Blog posts

Connect to Succeed

As we get closer and closer to graduation, we look forward to taking a step into the real world and work either for corporations or starting our own venture in order to reach our potential. Judging by the society we live in, connections have a great impact on our future. Events managed and produced by the GSU give such opportunities to students, allowing them to expand their horizons. One such event was the GSU connect 2019 initiative.

The event offered students the opportunity to enjoy the cross disciplinary collaboration with other students, allowing for students to benefit from different skills and expertise.

Cross-CDT PhDs @ Reunion

On Friday, 10th of May the third event of the Cross-CDT series took place. The students from five different CDTs gathered at the Union bar to catch up with people from their own cohort as well as with people from other CDTs and cohort years that they got to know at the other events. In total more than 20 students from different CDTs joined for this event in the course of the evening and had a great time together.

It was a great opportunity for friends who have not seen eachother in a long time to socialise and grab a drink together.

Inaugural Aeronautical and Mechanical Engineering Seminar (AMES)

Athanasios E. Giannenas, Alexander Schwertheim & Omar Mahfoze Postgraduate Students & Departmental representatives, Department of Aeronautics

The Inaugural Aeronautical and Mechanical Engineering Seminar took place on 29th of March 2019 comprising a joint academic seminar between the Aeronautics and Mechanical Engineering departments, followed by a networking opportunity over food/snacks. Three presenters (PhD students and Postdocs of both departments) introduced their latest research to their fellow colleagues. The seminar offered a unique opportunity for the presenters to share their work in a somewhat informal setting. This allowed them to discuss not only their achievements, but also their failures and struggles—something generally not shared at formal conferences.

LERU Doctoral Summer School 2019 – Building Research Capacity and a Collaborative Global Community

by Diego Mesa, PhD student in the Department of Earth Science and Engineering

This year the University of Edinburgh, a member of the League of European Research Universities (LERU), hosted in July  the 9th LERU Doctoral Summer School. The main focus of the Summer School was on  Collaboration in Research, aiming to develop a guidebook for early career researchers on effective collaboration.

My name is Diego Mesa and I’m a 3rd year PhD student in the Advanced Mineral Processing Research Group of Imperial College London. When I saw the Graduate School’s invitation to be part of this activity, I knew I had to apply.

Computational Chemistry Intradepartmental Meeting (CCIM)

On the evening of Thursday the 7th of February, the Computational Chemistry division of the Chemistry Department held its third monthly research and social event. These meetings started running in September to strengthen the professional and personal relationships between computational research groups, which have found themselves sharing a large open-plan office after the departmental move to the White City campus in Summer 2018. The meetings are mainly organised by the postgraduate students of each group and promote the integration of students of all levels into the wider departmental community.

This month, we put up the event with the generous help of the Graduate School cohort building fund.

IEEE Research Symposium for PG Students at the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Imperial College London

Founded in October 2018, the IEEE Student Branch at the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Imperial College London, was created with the motivation of “Developing collaboration between engineering students, researchers, academics, and industry by actively organising and promoting IEEE events”. The student branch strives to act as a common channel that various researchers, students and academics can use to share their research work, create new collaborations and discuss future directions. In doing so, we also hope to engender a more social atmosphere to the research scene in the college. This document will showcase the event that we have organised with your much appreciated support and will also detail intended future events with the hope that we will have your continued support moving on.

Geotechnics Bowling

On the 29th of March 2019 we made our way to the nearby bowling place in Bayswater for a Geotechnics Section-bowling night. After a nice group walk through Hyde Park we all gathered at the bowling alley at 18:00. Thanks to the great turnout of 26 people, we took over five of the lanes and played two hours of bowling – some more competitively than others. A few people tried bowling for the first time in their life and ended up getting one strike after the other, so there were many great celebration dances to be seen. While waiting for our next turn and cheering our teammates on, there was a large selection of burgers and other finger foods for everyone to enjoy.

Breakfast club: Making the most of your PhD experience

by Nora Schmit & Constanze Ciavarella, PhD students in the School of Public Health

The first School of Public Health breakfast club took place in the morning of Tuesday 26th March 2019 at St Mary’s campus. The student reps organised this initiative to bring together PhD students from 5 departments spread across St Mary’s, Charing Cross and White City campuses, to share their experiences around the theme “Making the most of your PhD” while enjoying a delicious breakfast buffet.

The event had a high turnout, with over 50 students from all stages of the PhD gathering in room G64. It started at 10am with tea, coffee and various breakfast options from Le Pain Quotidien, including waffles, pastries, baguettes and fruit.

Cross-CDT PhDs @ Escape Room

On Wednesday 13th of February 2019, the second event in the Cross-CDT series took place – a total of 14 PhD students from different 3 different CDTs gathered to face the tasks that needed to be solved. The students divided in to two teams and were required to work together to solve different puzzles in order to beat the clock (and each other), to escape and unlock their respective ‘rooms’. As this was the second of the scheduled activities, many of the students were already acquainted and were able to jump to the tasks at hand instantly.

The theme of the first room was “Project D.I.V.A”

Bringing Together Imperial’s and Britain’s Energy System Community

Britain is at the forefront of energy system transformation. In 2018, 53% of electricity consumed came from low-carbon generators, up from 25% in 2009. As a result, carbon intensity halved from nearly 500 to 217 gCO2/MWh (Electric Insights). However, as an island with limited interconnection to its neighbours, the stakes are particularly high to achieve further reductions down to 100 gco2/MWh by 2030 (Fifth Carbon Budget).

At the same time, me and fellow PhD students miss the exchange amongst us as well as with other academic, industry and policy experts on energy system transformation. What is missing is a closeknit energy system community that can easily discuss transformation pathways.