The annual Global Young Scientists Summit (GYSS) took place virtually on 12–15 January 2021. The GYSS was started in 2013 with the objective of exciting and engaging young scientists to pursue their scientific dreams through close interactions with distinguished scientists and researchers, and with peers. Each year, about 280 international young scientists discuss key areas of science and research, technology innovation and society, and potential solutions to global challenges. The summit is multi-disciplinary, covering topics relevant to chemistry, physics, medicine, mathematics, computer science and engineering. Invited speakers are globally recognised scientific leaders, including recipients of the Nobel Prize, Fields Medal, Millennium Technology Prize, and the Turing Award.
The Department's Arussa Nawaz (Blagden Group) and Hannah Bolland (Hammond Group) were both invited by the University to attend this prestigious event as part of a selected Oxford contingent.
'The GYSS conference was a great start to the year, being exposed to young and senior scientists from different disciplines all over the world. The difficulty was the time zone with the conference being held at Singapore time, but the organisers uploaded all of the talks online allowing me to catch up after my day in the lab.' - Arussa
Participants were able to take part in live plenary lectures, panel discussions and Q&A sessions, as well as participate in a small group informal session with their pre-selected speaker and interact with other attendees during the networking sessions.
'One of the highlights of the event was the informal 1-1 session with Nobel Prize laureate Sir Peter Ratcliffe who gave wonderful insights on his own career as well as advice on our own career choices. I also enjoyed listening to Rob Langer discuss his research career from post-doc to now having the largest biomedical engineering lab in the world at MIT and is also one of the founders of Moderna - whom as we know are pioneering one of the COVID-19 vaccines.
'The conference left me feeling motivated and determined despite the challenges our current situation brings us! Hopefully next year I will be able to attend in person and meet more members, face-to-face in happier and safer times.' - Arussa
Congratulations to Arussa and Hannah for being selected to attend this summit. Details of the next summit, as well as how to put yourself forward for consideration to join the Oxford contingent, will be published later on in the year.