̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - Awards

Researchers celebrated at the Cambridge Awards for Research Impact and Engagement

zs332 — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 08:09:41 +0000

̽��ֱ��Cambridge Awards for Research Impact and Engagement, formerly the Vice-Chancellor's Award, are held annually to recognise exceptional achievement, innovation, and creativity in developing research engagement and impact plans with significant economic, social, and cultural potential. Awarded in 3 categories, the winners for 2024 are:

Established Academic

Winner: Professor Sander van der Linden (Department of Psychology, School of Biological Sciences and Churchill College) and his team at the Cambridge Social Decision-Making Lab (Team application)

Project: A psychological vaccine against misinformation

Professor Sander van der Linden and team have developed a novel approach to countering the spread of harmful misinformation. This ‘psychological vaccine’ resulted in award-winning public impact tools that have shown millions of people how to spot fake news online. These games have been adopted by the World Health Organization, United Nations, UK Government and Google, and led to key policy changes in the EU Digital Services Act.

Early Career Researcher

Winner: Dr Gabriel Okello (Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, School of Technology)

Project: Applying multidisciplinary, collaborative approaches to tackle air pollution in rapidly urbanising African cities

̽��ֱ��project catalysed Uganda’s first-ever air quality standards, advancing policy and public health. It drove transformative growth in the e-mobility sector and battery-swapping stations. ̽��ֱ��Clean Air Network was established as a multi-regional community of practice for air quality management across Africa. ̽��ֱ��platform now provides real-time air quality data enabling evidence-based decision-making in Uganda and 8 other African countries.

Collaboration Award

Winner:

Lead: Professor Paul Fletcher (Department of Psychiatry, School of Clinical Medicine, Clare College), Dr Dervila Glynn (Cambridge Neuroscience IRC), Dominic Matthews (Ninja Theory Ltd), Sharon Gilfoyle (Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust)

Project: Representing psychosis in video games: communicating clinical science and tackling stigma

This work draws together expertise in video game design and clinical neuroscience, with lived experience of mental illness to co-produce two award-winning video games vividly conveying the nature of altered experience of reality in a character with psychosis. Within conversations around mental health, psychosis is neglected and highly stigmatised.

In creating a powerful character and telling her story through gameplay, the project has enabled sensitive and thoughtful conversations about psychosis, and mental illness in general. It has had a measurably positive impact on stigma.

More about the Cambridge Awards for Research Impact and Engagement

Find out more about the winning projects and meet our runners-up.

From helping to inoculate the public against misinformation to tackling air pollution in rapidly urbanising African cities, researchers from across the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge were honoured at the Cambridge Awards on 3 February.

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright © ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.

Yes

Simon Baron-Cohen wins MRC Millennium Medal for transformative research into autism and neurodiversity

Anonymous — Thu, 20 Jun 2024 07:00:07 +0000

Sir Simon Baron-Cohen is a Professor in the Departments of Psychology and Psychiatry at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and Fellow at Trinity College. He is Director of the Autism Research Centre, which he set up in 1997. He has published over 750 peer reviewed scientific articles and has made contributions to many aspects of autism research. In 2021, he received a knighthood in the New Year’s Honours list for his services to autism.

One of his earliest MRC grants, in 1996, was to investigate if autism could be diagnosed in babies as young as 18 months old, and his team showed that it can. Ideally, an early diagnosis should lead to the right support, so that a child has the best opportunity to fulfil their potential.

Baron-Cohen has drawn attention to the reality that a lot of autistic people do not receive their diagnosis in early childhood. In fact, many are not diagnosed until late childhood, or even adulthood. This means they are left unsupported and feeling different, but with no explanation. As a result, autistic people can end up feeling like they do not fit in, and may experience exclusion or bullying by their peer group. They can feel ashamed when they’re not coping in a mainstream classroom.

He argues that the reason they are struggling is because the mainstream educational setting was designed for non-autistic people. This can lead to a gradual deterioration in their mental health. Many underachieve academically and only 15% of autistic adults are employed. Most worryingly, one in four autistic adults have planned or attempted suicide. He said “Autistic people are being failed by our society”.

