Junior Research Fellows’ Activities As always, a particularly vibrant part of the Somerville College Community is our collection of Junior Research Fellows, who are pursuing postdoctoral research in a huge range of topics. The following report attempts to summarise some of this fascinating work. Maria Caiazza works in the Department of Physiology, has developed an AI model based on our understanding of Anatomy and Genetics, using stem cell models of Parkinson’s the human/primate relational reasoning which successfully disease to understand how calcium behaves inside cells since accounted for the results in a new eye-tracking experiment. calcium is central to cell function. Maria is working with AstraZeneca to find treatments that can help nerve cells in Björn Vahsen works in the Nuffield Department of Clinical Parkinson’s patients function normally again. Neurosciences. Björn models Motor Neurone Disease (MND) in a dish using human stem cells. In particular, Björn has been Andrea Kusec works in the Translational Neuropsychology studying the role of brain immune cells, microglia, in the group in the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences. commonest genetic form of MND. Amongst other awards, Andrea’s research focuses on developing accessible mental Björn received the Felgenhauer Research Award 2023 for health interventions for adults with various types of brain young Neuroscientists from the German Neurological Society injury, such as stroke, trauma or brain tumours. A recent in November 2023. paper from Andrea and her team showed that standard ‘talking therapy’ for depression can be less effective with brain injury George Ward is our Mary Ewart Junior Research Fellow. patients because of the impact of the injury on memory and George is an economist. His work focuses on worker and attention. The paper went on to show that adjustment to the workplace wellbeing, including measures of job satisfaction, standard therapy could significantly improve the outcomes for happiness, stress, and purpose/meaning. George is writing these patients. a book, co-authored with Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, entitled Why Workplace Wellbeing Matters, which will be published by Elizabeth MacGregor is our Joanna Randall MacIver JRF, Harvard Business Review Press in the Spring of 2025. George working in Music Education. Elizabeth is pursuing a project also studies the impact of negative emotions on shaping focusing on how the way that music is taught in schools can populist beliefs and voting intentions. have long-lasting impacts on students. These impacts can be highly detrimental if the student’s experience is characterised Sylvia Zanoli is a theoretical physicist working in the field of by experiences of failure, disappointment and exclusion in collider phenomenology. The main goal of Sylvia’s research is the music classroom. Elizabeth is hoping to develop a music improving the accuracy of theoretical predictions of particle pedagogy that is sensitive to this music vulnerability. interactions at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in order to obtain cutting-edge results that can be directly compared to Amanda Rojek works in the Pandemic Sciences Institute, part data. In the next few years, the LHC will undergo a substantial of the Nuffield Department of Medicine. Amanda’s work aims improvement, which will lead to experimental data with an to improve the agility of the clinical science response during unprecedented level of precision. Correctly interpreting the disease outbreaks to improve patient survival and public health upcoming data will be possible only if precise and realistic responses. Amanda has studied diseases such as Ebola, Nipah theoretical predictions are available. Sylvia is working to help Virus Disease, and Monkeypox. In particular, Amanda is leading provide those predictions. work to implement the first global harmonised trial for Ebola treatments across twelve countries in Africa with the World Rocco Zizzamia works in the Economics Department. Rocco Health Organisation. is using experimental methods to test the effectiveness of various innovative economic or behavioural interventions Emma Soneson works in the Department of Psychiatry, in the around the world. One project aims to test whether it is more section focusing on Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. Emma efficient and effective to provide anticipatory support for focuses on ways to try to reduce the incidence, prevalence people in disaster-prone areas rather than rely on emergency and impact of child and adolescent mental health difficulties. relief (often in kind rather than cash) after a disaster occurs. Emma is especially interested in public health approaches, the Rocco’s team is studying the impact of anticipatory cash intersections between education and mental health, and ways transfers in the Jamuna River Basin in Bangladesh, where in which we can support schools to take a central role in mental flooding is likely to occur in the forthcoming monsoon season. health promotion and prevention. Rocco has also evaluated the impact of an unconditional cash transfer programme undertaken in response to severe flooding Jessica Thompson works in the Department of Experimental in Pakistan in 2022. Other projects relate to the impact of Psychology. Jessica is working on developing a formalism to repeated rejection on job searching in South Africa and Group develop computational theories of human cognition. Notably, Coaching projects in Bangladesh, Uganda and the Philippines. Jessica has been focusing on visual relational reasoning, which is the way the brain interprets visual information to draw conclusions about the relationships between objects. Jessica DR STEVE RAYNER, Senior Tutor 17