This year’s Warwick Postgraduate Colloquium in Computer Science (WPCCS) was held on Monday 14th December and marked the 18th edition of this beloved event. For the first time in its history, WPCCS took place online, on the communication platform MSTeams, to allow everyone to participate safely during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

A cherished occasion to present one’s research, receive valuable feedback, and create connections within the department to develop new ideas, the Colloquium saw the participation of 50 PhD students who gave presentations spread across seven major themes, showcasing the quality and diversity of the research carried out in the Computer Science Department at Warwick. 22 PhD students also submitted longer, more detailed presentations which were made available to participants and attendees on the official WPCCS MSTeam, so to receive constructive in-depth comments.

Three thought-provoking guest talks accompanied the students’ presentations. Maria Liakata, Professor at Queen Mary University of London, gave a presentation on “Creating time sensitive sensors from language and heterogeneous user-generated content”. Patrick McCorry, Co-founder & CEO at PISA Research, gave a talk on “Creating a cryptocurrency start-up”. Dr Henry Crosby, Dr Neha Gupta, and Dr David Purser, PhD graduates from the Department of Computer Science at Warwick, shared their experience of the transition from PhD research to academic and non-academic careers in the “Life after PhD” panel.

The event ended with an award ceremony to celebrate the best presentations on each theme, and the best long presentations uploaded on the Team. Special prizes were awarded for the most creative presentations.

After the event, Dr Neha Gupta, presenter in the “Life after PhD” panel, commented:

“It is always a pleasure to speak to Warwick community, I owe so much to Warwick. I’m glad that I was invited to share my experience.”

Mahshid Mehr Nezhad, winner of two prizes for her short and long presentations, said:

“It was a great opportunity for me, and I enjoyed it a lot.”

Prize winners:

• Best and most creative presentation: Olly Styles (presentation)
• Best long presentations: Mary Scott, Sam Coy, Junru Lu, Mahshid Mehr Nezhad, Iman Bilan
• Most creative long presentation: Marcel De Sena Dall'Agnol
• Best presentations in Machine Learning: Olly Styles, Zheng Fang
• Best presentation in Computer Security and Databases: Mahshid Mehr Nezhad
• Best presentation in Data Science and Computer Network: Iman Bilan
• Best presentation in Computer Vision, Computational Biology, and Research Practice: Sarah Alshamrani
• Best presentation in Urban Science: Ivana Tosheva
• Best presentation in High Performance Computing: Alex Cooper
• Best presentation in Theory, Foundations, and Artificial Intelligence: Aparajita Haldar