In 2017 Baron-Cohen was invited by the United Nations to give a keynote lecture on Autism Acceptance Day. He described how autistic people are excluded from many basic human rights. These include the right to education, the right to health services, the right to dignity, and the right to employment.

In an effort to change this, Baron-Cohen created a charity called the Autism Centre of Excellence (ACE) at Cambridge. ̽��ֱ��charity is science-led and aims to put the science into the hands of policymakers, so there’s no delay in translating policy-relevant findings.

Alongside his applied research, Baron-Cohen’s team also conducts basic research. Autism starts prenatally and is partly but not completely genetic. For decades it was unclear what other factors might contribute to the cause of autism. Over the past 20 years Baron-Cohen made two big discoveries which have helped understand what causes autism. First, his team found elevated levels of prenatal androgens (sex hormones such as testosterone) in pregnancies that later resulted in autism. Second, they found that prenatal oestrogens (another group of sex hormones which are synthesised from androgens) levels were also elevated in pregnancies resulting in autism.

Autism is an example of neurodiversity. Autistic individuals’ brains develop differently, from before birth. Some of these differences result in disability, for example, in social skills and communication. But others result in strengths or talents. For example, many autistic people have excellent memory for facts and excellent attention to detail. And many are strongly attracted to patterns. Baron-Cohen’s recent book ̽��ֱ��Pattern Seekers celebrates autistic people’s different minds. In many environments, such skills are assets. In his research group, he employs neurodivergent individuals.

Baron-Cohen will receive the prestigious medal, specially created by ̽��ֱ��Royal Mint, and will be listed amongst the most highly influential and impactful researchers in the UK. He will deliver a lecture about his research, and his achievements will be celebrated at an Awards Ceremony on 20 June 2024 in the Law Society where he will receive the medal.

On receiving the news that he was to be awarded the MRC Millennium Medal, Baron-Cohen said: “This is the result of team work and I am fortunate to be surrounded by a talented team of scientists. I hope this Medal shines a light on how autistic people need a lot more support, from the earliest point, to lead fulfilling lives.”

̽��ֱ��UKRI Medical Research Council (MRC) in the UK will today present the MRC Millennium Medal 2023 to Professor Sir Simon Baron-Cohen, in recognition of his pioneering MRC-funded research into the prenatal sex steroid theory of autism, his establishment of the Autism Research Centre at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, and his work in the public understanding of neurodiversity.

I hope this Medal shines a light on how autistic people need a lot more support, from the earliest point, to lead fulfilling lives

Simon Baron-Cohen

Brian Harris

Professor Sir Simon Baron-Cohen

Yes

Three Cambridge researchers awarded Royal Academy of Engineering Chair in Emerging Technologies

sc604 — Thu, 14 Mar 2024 11:06:52 +0000

From atomically thin semiconductors for more energy-efficient electronics, to harnessing the power of the sun by upcycling biomass and plastic waste into sustainable chemicals, their research encompasses a variety of technological advances with the potential to deliver wide-ranging benefits.

Funded by the UK Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, the Academy’s Chair in Emerging Technologies scheme aims to identify global research visionaries and provide them with long-term support. Each £2,500,000 award covers employment and research costs, enabling each researcher to focus on advancing their technology to application in a strategic manner for up to 10 years.

Since 2017, the Chair in Emerging Technologies programme has awarded over £100 million to Chairs in 16 universities located across the UK. Of the four Chairs awarded in this round, three were awarded to Cambridge researchers.

Professor Manish Chhowalla FREng, from the Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy, is developing ultra-low-power electronics based on wafer-scale manufacture of atomically thin (or 2D) semiconductors. ̽��ֱ��atomically thin nature of the 2D semiconductors makes them ideal for energy-efficient electronics. To reap their benefits, complementary metal oxide semiconductor processes will be developed for integration into ultra-low power devices.

