The Winner of the 2020 Coimbra Group Three-Minute Thesis (3MT) final competition is from Unibo

Maria Francesca Di Filippo, PhD student of the Department of Chemistry, is the winner of the 2020 Coimbra Group three-minute thesis competition (3MT).

Maria Francesca Di Filippo (University of Bologna) is the PhD candidate winning the final 2020 edition of the Coimbra Group Three-Minute Thesis (3MT) competition. Congratulations!

PhD student in Chemistry, Maria Francesca told us in just 3 minutes and with the support of a single slide her research on the functional properties of chitosan films enriched with snail mucus extract and its different applications, as disposable films for food packaging or for the biomedical field. 

See her talk here: https://youtu.be/R_ddzGHZo7c 

Developed by the University of Queensland, the 3MT competition consists of effectively explaining one’s research in three minutes, in a language appropriate to a non-specialist audience. Competitors are allowed one PowerPoint slide, but no other resources. In 2017, the Doctoral Studies Working Group of the Coimbra Group launched this initiative within the Coimbra Group network and since then the Coimbra Group community has been looking forward to this exciting annual contest which brings science closer to people by making it more approachable and understandable. It also provides PhD candidates with a great opportunity to give visibility to their research in front of a large, international audience while honing their own communication skills.

Within the Coimbra Group network, there are two phases in the implementation of this event: in the first phase, after holding their institutional 3MT competition, universities are invited to submit the video of the winner from their own internal competitions to the Coimbra Group office, which then launches an online voting procedure. Voters are requested to assign 3, 2 and 1 point(s) to their preferred top three candidates. The three shortlisted candidates will then compete at the live final which is normally held during the Coimbra Group Annual Conference, in front of a jury, rectors, academic and administrative staff and students. This year, due to the Covid-19 emergency, the live final will exceptionally take place outside the Annual Conference, on 22 October and will be kindly hosted by the universities of Montpellier and Paul Valéry (pending travel and sanitary measures).