Imagine you are an engineering graduate student and have only three minutes to present your entire thesis. You are only allowed one slide. How would you do it?
Every year, BYU hosts a Three-Minute Thesis Competition for graduate students. They are given this short amount of time to present their research to a panel of judges in a concise, well-thought out manner. Contestants begin competing within their own majors, then the finalist of that round competes against other students in their school. Finally, they compete with the students from the whole university.
The Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering hosted their competition Thursday, January 31. Four contestants participated—Matt Hamblin, Jordan Brown, Nolan Hutchings, and Andy Monk. Doctors Chiang, Lundrigan, and Long acted as the judges.
Students’ performances were rated based on three criteria—engagement, comprehension, and communication. The theses were supposed to be described in simple terms, so non-engineers would understand. Contestants were allowed one presentation slide and were given only three-minutes to present their material.
In first place, receiving $100, Matt Hamblin presented his thesis. He has been researching how to quickly detect antibiotic-resistant bacteria. The technology he hopes to invent will be able to identify DNA from a single bacterium, so doctors know how to treat the disease before it causes serious issues.
Matt will go on to compete in the engineering school competition in the next few weeks.
In second place, receiving $75, Jordan Brown has been researching scatterometer wind retrieval technologies. This device can help predict the weather and provide crucial information about the earth. He is mostly concerned about creating a technology that can overcome ambiguity, allowing it to be even better at predictions and inductions.
Nolan Hutchings was awarded third place and received $50. His thesis was concerned with ultra high-resolution wind fields. Similar to Jordan’s research, the satellite can receive information about the earth from the wind patterns. His hope is to reduce the noise of those results. This will allow for better climate models, hurricane estimates, and more.
As for the audience’s choice, Andy Monk received $50. His thesis was about compact ultra high frequency radars. These radars, placed in vehicles, allow the operator to know how close they are to objects. He wants to make them low frequency with a small footprint.
The adjudicating panel recognized each student for their work. They ultimately deemed it a very successful year and look forward to the competitions to follow.