Caltech Library News

Announcing the 2023 Three Minute Thesis (3MT) Winners!

Congratulations to our 2023 Three Minute Thesis winners!

First Place: Niyati Desai ("Meet the Goldilox")

Second Place: Skyler Ware ("Water-Free Electrolytes for a Sustainable Future")

Third Place: Dominic Yurk ("What Guitar Strings Can Teach Us About Blood Pressure")

People's Choice Award: Sophie Miller ("Shedding Light on the Night: Uncovering the Molecular Signature of Sleep") 

The 2023 Three Minute Thesis (3MT) event—an academic research communication competition developed by The University of Queensland in Australia—took place on Tuesday, April 25 in Cahill's Hameetman Auditorium. The Three Minute Thesis competition challenges Caltech graduate students to explain their research in an engaging and clear three-minute talk intended for a non-specialist audience. The event was also livestreamed on YouTube to audience members who could not attend in person.

After being chosen during a round of video submissions, the thirteen finalists took the stage with one slide each and three minutes to explain their research. First place winner Niyati Desai assumed the guise of an interplanetary real estate agent ("Meet the Goldilox") to explain her work with Dimitri Mawet in the Exoplanet Technology Lab. She'll receive the grand prize of $3000. Last year's third place prize and People's Choice Award winner Skyler Ware took second place ($2000) with her presentation on "Water-Free Electrolytes for a Sustainable Future." The third place prize ($1000) went to Dominic Yurk after he demonstrated "What Guitar Strings Can Teach Us About Blood Pressure." The audience in attendance at the event and watching from home chose Sophie Miller as the People's Choice Award winner ($500) for her presentation titled "Shedding Light on the Night: Uncovering the Molecular Signature of Sleep." 

Given Caltech’s prominence in science and engineering communities, the Library feels it's important to give Caltech graduate students the opportunity to practice communicating their science in ways that will resonate and inspire. The graduate students who competed in the 2023 3MT competition represented five Caltech divisions: Biology & Biological Engineering, Chemistry & Chemical Engineering, Engineering & Applied Science, Humanities & Social Sciences, and Physics, Mathematics, & Astronomy. This year's 3MT competition was supported by diamond sponsors EBSCO Information Services, Elsevier, and Thieme Science of Synthesis, gold sponsors Institute of Physics and Wiley, and silver sponsors SPIE and Taylor & Francis. 

If you missed the live event, you can view a recording of the 2023 Three Minute Thesis competition and read the Caltech Weekly article on the event. The complete list of finalists is below. 

• Sneha Aenugu
• Miles Chan
• Benjamin Chang
• Niyati Desai
• Abdullah Farooq
• Sophie Miller
• Marcos Nazareth Gallo
• Jimmy Ragan
• Nicholas Rui
• Adam Shaw
• Skyler Ware
• Nitika Yadlapalli
• Dominic Yurk