Research into using computers to produce more prawns, how social media representations of yoga affect body image, and what’s required to save sun bears will be among the presentations at USC’s annual Three Minute Thesis (3MT) competition on Monday 29 July.

Eight finalists from USC’s growing cohort of higher degree by research students will compete for prizemoney and the opportunity to represent the University at the 2019 Asia-Pacific 3MT competition in Brisbane in October.

While an 80,000-word thesis would take hours to present, this competition challenges higher degree by research students to deliver their PhD theses in just three minutes with the aid of only one static presentation slide each.

They will be judged on their ability to provide entertaining explanations of their years of research – in laymen’s terms. This process helps enable researchers to succinctly outline their work to potential research collaborators, funding bodies and the media.

The winner will receive $1,000 and the runner-up $500, with prizes provided by event sponsor UniBank. The finalists and their topics are:

• Nicola Kent – ‘Adaptive diversification of the eastern water dragon’
• Chinh Thi My Dam – ‘Here comes the king(fish)!’ – This research is about developing cost-effective diets for yellowtail kingfish production in Australia.
• Haley Whitfield – ‘Perspectives of life, learning and identity in a rural gang community’
• Angela Hinz – ‘From social media to the yoga mat’
• Tuan Nguyen – ‘Creating more prawns for your next BBQ through computational biology’
• Sarah Pye – ‘Saving sun bears’
• Trang Trinh – ‘Genetic and genomic application for long-term sustainability of prawn farming’
• Nhut Minh Tran – ‘Molt bio-management for a better world’ – This research is about the neuropeptides involved in the molting processes of crustaceans and insects.