Professor Nic Lane and his team at the Department of Computer Science and Technology, are working to make the development of AI more democratic by focusing on AI methods that are less centralised and more collaborative, and offer better privacy protection.

Their project, nicknamed DANTE, aims to encourage wider and more active participation across society in the development and adoption of AI techniques.

“Artificial intelligence (AI) is evolving towards a situation where only a handful of the largest companies in the world can participate,” said Lane. “Given the importance of this technology to society this trajectory must be changed. We aim to invent, popularise and commercialise core new scientific breakthroughs that will enable AI technology in the future to be far more collaborative, distributed and open than it is today.”

̽��ֱ��project will focus on developing decentralised forms of AI that facilitate the collaborative study, invention, development and deployment of machine learning products and methods, primarily between collections of companies and organisations. An underlying mission of DANTE is to facilitate advanced AI technology remaining available for adoption in the public sphere, for example in hospitals, public policy, and energy and transit infrastructure.

Professor Erwin Reisner, from the Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry, is developing a technology, called solar reforming, that creates sustainable fuels and chemicals from biomass and plastic waste. This solar-powered technology uses only waste, water and air as ingredients, and the sun powers a catalyst to produce green hydrogen fuel and platform chemicals to decarbonise the transport and chemical sectors. A recent review in Nature Reviews Chemistry gives an overview of plans for the technology.

“ ̽��ֱ��generous long-term support provided by the Royal Academy of Engineering will be the critical driver for our ambitions to engineer, scale and ultimately commercialise our solar chemical technology,” said Reisner. “ ̽��ֱ��timing for this support is perfect, as my team has recently demonstrated several prototypes for upcycling biomass and plastic waste using sunlight, and we have excellent momentum to grasp the opportunities arising from developing these new technologies. I also hope to use this Chair to leverage further support to establish a circular chemistry centre in Cambridge to tackle our biggest sustainability challenges.”

“I am excited to announce this latest round of Chairs in Emerging Technology,” said Dr Andrew Clark, Executive Director, Programmes, at the Royal Academy of Engineering. “ ̽��ֱ��mid-term reviews of the previous rounds of Chairs are providing encouraging evidence that long-term funding of this nature helps to bring the groundbreaking and influential ideas of visionary engineers to fruition. I look forward to seeing the impacts of these four exceptionally talented individuals.”

Three Cambridge researchers – Professors Manish Chhowalla, Nic Lane and Erwin Reisner – have each been awarded a Royal Academy of Engineering Chair in Emerging Technologies, to develop emerging technologies with high potential to deliver economic and social benefits to the UK.

̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge

L-R: Manish Chhowalla, Nic Lane, Erwin Reisner

Yes

Cambridge commended for communication of research

lw355 — Tue, 28 Jun 2022 09:41:10 +0000

"Creative, resourceful and innovative" approaches to communicating research have been recognised with four international CASE Circle of Excellence awards.

Vice-Chancellor’s Awards highlight research impact and engagement across Cambridge

zs332 — Thu, 07 Oct 2021 14:44:34 +0000

Academics from across the ̽��ֱ�� have been recognised in this year’s Vice-Chancellor’s Research Impact and Engagement Awards for their research into improving management of maternity emergencies during COVID-19, helping rural communities in India become agriculturally more sustainable and aiding the Government’s real-time COVID-19 monitoring.

Cambridge researchers elected Fellows of the Royal Academy of Engineering

sc604 — Wed, 22 Sep 2021 05:00:00 +0000

Professors Holger Babinsky, Andrea Ferrari, Rob Miller and Rachel Oliver have been elected in this year’s intake, which consists of 60 Fellows, four International Fellows and five Honorary Fellows, with each individual having made exceptional contributions to their sectors in their own way, as innovation leaders, inspiring role models, or through remarkable achievements in business or academia.

Professor Holger Babinsky is Professor of Aerodynamics in the Department of Engineering and a Fellow of Magdalene College. He researches fundamental and applied aerodynamics with application to aeronautics, road vehicles and energy production.

