December 2022 saw students from across the faculty present their higher degree by research in a somewhat unexpected form. While a lot of blood, sweat and tears goes into a PhD or Masters thesis, these presentations were comprised of flour, eggs and sugar – as researchers battled it out in the 2022 Bake Your Thesis competition.
As you can see from these pictures, the level of creativity was high as entrants worked to communicate the essence of their research in edible form. And while the contents of a thesis might on occasion be accused of being dense, the judges found these entries generally fluffy, light and delicious!
This year's winner, Elaheh Samandi, used the presence of chocolate chips and other ingredients to demonstrate variations in air quality across UTS buildings. A deserving victory for a cake that quite literally had the thesis idea baked into it.
Winner: Elaheh Samandi, Using IoT Sensing and Occupant Surveys to Evaluate the Temporal and Spatial Correlations Between Indoor Air Quality and Occupancy Comfort in Campus Buildings.
Runner up: Megan Taylor, Planning, Funding, and Implementing Open Space post Covid: A Delphi Approach
Bake Your Thesis (or Bake Your PhD) idea has been held on a number of university campuses across Australia, NZ, Europe, North America, and possibly beyond, in part as a way to help researchers improve the accessibility of their work. It's also a delicious way to have a little fun at the end of the year!