Latest News Archive

Please select Category, Year, and then Month to display items
Categories
UFS News Media Release Research
Years
2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024
Months
January February March April May June July August September October November December
Previous Archive
29 August 2018 Photo Barend Nagel
Think three minutes is a long time
One slide and three minutes was all they had to present their research. Winners of the UFS Three-Minute Thesis competition in the Master’s category are from left: Nigel Masalla, Phuthi Samuel Masingi and Vuyisa Sigwela. Home page photo: Winners in the PhD Category were Trudie Strauss and Nokuthula Tlalajoe.
It may take three minutes to make noodles, but imagine presenting the 80 000-word research you spent months writing in just three minutes.

For master’s and PhD students participating in the annual institutional Three-Minute Thesis (3MT) competition at the University of the Free State (UFS), three minutes seem to go as fast as three seconds. Each participant is given three minutes to present the essence of their research, explaining the problem, methodology used, as well as the importance of their research using one slide.

A jubilant audience of staff members and students gathered at the Equitas Auditorium on the Bloemfontein Campus for the annual institutional 3MT competition. Interesting research topics across different fields of study, which the participants had spent months and even years researching, were presented in the master’s and PhD categories. After each presentation, a panel of judges and the audience had the chance to ask the participants questions on their research.

The competition is part of the initiative by the UFS Postgraduate School to showcase postgraduate research across disciplines, faculties, and universities. Participation in this competition helps to develop academic, presentation, and research communication skills to ensure that research students can effectively communicate their research in a language that even non-specialists can understand. 

It is the mandate of the school to “create an enabling environment for postgraduate students to excel in their pursuit of their academic quests”, according to Prof Witness Mudzi: Director of the UFS Postgraduate School. 

Winners at the event:

PhDs
• Third prize: Trudie Strauss - Babelish Confusion: Finding Statistical Structure in the Diversity of Languages (R3 000 cash prize)
• People’s choice: Nokuthula Tlalajoe - The transition of undergraduate first-year students into the MBChB programme: Social learning and integration

Master’s
• First prize: Phuthi Samuel Masingi   Physical demands of South African Football (R6 000 cash prize)
• Second prize and people’s choice: Nigel Masalla   “ Stealthing” – lifting the veil on non-consensual condom removal (R4 000 cash prize)
• Third prize: Vuyisa Sigwela - Extraction, characterisation and application of betalains from beetroot, cactus pear and amaranth (R2 000 cash prize)

The UFS will be represented by Trudie Strauss at the national 3MT competition on 26 October 2018. The national competition will take place on the UFS Bloemfontein Campus

News Archive

Cochlear implant changes Magteld's world
2009-11-06

The microphone is ready for Magteld Smith’s (second from the left) first radio interview after the cochlear implant was switched on by Mr Henk Wolmarans (right) of MedEl. With them are, from the left: Ms Vicki Fourie, Deaf Miss SA, Ms Eunika Smith from the SABC and Prof. Jonathan Jansen.
Photo: Leatitia Pienaar


Magteld Smith gave her first steps towards the world of the hearing when her cochlear implant was switched on in the Universitas Hospital this week.

A whole team was there to share her joy and disbelief and amazement the moment she could hear noises, voices and conversations. Among them were the Rector and Vice-Chancellor of the University of the Free State (UFS), Prof. Jonathan Jansen, and the acting dean of the Faculty of Heath Sciences at the UFS, Prof. Gert van Zyl.

“I can hear my own voice! I haven’t heard it for a long time. My wish is that every deaf child can get something like this,” she said while prodding Prof. Jansen to speak so that she can hear his voice.

Magteld is working at the university's Centre for Health Systems Research and Development and was deaf since birth. She lost her last bit of hearing due to meningitis last year. Her hearing aids could then not assist her to communicate and a cochlear implant was the only option.

A donation by the Austrian company MedEl made the implant possible. Prof. André Claassen, Head of the Department of Otorhinolaryngology at the UFS, says MedEl was also instrumental in the establishment of the implant programme at the Universitas Hospital and sponsored the first five implants at a total cost of R1 million.

Prof. Claassen says 27 implants have already been done here, but it came to an abrupt halt due to a lack of funds. Strong hearing aids are expensive and cochlear implants are even more expensive at R200 000 each. People with hearing disabilities must be identified at an early age as the brain’s ability to learn sound and voice diminishes after the age of three.
 

We use cookies to make interactions with our websites and services easy and meaningful. To better understand how they are used, read more about the UFS cookie policy. By continuing to use this site you are giving us your consent to do this.

Accept