“I am delighted to receive this remarkable honour and feel very lucky to be recognised by my peers for doing something I love,” said Babinsky. “I am also truly grateful to the ̽��ֱ��, the Engineering Department and all my colleagues and students for providing the environment and support that allowed me to grow as a researcher and educator.”

Professor Andrea Ferrari is Professor of Nanotechnology in the Department of Engineering. He is Director of the Cambridge Graphene Centre and of the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Graphene Technology, and a Fellow of Pembroke College.

“ ̽��ֱ��Cambridge Graphene Centre allows our partners to meet, and effectively establish joint industrial-academic activities to promote innovative and adventurous research with an emphasis on applications,” said Ferrari. “It is often at the interface between academia and industry that new challenges for fundamental research are generated. I am pleased the Royal Academy of Engineering has recognised the translational potential of our work and I see this as a further encouragement to develop state of the art facilities that will lead to world-class research, technology and innovation.”

Professor Rob Miller is Professor of Aerothermal Technology in the Department of Engineering. He is Director of the Whittle Laboratory and a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College. Much of the research of the Whittle Laboratory is geared toward solving one of technology’s biggest puzzles: how to achieve zero-carbon flight.

“I am deeply grateful to all the colleagues and students that I have worked with, especially at the Whittle Laboratory and at Rolls-Royce, without whose support this would not have been possible,” said Miller. “Throughout my career I have benefited from working closely with industry. I believe that it is only through these partnerships, between industry and academia, that engineers can meet society’s greatest challenge, climate change.”

Professor Rachel Oliver is Professor of Materials Science in the Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy, Director of the Cambridge Centre for Gallium Nitride and a Fellow of Robinson College. When she’s not making atomic-scale changes to create super-efficient light bulbs and cut carbon emissions, she has her sights set on helping to improve equality and diversity in science.

“It’s fantastic that the Academy engages with everything from the nanoscale materials engineering, which is my focus, all the way up to the much grander scale of wind turbines and jet engines,” said Oliver. “All of these varied aspects of engineering are hugely important for sustainability, which is a big current focus for the Academy. I’m also looking forward to having the opportunity to engage with the work the Academy does to increase equity in the engineering profession, since I'm passionate about making fascinating and fulfilling careers in engineering accessible to the widest possible range of talented people.”

This year’s new Fellows are the first to reflect the Academy’s Fellowship Fit for the Future initiative announced in July 2020, to drive more nominations of outstanding engineers from underrepresented groups ahead of its 50th anniversary in 2026. This initiative will see the Academy strive for increased representation from women, disabled and LGBTQ+ engineers, those from minority ethnic backgrounds, non-traditional education pathways and emerging industries, and those who have achieved excellence at an earlier career stage than normal.

These new Fellows will be admitted to the Academy, which comprises nearly 1,700 distinguished engineers, at its AGM on 22 September. In joining the Fellowship, they will add their capabilities to the Academy’s mission to create a sustainable society and an inclusive economy for all.

Sir Jim McDonald FREng FRSE, President of the Royal Academy of Engineering, says: “Our Fellows represent the best of the best in the engineering world, and we welcome these 69 excellent and talented professionals to our community of businesspeople, entrepreneurs, innovators and academics.

“This year’s new Fellows are the most diverse group elected in the history of our institution. ̽��ֱ��engineering profession has long suffered from a diversity shortfall and the Academy is committed to changing that, including by ensuring that our own Fellowship community is as inclusive as it can be. It is well established that diverse organisations tend to be more agile and more innovative, and as the UK’s National Academy for engineering and technology, we have a responsibility to reflect the society we serve in addressing the shared challenges of our future.”

Four researchers from the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge are among the leading figures in engineering and technology elected as Fellows of the Royal Academy of Engineering.

Left-right: Holger Babinsky, Andrea Ferrari, Rob Miller, Rachel Oliver

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright © ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – as here, on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.

