PhD
PhD student wins award for best thesis in data protection
Dr Janis Wong had a productive week, firstly attending her graduation in St Andrews. The Bedellus placed a PhD hood on Janis’ head in the Younger Hall for her thesis on Co-creating data protection solutions through a commons.
Following graduation, Janis flew straight to Strasbourg for the 44th Plenary meeting of the Committee of Convention 108, where she received the Council of Europe’s Stefano Rodotà award for the best PhD thesis in data protection.
Janis was supervised by Professor Kirstie Ball in the School of Management and Dr Tristan Henderson in the School of Computer Science, who are both very proud of their graduating student. Well done Janis!
World-Leading PhD Scholarship in Health Informatics
A fully-funded PhD scholarship is available to support an exceptional student wishing to undertake doctoral research in health informatics, in particular looking at analysing and predicting disease trajectories of multimorbidity. This prestigious PhD scholarship is awarded by St Leonard’s Postgraduate College at the University of St Andrews and will be supervised by Dr Areti Manataki, Dr Katherine Keenan, Prof Colin McCowan and Dr Michail Papathomas. Applications must be received by 12 June 2023.
Further information, including how to apply, can be found at: https://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/study/fees-and-funding/scholarships/scholarships-catalogue/postgraduate-scholarships/world-leading-scholarship-04-computer-science-medicine-geography/
Graduation Reception
Congratulations to all of our students who are graduating this year!
Hopefully we will see most of you again on Wednesday 14 June where the School will host a small reception in the coffee area between 11.00 and 13.00 for you and your guests, with a glass of bubbly and of course some cakes from Fisher and Donaldson.
PhD Viva Success: Abd Alsattar Ardati
Congratulations to Abd Alsattar Ardati, supervised by Dr Alex Voss, Dr Uta Hinrichs, Prof Ian Gent & Dr Angie Miguel, who has passed his PhD viva subject to minor corrections.
Many thanks to Prof Sampsa Hyysalo (Aalto University) for serving as the external examiner and to Dr Jason Jacques for being the internal examiner.
School of Computer Science competition winner
Congratulations to Mirza Hossain, a MSc student from the School of Computer Science, who won the ‘technology’ category of our bi-annual ideas competition What’s the big idea?. Mirza was awarded £100 for telling his idea for a new technology specifically targeted at AI researchers. Mirza has also secured a space on the upcoming Steps to Start Up and FastStart Design Thinking Sprint programmes in May.
These programmes are part of the Entrepreneurship Centre’s Summer series which are open to all staff, students, and non-University members.
More information and registration here.
The competitions will re-open again in the new academic year and students and staff can apply here.
PhD Viva Success: Ai Jiang
Congratulations to Ai Jiang who passed her viva in Jan and has been awarded the PhD degree today after minor corrections!
Thanks to Juan Ye as supervisor, the external Prof. Luke Chen from Ulster University and internal Dr. Areti Manataki.
PhD Viva Success: Yunjia Wang
Congratulations to Yunjia Wang who passed his PhD in February Supervised by Dr Ishbel Duncan.
Thanks are due to Alan Miller as the internal, and to Karen Renaud from Strathclyde as the external.
Yunjia was the last PhD student of Ishbel so we hope you can now enjoy your retirement!
World-Leading PhD Scholarship: Personalised, Adaptive, Language-based Planner for next generation Robotics
A fully-funded PhD scholarship in Computer Science is available for a strong and motivated student wishing to work at the intersection of vision, large-language models, and robotic planning. This prestigious PhD scholarship is awarded by St Leonard’s Postgraduate College at the University of St Andrews and will be supervised by Dr Juan Ye, Dr Alice Toniolo, and Dr Kasim Terzic.
For more information, including how to apply, please see the advert: https://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/study/fees-and-funding/scholarships/scholarships-catalogue/postgraduate-scholarships/world-leading-scholarship-01-computer-science/?
Fully-funded PhD scholarship in Health Data Visualisation
The School of Computer Science at the University of St Andrews has a fully-funded scholarship available working with Dr Areti Manataki. The PhD topic is “Shedding light on patient flow through advanced data visualisation”. Applications must be received by 1 March 2023.
Project Overview
In modern healthcare systems, millions of patients are admitted to hospital every day. Managing patient flow through hospital, to ensure that patients are at the right place at the right time, can improve quality of care and health outcomes, while saving money and time. However, managing patient flow in a way that is safe for patients and cost-efficient is a challenging task, and requires a deep understanding of the complexities associated with patient flow.
This project involves employing advanced data visualisation techniques to shed light on patient flow and its many important dimensions: temporal and spatial patterns, patient characteristics, clinical expertise, hospital capacity and associated cost. Drawing inspiration from visualisation approaches to astronomy and transportation, and working closely with healthcare professionals, we will develop interactive visualisations that allow for the exploration of large and rich patient flow data. Our aim is to build visualisations that are powerful enough to capture the complexity of patient flow, and, at the same time, simple enough for clinicians to easily use to draw conclusions towards improving care.
Eligibility Criteria
We are looking for highly motivated research students willing to be part of a diverse and supportive research community. Applicants must hold a BSc or MSc in Computer Science or a related area (e.g., Data Science, Engineering, Mathematics, etc.). Experience in data visualisation, enthusiasm for research at the intersection of data science and health, an ability to think and work independently, excellent programming and analytical skills, and strong verbal and written communication skills are essential.
International applications are welcome. We especially encourage female applicants and underrepresented minorities to apply.
To apply
Informal inquiries can be directed to Dr Areti Manataki at A.Manataki@st-andrews.ac.uk. Formal applications can be made through the School’s postgraduate research portal.
The deadline for applications is 1 March 2023.
Funding Notes
We have one fully-funded scholarship available, which will be awarded competitively to the best applicant. This scholarship covers all tuition fees irrespective of country of origin and comes with a stipend (currently £17,668 per annum full-time equivalent). Additional scholarships may be available from other sources.
The School welcomes applications from under-represented groups, and is willing to consider part-time and flexible registrations. The successful applicant will however be expected to conduct their research in St Andrews and not fully remotely.
















