Stage is set for final round of Three Minute Thesis competition on March 28

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Ten Penn State graduate students are preparing to put their research communication skills to the test for monetary prizes of up to $1,000 in the final round of Penn State’s third annual Three Minute Thesis (3MT) competition.

Hosted by the J. Jeffrey and Ann Marie Fox Graduate School, the event will take place at 3 p.m. on Saturday, March 28, at the Nittany Lion Inn on the University Park campus and also will be livestreamed online. Attendance is free and open to the public, but advance registration is required.

First developed by the University of Queensland in Australia, 3MT is a graduate-level research presentation competition designed to help students effectively highlight the impact of their research in three minutes to a general, nonspecialist audience. Each competitor is permitted one static presentation slide to serve their pitch as a visual aid.

Finalists represent eight disciplines across seven academic colleges. Topics covered include the impact of the fibers you eat, diagnosing Parkinson's Disease earlier, developing more sustainable heating and cooling systems, extracting beneficial elements from environmental waste, and leveraging modern technology for architectural efficiency.

Three awards will be up for grabs in the final round. The first-place winner will take home $1,000 and the runner up will receive $500. The Graduate and Professional Student Association (GPSA) will sponsor a People’s Choice Award, where audience members vote for their favorite presentation, worth $500.

The first-place winner will advance to the regional 3MT competition held by the Northeast Association of Graduate Schools.

A panel of pre-selected judges will determine the first- and second-place awardees. This year’s judges include Christina Grozinger, director of the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences; Daniil Rose, master's student in international affairs and president of the GPSA; Clarence Lang, Susan Welch Dean of the College of the Liberal Arts and professor of African American studies; and Tracy Langkilde, Verne M. Willaman Dean of the Eberly College of Science and professor of biology.

Previous participants have highlighted the professional skills they took away from the competition.

“You get this kind of captive audience, who doesn’t know much about your research, to talk to and gather some feedback on how you’re communicating to them,” said Adam Smerigan, second-place winner in the 2024-25 Penn State 3MT competition. “Beyond that, it’s been really helpful in my job search, as well, giving me the opportunity to better convey my research and demonstrate how I’m improving in soft skills like public speaking.”

Competitors and their presentation titles are:

• Sayan Deep De, doctoral student in kinesiology, “Diagnosing Parkinson’s Early: A Simple Finger-Force Biomarker to Detect Disease Before Symptoms Appear."
• Yasaman Ghaffarian, master's student in architecture , “Rethinking Traditional Spatial Concepts: A Comparative Study of Azuma’s Tower House and Traditional Japanese Houses."
• Julia Ho, doctoral student in architectural engineering, “Developing accurate, efficient models to design optimal heating and cooling systems."
• Zilfa Irakoze, doctoral candidate in food science with a dual title in international agriculture and development, “The Mold Protecting Our Food.”
• Patrick Sarpong, doctoral student in energy and mineral engineering, “Environmentally Benign Extraction of Lithium from Underclay Coal Waste.”
• Shakshi Sekar, doctoral student in energy and mineral engineering, ““Upcycling Plastic Waste into Critical Mineral Graphite.”
• Saiber Shaikh, doctoral student in counselor education, “When Your Therapist Has a Therapist: Counselors Living With Mental Illness.”
• Shikha Soneji, doctoral student in informatics, “Beyond 'I Agree': Revealing the Secret Life of Your Data in Plain English.”
• Nusrat Tabassum, doctoral student in architecture, “Enabling formwork-free 3D printing of spanning roof structures at the construction scale - Using multi-directional slicing to decrease the overhang angle."
• Gopi Yalavarthi, doctoral student in nutritional sciences, “Processed dietary fibers can increase inflammation in the gut."

Learn more about the finalists here.

Community members interested in attending online or in person can register through the 3MT website.