Yes

Four Cambridge researchers recognised in the 2022 Breakthrough Prizes

sc604 — Thu, 09 Sep 2021 11:59:47 +0000

Professors Shankar Balasubramanian and David Klenerman, from Cambridge’s Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry, have been awarded the 2022 Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences – the world’s largest science prize – for the development of next-generation DNA sequencing. They share the award with Pascal Mayer, from the French company Alphanosos.

In addition, Professor Suchitra Sebastian, from the Cavendish Laboratory, and Professor Jack Thorne, from the Department of Pure Mathematics and Mathematical Statistics, have been recognised with the New Horizons Prize, awarded to outstanding early-career researchers.

Professor Suchitra Sebastian has been awarded the 2022 New Horizons in Physics Prize for high precision electronic and magnetic measurements that have profoundly changed our understanding of high temperature superconductors and unconventional insulators.

Professor Jack Thorne has been awarded the 2022 New Horizons in Mathematics Prize, for transformative contributions to diverse areas of algebraic number theory, and in particular for the proof, in collaboration with James Newton, of the automorphy of all symmetric powers of a holomorphic modular newform.

Professors Balasubramanian and Klenerman co-invented Solexa-Illumina Next Generation DNA Sequencing (NGS), technology that has enhanced our basic understanding of life, converting biosciences into ‘big science’ by enabling fast, accurate, low-cost and large-scale genome sequencing – the process of determining the complete DNA sequence of an organism’s make-up. They co-founded the company Solexa to make the technology available to the world.

̽��ֱ��benefits to society of rapid genome sequencing are huge. ̽��ֱ��almost immediate identification and characterisation of the virus which causes COVID-19, rapid development of vaccines, and real-time monitoring of new genetic variants would have been impossible without the technique Balasubramanian and Klenerman developed.

̽��ֱ��technology has had – and continues to have – a transformative impact in the fields of genomics, medicine and biology. One measure of the scale of change is that it has allowed a million-fold improvement in speed and cost when compared to the first sequencing of the human genome. In 2000, sequencing of one human genome took over 10 years and cost more than a billion dollars: today, the human genome can be sequenced in a single day at a cost of less than $1,000. More than a million human genomes are sequenced at scale each year, thanks to the technology co-invented by Professors Balasubramanian and Klenerman, meaning we can understand diseases much better and much more quickly. Earlier this year, they were awarded the Millennium Technology Prize. Balasubramanian is also based at the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Institute, and is a Fellow of Trinity College. Klenerman is a Fellow of Christ's College.

Professor Sebastian’s research seeks to discover exotic quantum phases of matter in complex materials. Her group’s experiments involve tuning the co-operative behaviour of electrons within these materials by subjecting them to extreme conditions including low temperature, high applied pressure, and intense magnetic field.

Under these conditions, her group can take materials that are quite close to behaving like a superconductor – perfect, lossless conductors of electricity – and ‘nudge’ them, transforming their behaviour.

“I like to call it quantum alchemy – like turning soot into gold,” Sebastian said. “You can start with a material that doesn’t even conduct electricity, squeeze it under pressure, and discover that it transforms into a superconductor. Going forward, we may also discover new quantum phases of matter that we haven’t even imagined.”

In addition to her physics research, Sebastian is also involved in theatre and the arts. She is Director of the Cavendish Arts-Science Project, which she founded in 2016. ̽��ֱ��programme has been conceived to question and explore material and immaterial universes through a dialogue between the arts and sciences.

“Being awarded the New Horizons Prize is incredibly encouraging, uplifting and joyous,” said Sebastian. “It recognises a discovery made by our team of electrons doing what they're not supposed to do. It's gone from the moment of elation and disbelief at the discovery, and then trying to follow it through, when no one else quite thinks it’s possible or that it could be happening. It’s been an incredible journey, and having it recognised in this way is incredibly rewarding.”

