In this episode of Living Proof, Dan Aspel is joined by three guests: Daniel Gardham (Surrey), Katherine Benjamin (Oxford), and Francisco de Melo Virissimo (LSE), all of whom won medals as podium finishers at the 2024 STEM for Britain awards at the UK parliament in March. The conversation covers their success in the highly competitive poster exhibition, how it felt to present their mathematical research to politicians and the public, and what the future holds for each of them from this point onwards.

> https://stemforbritain.org.uk/
> https://www.newton.ac.uk/news/ini-news/stem-for-britain-winners-2024/

00:00 - Introduction
02:20 - How does it feel to have won medals at STEM for Britain?
04:40 - What attracted you to the event?
08:10 - What’s it like presenting mathematical research to MPs and politicians?
12:10 - Learning to communicate key information quickly and more efficiently, and comparisons with academic settings
16:40 - Could all academics benefit from this kind of experience?
19:00 - How would pure maths fare at en event such as STEM for Britain?
20:50 - A strong field of finalist posters, but little time to enjoy them
23:30 - The experience of visiting Parliament and the atmosphere of the event
27:27 - What does the future hold for each of you?

Now in its third year, the INI Postdoctoral Fellowships in Mathematics scheme enables “exceptional early career researchers in the mathematical sciences” to gain “experience, independence and new connections on their way to a successful academic career”.

In this episode of Living Proof, Dan Aspel speak to Dr Swapnil Jaideo Kole to learn about her journey through mathematics so far, and to find out what being awarded this Fellowship – which involves spending three months on the INI research programme "New statistical physics in living matter: non equilibrium states under adaptive control" and nine months working with Professor Michael Cates at Cambridge University’s Department for Applied Maths and Theoretical Physics – means to her personally.

From 8-12 January 2024, the "Equivariant methods in geometry" took place in INI's main seminar room in Cambridge, UK. So far, so routine procedure. However, this workshop had the unique twist of being run in parallel with a team at the University of Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria. Linked by audio-visual streaming connections, the two events were remotely connected and operated as one throughout the week.

Following successful interactions across continents (on top of the usual collaborations taking place at the Cambridge base), Dan Aspel caught up with organisers and participants: Victoria Hoskins, Praise Adeyemo, Joshua Jackson and Dominic Bunnett to find out how the partnership came about, and how others could do the same with their own research meetings.