Three Minute Thesis competition, 28 JulyThe Clock Is Ticking: Explain Your Research Project in 3 Minutes

The competition provides the participating doctoral researchers good practice in communicating their own research in a clear and concise manner to an interdisciplinary audience. Developed at the University of Queensland, Australia, the first Three Minute Thesis (3MT®) took place in 2008 and is today held at over 600 universities.

Kay-Dennis Boom was the moderator for the evening. Thanks to Boom’s questions to the participants, the audience learned about the motivation behind the research project or their experiences during preparation for the competition.

Concentrated on the task: The 3-person jury was made up of Dr. Linda Krause (biostatistician and member of the HRA Postdoc Council), Dr. Philipp Gadow (physicist and science slammer), and Dr. Sabrina Kulin (educational scientist and freelance doctoral studies advisor).

Hubert Fudjumdjum, a doctoral student at the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences (HAW) and the University of the West of Scotland, kicked off the event with a presentation of his doctoral dissertation on the effects of climate change on farmers’ food security in Cameroon’s West Region.

Taha Hatcha is a doctoral student at Hafencity University Hamburg. His work focuses on mobility as a service and its data exploitation for city planning.

Henrike Diekhoff from Lüneburg is doing her doctorate at Leuphana University on video evidence in physical education.

Marcus Dorau, a research associate at the Helmut Schmidt University, presented his doctoral project on source searching with robot groups.

The break was used for networking with the Doctoral Council ...

or to discuss the presentations.

Away from the stage, the competition also provided a good opportunity for cross-university exchange among the speakers.

Sara Bauer presented her topic “The double mapping in Iconic Metaphorical Signs in German Sign Language (DGS),” on which she is working toward her doctorate at Universität Hamburg.

Yuri Akbalkan of the Hamburg University of Music and Drama presented his doctoral topic “Sensorium: Perceptual Construction as Artistic Process” and, at the same time, the particularities of a doctorate in the arts.

In her doctoral studies at Universität Hamburg, Hannah Franz is examining access to rights for detained individuals without residence status in deportation proceedings.

Benoît Richard of the Center for Ultrafast Imaging at Universität Hamburg presented his topic “Machine Learning Methods to Reconstruct Molecular Geometry from Coulomb Explosion Imaging.”

Applause for the presenters: Over 80 people were in attendance to follow the competition.

The Hamburg Research Academy Doctoral Council hosted the event. Members Dennis Lopatta and Constanze Struck talked about the committee’s activities and invited those in attendance to attend other events.

What would a competition be without a prize? Many thanks to the University Society for its support! Shown here are Dr. Silke Richter of the advisory board and Dr. Anton F. Guhl, the managing director.

Third place went to our guest from Lüneburg, Henrike Diekhoff, for her presentation on video evidence in physical education.

We all remembered the sign for “Switch your brain off!”—second place went to Sarah Bauer!

The audience hung on her every word—first place to went to Hannah Franz!

We are happy with the successful event and would like to thank all the organizers from the Doctoral Council, the jury members, the University Society, and

the moderator, Kay-Dennis Boom (in his outstanding suit)!