Professor Jack Thorne is a number theorist in the Department of Pure Mathematics and Mathematical Statistics. One of the most significant open problems in mathematics is the Riemann Hypothesis, which concerns Riemann’s zeta function. Today we know that the zeta function is intimately tied up with questions concerning the statistical distribution of prime numbers, such as how many prime numbers there are, how closely they can be found on the number line. A famous episode in the history of the Riemann Hypothesis is Freeman Dyson’s observation that the zeroes of the zeta function appear to obey statistical laws arising from the theory of random matrices, which had first been studied in theoretical physics.

In 1916, during his time in Cambridge, Ramanujan wrote down an analogue of the Riemann zeta function, inspired by his work on the number of ways of expressing a given number as a sum of squares (a problem with a rich classical history), and made some conjectures as to its properties, which have turned out to be related to many of the most exciting developments in number theory in the last century. Actually, there are a whole family of zeta functions, the properties of which control the statistics of the sums of squares problem. Thorne's work, recognised in the prize citation, essentially shows for Ramanujan’s zeta functions what Riemann proved for his zeta function in 1859.

Taking a broader view, Ramanujan’s zeta functions are now seen to fit into the framework of the Langlands Program. This is a series of conjectures, made by Langlands in the 1960’s, which have been described as a “grand unified theory of mathematics”, and which can be used to explain any number of phenomena in number theory. Another famous example is Wiles proof, in 1994, of Fermat’s Last Theorem. Nowadays the essential piece of Wiles’ work is seen as progress towards a small part of the Langlands program. Thorne's work establishes part of Langlands’ conjectures for a class of objects including Ramanujan’s Delta function.

"I am deeply honoured to be awarded the New Horizons Prize for my work in number theory," said Thorne. "Number theory is a subject with a rich history in Cambridge and I feel very fortunate to be able to make my own contribution to this tradition."

For the tenth year, the Breakthrough Prize recognises the world’s top scientists. Each prize is US $3 million and presented in the fields of Life Sciences, Fundamental Physics (one per year) and Mathematics (one per year). In addition, up to three New Horizons in Physics Prizes, up to three New Horizons in Mathematics Prizes and up to three Maryam Mirzakhani New Frontiers Prizes are given out to early-career researchers each year, each worth US $100,000. ̽��ֱ��Breakthrough Prizes were founded by Sergey Brin, Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg, Yuri and Julia Milner, and Anne Wojcicki.

Four ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge researchers – Professors Shankar Balasubramanian, David Klenerman, Suchitra Sebastian and Jack Thorne – have been recognised by the Breakthrough Prize Foundation for their outstanding scientific achievements.

L-R: Millennium Technology Prize, Nick Saffell, Jack Thorne

L-R: David Klenerman, Shankar Balasubramanian, Suchitra Sebastian, Jack Thorne

Yes

Submissions open for BBC National Short Story Award and BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ��

Anonymous — Fri, 15 Jan 2021 12:14:44 +0000

̽��ֱ��BBC National Short Story Award is one of the most prestigious for a single short story, with the winning author receiving £15,000, and four further shortlisted authors £600 each. ̽��ֱ��stories will be broadcast on Radio 4 and published in an anthology by Comma Press.

̽��ֱ��2020 winner of the BBC National Short Story Award was Sarah Hall for ‘ ̽��ֱ��Grotesques’, a timeless and unsettling story set against a backdrop of privilege and inequality in a university town. This was the second win for Hall who also won the prize in 2013. Previous alumni of the award include Lionel Shriver, Zadie Smith, Hilary Mantel, Jon McGregor, Ingrid Persaud, Cynan Jones and Jo Lloyd.

̽��ֱ��writers shortlisted for the BBC Young Writers’ Award have their stories narrated by an actor, recorded for a BBC podcast, and published in an anthology. ̽��ֱ��winner of the 2020 BBC Young Writers’ Award was Lottie Mills for her story inspired by her experience of disability, ‘ ̽��ֱ��Changeling.’ Both winning stories are available to listen to on BBC Sounds.

This is the first year of a new three-year partnership with the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, including Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Library, the Faculty of English, Cambridge Institute of Continuing Education and for the first time, the Fitzwilliam Museum.

