Event Date: March 13, 2020
Graham Hammill, vice provost for academic affairs and dean of the Graduate School, offered remarks and welcomed participants as the Three Minute Thesis competition began.
Seyed Omid Sajedi, a PhD candidate in the Department of Civil, Structural and Environmental Engineering, kicked off the presentations with his research on artificially intelligent systems for rapid post-earthquake inspections.
Emily Sekera, a PhD candidate in the Department of Chemistry, presented her research to find a biomarker for autism spectrum disorder.
Oladapo Ogunbodede, a PhD candidate in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, presented on energy-efficient drones.
Joëlle Carota, a PhD candidate in the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, researched the Venezuelan community of Pescara in Italy in a "Sociolinguistic Analysis of Spanish in Contact With Italian."
A PhD student in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Farshad Ghanei's research targets modern battery-powered systems and energy efficiency.
Poonam Choudhary, a PhD candidate in the Department of Medicine, studies using advanced imaging techniques involving Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) and Positron Emission Tomography (PET) to diagnose pre-symptomatic biomarkers of Krabbe Disease in a pre-clinical setting.
Christopher Spence, an educational leadership and policy PhD candidate, is studying the intersectionality between educational policy — particularly high-stakes testing — and teachers’ expectations of students as they relate to the black and white achievement gap.
Xiaoxiao Zhang, a PhD candidate in the Department of Oral Biology, hopes to develop a novel drug that treats osteoporosis with fewer side effects.
Seyed Hamed Ghodsi is a PhD candidate in the Department of Civil, Structural and Environmental Engineering. His presentation focused on combined sewer overflow (CSO) prediction and reduction.
An epidemiology and environmental health PhD candidate, Zeinab Farhat’s research focuses on how garlic can be used as a dietary agent to fight cancer.
Ben Rein, a physiology and biophysics PhD candidate, studies gene mutations and their effects on autism, and hopes to develop breakthrough treatment strategies with broad applications.
Nagashri Lakshminarayana is a computer science and engineering PhD candidate whose research on facial expression recognition focuses on bridging the gap between human and computer interaction, which currently lacks the empathy factor.
The competition was different this year due to COVID-19: no audience, social distancing among a limited number of facilitators and hand sanitizer.
