Oxford-MRC DTP Symposium

2019 Oxford-MRC DTP Symposium took place on 27th June 2019 in the MRC Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine (John Radcliffe Hospital site).  70 attendees and the following sponsors took part in the event:

 

In the morning six students gave engaging presentations showcasing their research:

Session 1	Session 2
Barnabas Williams (NDM)	Mary Kempnich (EP)
Rosie Little (DPAG)	Nidi Tapoulal (DPAG)
Giulia Pilla (Pathology)	Imran Yusuf (NDCN)

Imran Yusuf was announced the Winner of the Oxford-MRC DTP Symposium Student Talk Competition with Giulia Pilla as the Runner-up.

Student talks were followed by the thank you address to Professor Marella de Bruijn who recently stepped down from her role of the Oxford-MRC DTP Director. Her last Director's duty was to introduce Professor Gil McVean who delivered the Symposium's Keynote Speech entitled "Using Genomics to Understand the Human Wiring Diagram".

During lunch break attendees participated in two 30-minute poster sessions during which fourteen students took part in the Poster Competition.

The poster presented by Letitia Harris (Oncology) won the top prize awarded by the judges, while Romain Guyon (NDM) was the author of the poster that received the highest number of votes from students.

 

Afternoon sessions featured:

- presentations by Alumni who were MRC-funded during their study at Oxford: Amy Varney, Bo Jing and Cecilia Chui

- "Introduction to Intellectual Property" - a talk by Sarah Jones from Oxford University Innovation; and

- Discussion Panel entitled "Bioentrepreneurship for DPhil Students" during which attendees discussed the topic with representatives from Oxford University Innovation, SBS Entreprenership Centre and Enterprising Oxford.

The Symposium closed with the networking session during the drinks & nibbles reception.

 

For details of topics presented at the event please consult the Symposium Brochure.

 

Attendees comments about the event:

"It was nice to see what other MRC funded students work on and to mingle. I also really enjoyed alumni talks and the bioentrepreneurship panel discussion."

"I really liked afternoon sessions on developing spin out companies, panel and IP. Very useful and inspiring."

"The variety of topics presented throughout the talks and poster sessions. A very engaging and informative atmosphere and encouragement of questions and feedback."

"I thought it was great that there was a mixture of students, postdocs and PIs!"

 

Thank you to the Student Organising Committee:

Laura Colling (Oncology)

Ryan Hole (NDM)

Magda Mareckova (NDWRH)

Helena Meyer-Berg (RDM)

Joost van Haasteren (RDM)

2018 Oxford-MRC DTP Symposium took place on Thursday 21st June 2018 in Richard Doll Building (Old Road Campus). 

 

For further details please browse the Symposium Brochure.

 

Symposium sponsors were: 

• Covaris
• Cyagen
• IDT Integrated DNA Technologies
• New England BioLabs

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

Their representatives were on hand during the breaks to answer student questions.

The inaugural MRC-DTP Symposium took place on 22 June 2017 in the Richard Doll Building at the Old Road Campus.  With sponsorship from Fisher Scientific and the Nuffield Department of Population Health, 52 people attended the symposium.

The MRC DTP Steering Group Chair, Prof. Marella de Bruijn opened the day and the first session featured talks from Ulrike Kuenzel, Soren Thomsen and Josephine Hellberg. The second session, chaired by Paolo Spingardi, brought together Jan Cosgrave, Abigail Enoch and Daniel Alanine. During the lunch break, poster sessions took place allowing researchers to showcase their work in an informal setting whilst providing a basis for discussion and networking. The afternoon had two parallel training sessions- a Managing Your Supervisor workshop led by Afsie Sabokbar, and a CV workshop from Michael Moss of the University of Oxford, Careers Service. The symposium closed with a ‘Speed Science’ session (think speed dating with science) followed by a wine reception.

Symposium participants commented:

“Good opportunity to present work to local and informal audience, good prep for conferences etc. Also interesting breadth of research.”

“The CV workshop was supreme and it was so wonderful networking with fellow MRC students and hearing about their work.

"Interesting to hear about different research being done; interesting to hear more about the MRC-DTP program”

With thanks to the Organising Committee:

Joost van Haasteren
Jessica Valli
Marella de Bruijn
Laura Colling
Marc Rose

Thanks also to Paolo Spingardi who provided assistance on the day.