On Tuesday evening, Thomas Abbate from the University of Mons (UMons) and Alexis Darras from the University of Liege (ULg) were selected as the winners of the inter-university final of the contest: "My thesis in 180 seconds".

The contest involves summarising the research carried out by the competitors, often over several years, in a talk that lasts 180 seconds. The 18 candidates came from selections organised in six French language Belgian universities. The two prize winners selected on Tuesday in Louvain-la-Neuve will represent Belgium at the international final organised in Liege on 28 September.

The presentation by Thomas Abbate (UMons) is entitled "Les vaccins, c’est comme le vin" (Vaccines are like wine) in order to communicate as effectively as possible about his thesis, the official title of which is "Modélisation mathématique, observation et contrôle de l’amplification virale en culture de cellules animales" (Mathematical modelling, observation and control of the viral amplification in the culture of animal cells). The other prize winner, Alexis Darras (ULg), made a presentation to the jury entitled "Sang pour sang magnétique" (Blood for magnetic blood) summarising his thesis entitled "Évaporation sous champ de gouttes de colloïdes superparamagnétiques (Evaporation under a field of superparamagnetic colloid droplets".

The competition has two main objectives, the first being to allow the general public to understand the role of doctorates in the field of research, and the second being to allow researchers to work on their communication skills in order to explain a complex subject in a simple manner.

Finally, Félicien Hespels, from the University of Namur, was awarded the public's prize for her presentation "De l’or contre le cancer" (Gold against cancer).  Her thesis is entitled "Émission d’éléments secondaires depuis des nanoparticules d’or soumises à des irradiations de protons" (Emission of secondary elements from gold nanoparticles subjected to proton irradiation).