2019 Honours Fest Winners

Honours Fest 2019 — Students, staff, faculty and other lovers of science from across the campus and Victoria gathered to learn more about remarkable student projects, ranging in topic from ocean acidification to intermittent fasting.

Last month, thirty-six Honours students throughout the Faculty of Science presented their research at the eighth annual Honours Fest, a conference-style poster session that showcases outstanding undergraduate research. Honours Fest is the culmination of two semesters of gruelling research, and an opportunity for students to show what has been occupying their time and brainpower.

Students, staff, faculty and other lovers of science from across the campus and Victoria gathered to learn more about remarkable student projects, ranging in topic from ocean acidification to intermittent fasting.

Thanks to the generosity of Dr. Fritz Boehm, students who place in the top three, as well as the top presenter in each department and school win generous cash prizes. Students are judged in three areas: scientific thought and creativity, their communication skills in presenting the research, and the quality of the poster and its ability to explain complex research in a logical way.

The top Presenters for each unit are:

Unit	Award Winner	Poster
Biochemistry & Microbiology	Brandon Moeller	Investigating the potential role of thymic eosinophils in oral tolerance
Biology	Konrad Suesser	The effects of intermittent fasting on synaptic plasticity in the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus in Sprague Dawley rats
Chemistry	Chelsea Wilson	The road to inhibiting CBX6, the epigenetic protein driving aggressive liver cancer
Earth & Ocean Sciences	Elena Savidge	Characterizing an earthquake triplet in Iran using InSAR imagery
Math	Etienne Leclerc	The switching operation on mixed graphs
Physics & Astronomy	Alex Tofini	Active stabilization of an optical cavity, for experiments in strong photon-photon interaction