Master’s degree students in the College of Engineering (CEN) at American University of Sharjah (AUS) had the chance to hone their presentation skills at the university’s first Three Minute Thesis (3MT) competition held recently. A popular research communication competition, 3MT was developed by the University of Queensland in Australia. With its debut, AUS becomes a part of the global 3MT network comprising more than 900 universities in over 85 countries across the world. 

While only PhD students participate in the global competition, master’s students were allowed to participate in the CEN competition, which was held virtually due to restrictions resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. The excellent IT services at AUS, along with a state-of-the-art digital platform, made it possible to hold the competition in a virtual amphitheater where the jury and the audience were able to see the speaker and their viewgraph. 

Twelve master’s students participated in the competition, with topics ranging from ultrasound triggered release of trastuzumab conjugated immunoliposomes to the design and implementation of dynamic wireless charging system for electric vehicles. Each student had just three minutes to present their thesis to the audience.

Judging the competition were Dr. Wei Zhao, AUS Chief Research Officer; Dr. Mohamed El-Tarhuni, AUS Vice Provost for Graduate Studies; and Dr. Marie-José Montpetit, Consultant at TriangleVideo.com and Associate Professor at Concordia University.

Shafiya Sabah, a master’s student in biomedical engineering, won the competition with her thesis presentation entitled “Image-based extraction of breathing signal from cone-beam CT projections.” The winner of the Audience Choice Award was Abdullah Abou Hewelle, a mechanical engineering master’s student, with his presentation “Ferromagnetic FeCu coating for ferrous contaminants sensing in water bodies.”

Participants were judged based on how well they provided an understanding of the background and significance of the research question being addressed, while using language appropriate to a non-specialist audience. Judging was also based on participants’ skills in clearly describing the impact and results of the research and whether their presentation followed a clear and logical sequence.

AUS hopes to participate in the global competition, which is at the doctoral level, when it qualifies its first PhD candidates. Speaking about the 3MT, Dr. Sirin Tekinay, Dean of the College of Engineering, said:

“I am proud of all of our students who stepped up to compete, and their advisors who encouraged them. Though the global 3MT competition is at the doctoral level, we will keep running these competitions at all levels to spread the practice of developing communication skills for research and development at the local level. We will always seek to collaborate as part of the global fabric of research and development where competition is a method to communicate and evolve engineering, technology and science.”