Imperial people

“The interface between engineering, technology and policy is something that particularly interests me” 

I am a second-year mechanical engineering undergraduate at Imperial. After graduating, I hope to go into renewable or nuclear energy as I would like to have a tangible impact on global challenges. One of the key points for me choosing engineering was the rescue of the trapped Chilean miners in 2010. Seeing the efforts to save their lives and overcome challenges to extract them from an extremely complex location inspired me and illustrated the vast reach and importance of engineering. 

Engineering has been responsible for many of the improvements to quality of life and technological advancements that humanity has seen. At the same time, it has brought about changes that have had negative impacts on the world and the people around us. An area I am particularly passionate about is tackling the climate crisis. This has a devastating impact on some of the most vulnerable people in the world, the same people who have contributed the least to the issue. It’s this injustice that drives me to want to apply engineering to tackling problems and improving people’s lives. Africa as an entire continent is only responsible for 3% of global emissions, but faces some of the most severe climate impacts from floods to droughts and more.  

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Read Josh Tregale, Undergraduate, Department of Mechanical Engineering in full

“Taking part in the StudentShapers programme was a rewarding experience that broadened my understanding and enhanced my skills.” 

I am a second-year master’s student at the Dyson School of Design Engineering and the Royal College of Art, on the Innovation Design Engineering course. This course is a unique blend of the arts and sciences, bringing together a diverse mix of students from different backgrounds. In the previous academic term, I was part of a dynamic team of four that created a revolutionary, carbon-negative, biodegradable replacement for petrol-based foams, such as Styrofoam. Working on this project gave us a chance to collaborate with experts from different departments across Imperial, which was a valuable learning experience for all of us. 

As someone with a bachelor’s degree in industrial design, I have always been fascinated by the manufacturing and making processes, the interaction involved, and the skills required for such processes. Last year, I had the incredible opportunity to be part of the StudentShapers programme, which supports staff and students working together on a broad range of projects related to educational development and educational research. I worked on a project called ViRSE, which stands for Virtual Reality for Student Education, and involved creating a mechanical lathe simulation for mechanical engineering students. The lathe can be quite daunting for first-time users in the workshop, due to its high speed and noise. So, our goal was to create an engaging onboarding experience for students, that would prepare them for their first real-life interaction with a lathe.  (more…)

Read Ori Blich, Taught Postgraduate, Dyson School of Design Engineering and Royal College of Art in full

“At Imperial, my two seemingly opposing passions in the arts and sciences are allowed to seamlessly intertwine” 

Studying a biotechnology degree, people often think my days are spent in labs creating samples, writing extensive reports, and planning for experiments. But what if I tell you that I spend a lot of my time creating infographics, writing YouTube video scripts, and planning for Instagram reels?  

At Imperial, my two seemingly opposing passions in the arts and sciences are allowed to seamlessly intertwine. The skills I gain as a scientist also prepare me to become a creative and detail-oriented person. I enjoy being able to transform complex concepts into easy-to-digest diagrams as an illustrator for Felix, the student newspaper, as well as sharing my personal experiences through “A Day in the Life” or “Why I chose Imperial” videos featured on the College’s official social media accounts as a Student Content Creator.  

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Read Ruchipat (Aim) Kumpusiri, Undergraduate, Department of Life Sciences in full

“Coming to university I was suddenly thrown into an environment where people were celebrated for being themselves. It was wonderful.”

I was always bothered when my peers would talk about how big the universe is and how small we are, and how because of this life is meaningless. Year nine career talks didn’t help this existential crisis – if life was meaningless, how was I supposed to decide what I wanted to do for the rest of mine? In the end, it was a poem, by Rupi Kaur, that inspired me. It talked about how in the end, while we’ll realise so many of the things we worried over were trivial and meaningless, human connection is meaningful. Between a mother and her daughter, between a couple married for five decades, between a group of lifelong best friends – I think human connection is meaningful because we feel it is meaningful. And I realised that something that made me angry was how such arbitrary things – a virus, a drunk driver, a clump of cells growing where they shouldn’t be – could end these connections. I realised that if I did medicine, if my life was about trying to stop these arbitrary things, then it didn’t matter how big the universe was. My life would be meaningful to me. And that would be enough. (more…)

Read Devni Peramunugamage, Undergraduate, Faculty of Medicine in full