An engineering PhD student from the University of Bath has been awarded the £3,000 first prize for Engineering and the prestigious Westminster Medal at the SET for Britain national poster competition at the House of Commons last week.  

Julian Rose, from the University’s Department of Electronic & Electrical Engineering, is developing technology to help reduce the errors in GPS caused by storms in the upper atmosphere (ionosphere).

He was one of 60 engineering researchers selected to present a poster at the annual event, which is designed to spotlight the excellent research being carried out by Britain’s early-career scientists, engineers and technologists.

The competition is split into three sessions: Physical Sciences, Engineering and Biological & Biomedical Sciences, each of which has a first prize worth £3,000 and a runner-up prize of £1,000. Apart from winning the Engineering prize, Julian was awarded the Westminster Medal which is presented to the overall winner of all three sessions.

Julian said: “Winning both the Engineering section medal and the Westminster Medal as overall winner is a fantastic achievement for me personally and for my research career. The medals are incredible – it was a great honour to accept them.

“The event organisers, judges and sponsors delivered a really enjoyable, rewarding and valuable event. Meeting so many enthusiastic, encouraging and outstanding people was not only great fun but also a great learning experience.”

Dr Stephen Richards, of the University’s Department of Chemistry also presented a poster at the event entitled ‘Metal oxide surface modification of transparent electrodes for photovoltaic device applications’. It detailed research carried out with Professor Kieran Molloy, Dr Michael Hill and Dr Andrew Johnson into the development of new metal coordination compounds for the deposition of metal oxide thin films via chemical vapour deposition.

Other projects on show ranged from the development of commercial materials for tougher biodegradable bottles, detection of blockages in natural gas pipelines, autonomous science for planetary exploration, organic memory devices and the safe design of nuclear reactors.

The Royal Academy of Engineering is a sponsor of the event, which is organised by the Parliamentary and Scientific Committee.