The YPWLC is an extension of the Young Persons' Lecture Competition (YPLC) and is organised by the IOM3 Student & Early Career Group.
The winners of the finals, held in countries and regions where IOM3 has international branches or sister institutions, compete in the world final, which every year is held in a different location around the world. The first YPWLC was held in London in 2005, and since then has travelled to different locations in four continents.
The YPWLC finalists normally gather in the city where the final is to be held ahead of time, to have the opportunity to get to know each other and exchange experiences. They also have a programme of technical, cultural and social visits based around the competition, so that they get to know something of the country they are visiting and experience its culture and industry. For most finalists, it is the experience of a lifetime!
How to enter
To enter the national and regional YPLC finals, follow the link below.
2023 YPWLC finalists
Meet the Young Persons' World Lecture Competition finalists:
Georgina Burgoyne Morris
Georgina Burgoyne Morris
Georgie is a first year PhD student at the Department of Materials Science & Metallurgy at the University of Cambridge, where she stayed having completed her undergraduate degree in Natural Sciences, specialising in Materials Science. Her research, within the Photoactive Materials group, surrounds the development of self-healing polymeric hosts for triplet-triplet annihilation upconversion – a process by which the efficiency of solar cells could be boosted through the ability to usefully harvest sub-bandgap photons.
When she’s not in the lab, Georgie enjoys cooking, playing music, and going to pub quizzes.
Stimuli-responsive polymers as self-healing materials
The ability to autonomously repair damage can lead to significant improvements in lifetime and recyclability of polymeric materials, reducing both waste and production costs. This may be achieved either extrinsically, through the release of healing agents encapsulated in the polymer matrix, or intrinsically, as a result of dynamic interactions between the polymer chains themselves. The latter systems have the advantage that their healing ability is not reliant upon the presence of a secondary reactive species, giving potential to repair more extensive or repeated damage.
This talk will discuss how, through tuning their chemistry, polymers can be made to intrinsically self-heal under ambient conditions, or in response to external stimuli such as heat or light. It will also explore the variety of applications for these materials, from healable protective coatings to recyclable thermoset resins.
YPWLC Resources