Dr Lisa Mullen from the ̽��ֱ��’s Faculty of English and Director of Studies at Downing College said: “ ̽��ֱ�� ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge is delighted to be collaborating with the BBC again on these awards, and to support and nurture both new and established short-story writers.

“Stories are at the heart of our shared human experience, and Cambridge's Faculty of English, Institute of Continuing Education, the ̽��ֱ�� Library and Fitzwilliam Museum all have a special interest in how this dynamic form of fiction responds to a changing world.”

̽��ֱ��BBC National Short Story Award and BBC Young Writers’ Award are now open for submissions. Novelist and former Radio 4 Commissioning Editor for Arts James Runcie will chair the judging panel for the BBC National Short Story Award, an award that has enriched both the careers of writers and the wider literary landscape since its launch sixteen years ago.

Runcie said: “I am so delighted to chair the 2021 BBC National Short Story Awards. We need imaginative alternatives in these dark times: stories that question and surprise and open up new worlds.

“They can be short or long. They can take place in the past, present, future, or even all three at once. They can be set in a nutshell or in infinite space. But what I think we’ll be looking for is uniqueness of vision, a distinctive tone, curiosity, intrigue, surprise: an invitation to the reader’s imagination. I can’t wait to get started.”

Chair of the BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� is BBC Radio 1 Presenter Katie Thistleton. She chairs the judging panel for the teenage award for the fourth time as it opens for submissions for the seventh year. Thistleton is a writer and the co-host of Radio 1’s Life Hacks and ̽��ֱ��Official Chart: First Look on Radio 1. ̽��ֱ��BBC Young Writers’ Award is open to writers between the ages of 14-18 years.

Thistleton said: “I’m really looking forward to chairing the BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� again for 2021. As a keen writer myself, and someone who loved entering writing competitions when I was younger, I know how important and exciting this opportunity is.”

Runcie and Thistleton will be joined by a group of acclaimed writers and critics on their respective panels.

For the BBC National Short Story Award: Booker Prize shortlisted novelist Fiona Mozley; award winning writer, poet and winner of the Desmond Elliott Prize, Derek Owusu; multi-award winning Irish novelist and short story writer, Donal Ryan; and returning judge, Di Speirs, Books Editor at BBC Radio.

For the BBC Young Writers’ Award, Thistleton will be joined by bestselling, highly acclaimed Irish YA author, Louise O’Neill; twenty-year old singer-songwriter Arlo Parks; Sunday Times bestselling author and actor Robert Webb; and Guardian Children’s Fiction Award winner Alex Wheatle.

Full Terms and Conditions for the NSSA and YWA are available with submissions accepted online at www.bbc.co.uk/nssa and www.bbc.co.uk/ywa. The deadline for receipt of entries for the BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� is 9am (GMT) Monday 15th March 2021. The deadline for receipt of entries for the BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� is 9am (GMT) Monday 22nd March 2021.

̽��ֱ��shortlist for the BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� will be announced on BBC Radio 4’s Front Row at 7.15pm on Friday 10th September 2021. ̽��ֱ��shortlist for the BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� will be announced on Radio 1’s Life Hacks from 4pm on Sunday 19th September 2021.

̽��ֱ��stories shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 from Monday 13th to Friday 17th September 2021 from 3.30pm to 4pm.

̽��ֱ��announcement of the winners of the two awards will be broadcast live from the award ceremony at BBC Broadcasting House on BBC Radio 4’s Front Row from 7.15pm on Tuesday 5th October 2021.

Novelist James Runcie and broadcaster Katie Thistleton will chair the judging panels for the 2021 BBC National Short Story Award and BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ��, and submissions are now open.

Stories are at the heart of our shared human experience, and Cambridge's Faculty of English, Institute of Continuing Education, the ̽��ֱ�� Library and Fitzwilliam Museum all have a special interest in how this dynamic form of fiction responds to a changing world

Dr Lucy Mullen

Yes