Festival of Postgraduate Research 2012: full results

Our annual Festival of Postgraduate Research has been another rip-roaring success, with enthusiastic and knowledgeable research students communicating their work, and their passion for their work, to festival visitors.

This year, as well as 50 of our best campus-based research postgrads, there were also posters by 13 students taking their PhDs part-time or by distance learning. So 63 competing posters, representing the full range and depth of University of Leicester postgraduate research.

In the afternoon, Maggie Philbin delivered a fascinating and entertaining talk to presenters, organisers and judges about the importance of effective communication. And then the prizes were handed out, as follow:

Peer Recommendation Prize

sponsored by Elsevier

Elee Kirk, School of Museum Studies: Through a Low-Down Lens: Young Childrens' Perspectives of a Natural History Museum

Media Prize

sponsored by the Leicester Mercury

Hayley Harris, School of Management: Mind Your Language! Getting the Job Done with a Linguistically Diverse Workforce

Best Poster (Distance Learning and Part-Time Researchers)

sponsored by the Leicester Mercury

Owen Vennard, Department of Infection, Immunity, and Inflammation: Higher or Lower? A Sugary Implication to Antibody Structure and its Relation to IgA Nephropathy

Highly commended: Claudia Eicher, School of Archaeology and Ancient History: And Gaul Became Christian: Archaeologies of Conversion in Late Antiquity

Best Poster (College of Arts, Humanities, and Law)

sponsored by Leicester City Council

Megan Leyland, Department of the History of Art and Film: Where There's a Will, There's a Wife

Best Poster (College of Medicine, Biological Sciences, and Psychology)

sponsored by Grant Thornton

Kate Beaumont, Department of Cardiovascular Sciences: At the Heart of Fly Research: Myocyte Stress 1 and its Effects on Heart and Muscle in Drosophila melanogaster

Best Poster (College of Science and Engineering)

sponsored by the Leicestershire Asian Business Association

Frederique Vanheusden, Department of Engineering: Combining MRI Images and Body Surface Signals to Reveal the Heart's Secrets

Best Poster (College of Social Science)

sponsored by Harvey Ingram

Laura MacKenzie, Department of Politics and International Relations: Anarchy in the EP? Success and Fragmentation of the Populist Radical Right in the European Parliament Since 1979

Best Poster overall

Each of the winners received a certificate and £250. Finally, the Graduate Dean's Prize for Best Poster overall, sponsored by the Graduate School – worth £350 – went to:

Laura MacKenzie again. Laura’s research examines the success of right-wing, nationalist parties such as the BNP in the European Parliament and what that can tell us about European politics.

All the winners will go through to the Vitae regional competition in Coventry in July. You can see microsites about some of the research featured in the festival in the Meet the Researchers section of the Festival website.