Graduate Research Day

Homerton College, Cambridge, and Harris Manchester College, Oxford, share a part of their history in the story of Charles Wellbeloved, the Homerton alumnus who became the Harris Manchester Principal. Two years ago, this bond was developed by establishing an annual Graduate Research Day, alternating between the two Colleges.  This event provides members of the two postgraduate research communities with an opportunity to share their work with a friendly, interdisciplinary audience.

Building on the success of the two previous events, 2018’s Graduate Research Day on Saturday, 2 June at Homerton College was another day of fascinating presentations and stimulating conversation. Presentations ranged from neuroscience to the UN Human Rights Council, from video games to the concept of time. The day was a showcase of the breadth and complexity of research at Homerton and Harris Manchester, and at the same time gave the speakers a chance to get out of the libraries and labs, to demystify their research and engage a brand new audience.

The twelve student speakers on this year’s programme reflect the innovative, challenging, and diverse research topics of the Oxbridge postgraduate community. Presentations across the board were indicative of a bright present, and a promising future, for both Colleges.

Dr Melanie Keene, Graduate Tutor at Homerton College

The programme for this year’s event included:

• Emma Reay (PhD Children’s Literature, Homerton): ‘Appraising the aesthetic power of children’s video games’
• Jordan Miller (MSt Egyptology, Harris Manchester): ‘Fantastic beasts and how to view them: from concept to representation in ancient Egyptian art’
• Elif Naz Çoker (MPhil Social and Developmental Psychology, Homerton): ‘Parents’ transition to parenthood and responsiveness to infants: a longitudinal study of prenatal expectancies and joint picturebook reading at age 1’
• Thierry Schultz (BPhil Philosophy, Harris Manchester): ‘If time passes, does this explain why the past differs from the future?’
• Sundeep Popat, (PhD Chemistry, Homerton): ‘Including quantum effects in the motion of atomic nuclei’
• Joost Haarsma (PhD Psychiatry, Homerton): ‘Early psychosis is associated with a failure to scale key neural and behavioural learning signals to the reliability of information, explaining psychotic symptoms’
• Alice White (PhD Neuroscience, Homerton): ‘Neural correlates of decision-making in Huntington’s Disease’
• Lauren Bell (MSt Archaeological Science, Harris Manchester): ‘Human or Neanderthal? A multi-disciplinary study in search of the makers of the Uluzzian technocomplex in Upper Palaeolithic Italy’
• Elizabeth Evens (MSt US History, Harris Manchester): ‘Undercover female police and abortion in New York, 1913–24’
• Sarah Streyder (MPhil Public Policy, Homerton): ‘Depoliticising the UN Human Rights Council’
• Patrick Allen (MPhil Criminological Research, Homerton): ‘To enforce, or not to enforce, that is the question…’
• Jennifer Keute (MSc Archaeological Science, Harris Manchester): ‘Investigating the efficiency of liquid and supercritical solvents for the extraction of organic residues from ancient pottery’.