Broadcast: News items

JRA student Jack Miller refines apparatus used in his physics experiment

JRA student Melvyn Ansell at work in a chemistry laboratory

JRA student Lekshmy Balakrishnan at work in the lab for her breast cancer research project

JRA student Claudia Cockrell with Salvador Dali's Mae West Lips sofa in Brighton Museum and Art Gallery

JRA student Katie Fensome surveys downland for honey bee forage research

A group of Sussex undergraduates gave up part of their summer holidays to get a taste of top-flight research as part of a University scheme to inspire the academics of tomorrow.

A total of 22 second-year students were awarded Junior Research Associate (JRA) bursaries, worth up to £1,800 each and made possible by generous alumni donations, to fund up to two months’ university research work at Sussex in the summer.

The aim of the JRA scheme is to encourage talented and ambitious Sussex undergraduates to consider postgraduate study at Sussex and a career in research following graduation.

The students, who have excelled in undergraduate study, assisted on research projects or conducted their own research in diverse areas including breast cancer research, bee conservation, a study of Surrealism and work on one of the world’s biggest physics experiments.

Now, the students are to present their work at a special poster exhibition this afternoon (Wednesday 19 September 2012) in the Freeman Centre on campus before they get back to their final year of undergraduate studies.

Among the students presenting their research at the exhibition are:

• Chemistry student Melvyn Ansell took part in molecular research in the lab as part of wider research at Sussex into the chemistry of greenhouse gases;
• Brighton and Sussex Medical School second-year student Lekshmy Balakrishnan, who investigated the molecular mechanisms underlying drug resistance in breast cancer;
• English undergraduate Claudia Cockrell explored the life of Sussex man Edward James, a major figure in the Surrealist movement and a patron of and collaborator with Salvador Dalí;
• Life Sciences student Katherine Fensome spent the summer on the Downs, recording flower species for a survey of wildflower forage for bees – part of research being conducted in the University’s Laboratory of Apiculture and Social Insects;
• Physics undergraduate Jack Miller, has been assisting Sussex physicists in one of the UK's most important particle-physics projects – the neutron electric dipole moment experiment – which seeks to which seeks to explain why the Big Bang created more matter than anti-matter in the Universe.

Professor Richard Black, Head of Global Studies, speaking on behalf of the Doctoral School, says: “The JRA scheme has proved highly popular among our undergraduates and there has been heavy competition for places.

"The work produced by our JRA students is of an extraordinary quality and bodes well for the future of top-flight research at Sussex. Our alumni deserve special thanks for supporting such a rewarding and innovative scheme.”

The JRA exhibition will be held in Rooms 24 and 25 in the Freeman Centre between 3.30pm and 5.30pm.