics): Number Theory → Cryptography
17.15 – 18.00 Canapes reception and prizes
Awards will be given at 17.30.