The Questions

Dr Jad Marrouche:

Explain a scientific concept of your choice in a 3-minute video

Professor Sir Brian Hoskins:

Is public debate a good forum for discussing science issues such as climate change?

Professor Sir Roy Anderson:

What are the scientific challenges facing the development of effective vaccines against pathogens with hyper variable genome sequences?

Professor Lord Robert Winston:

Why are so many students being put off studying science at school?

Entry Guidelines

Essay Competition

• Don't ignore the 800 +/- 50 word count.
• Your entry must be in PDF format.
• You should answer the questions set in a manner in which any member of the general public could understand.
• The essay should probably not be approached as if it were a scientific paper - it would be in contradiction to the above point.
• As such, referencing should (perhaps, though not obligatory) be mentioned in passing, as if it were a newspaper article, rather than as citations.
• Do enter on time! Entries close at 5pm on 12th March for School and Imperial entrants!
• No personal information should appear on the entry - including name, CID, school or login.

Video Competition

• A strict maximum time limit of 3 minutes.
• Entries must be uploaded to Youtube, and the video link sent to this email address

How the marking works

Every year we recieve far too many entries for one person to mark, and so, in the spirit of fairness, a mark scheme is adhered to by our PhD Markers. Our PhD Markers, are Doctoral students at Imperial College London who very generously give up their time to read the entries. Once marked, the top five entries in the Imperial students category, and the top five entries in the school & college category are sent to our panel of judges, who, then pick a winner and runners up for their respective questions. Our Lead Judge, Professor Lord Robert Winston will then decide on an overall winner out of the four winners. The runner up of the question category from which the overall winner was selected becomes the winner for that question.