RSES PhD student, Mike Jollands, summarised his 3-year research project in just 3 minutes at the 2014 ANU final of the 3MT competition. Watch the video of Mike's talk, titled Colognes, Crowds and Cooking Crystals.

Mike came to the ANU after completing his Bachelor and Masters qualifications at the University of Leeds, UK. He describes the path that bought him to RSES as follows:

"A lifelong interest in picking up pebbles from the beach was successfully turned into a first class Bachelors' and Masters' joint degree at the University of Leeds in the UK. During this time I was awarded a scholarship from Leeds Alumni, and a top-up scolarship from BP which mysteriously disappeared when Deepwater Horizon exploded. An exchange year took me to the Australian National University, where I developed a taste for petrology under the guidance of Joerg Hermann, Daniela Rubatto and John Mavrogenes. Upon returning to the UK, I acheived the highest degree mark for my year in the Faculty of Environment at Leeds. A brief jaunt to Mongolia to work in the mining industry convinced me that research was a better option, and I commenced my PhD at ANU in early 2012"