Anish Pyne speaks at the Three Minute Thesis Championships.

Innovative Research Meets Concise Storytelling at 好色先生TV鈥檚 3MT Finals

By Sarah Bender

Heidi Opdyke

Ten doctoral students lit up the stage as they raced the clock to explain research from fighting cancer to training robot teams to giving AI a sense of touch 鈥� all in just three minutes. The 好色先生TV Libraries鈥� Three Minute Thesis (3MT) Championship, held March 25 in McConomy Auditorium, brought together finalists from across campus and challenged them to make their cutting edge work clear and compelling for a general audience.

This year鈥檚 winners included:

The event, which is in its 11th year at Carnegie Mellon, started at the University of Queensland in 2008 and has been adopted by over 900 universities across more than 85 countries. Helen and Henry Posner, Jr. Dean of the University Libraries , who brought the competition to CMU, served as host of Wednesday鈥檚 finals.

Belkhir鈥檚 award-winning presentation, 鈥淲hen No Error Isn鈥檛 the End of the Story,鈥� explained his research focused on preserving parts of the brain that produce speech during brain surgery. The doctoral student from shared evidence from thousands of trials of awake neurosurgery. He simplified his work to help the audience understand its significance, using metaphors like highway traffic to explain the steps of speech production and how they can be affected by stimulation during surgery.

鈥淢ost of us are able to speak and produce words, and we probably rely on our ability to speak more than most people would think. In certain patient populations, when that ability is at risk, it's a very scary thing,鈥� he explained. 鈥淢y work is just one example of efforts toward trying to alleviate that risk in those patients, to ensure the best possible outcomes.鈥�

For Belkhir, 3MT was a chance to practice explaining key ideas at the intersection of science and medicine. It also was a chance to connect with students from other programs. 鈥淚t was especially cool to hear about some of the robotics research that is happening at this institution,鈥� he reflected.

鈥淭o see those presentations and talk to those presenters was a really great opportunity. I鈥檓 glad I was able to make some connections with people I might not otherwise get to meet.鈥�

As a child, Blum鈥檚 parents introduced him to TED talks, and that served as his first exposure to science communication.

鈥淚鈥檝e always really liked the idea of learning about an overarching topic like that 鈥� how you can dip your toes in and start to learn what words and concepts mean, and then decide if you鈥檙e interested in the topic,鈥� he said. 鈥淚 really enjoyed being able to pass that forward as I put my own presentation together and figured out the best way to connect with the audience.鈥�

Christopher Blum stands in a hallway with a Three Minute Thesis medal and watch.

In the Mellon College of Science, Blum studies cancer treatment, and he鈥檚 working on a precise way to kill cancer cells that doesn鈥檛 harm healthy cells. His delivery method involves special messengers disguised with DNA. The disguise changes the way these messengers interact with other cells: healthy cells ignore them, but they latch onto cancer cells.

Blum鈥檚 relevant topic, plus his straightforward explanations, resulted in a presentation that resonated with both the judges and the alumni audience.

鈥淚鈥檓 just trying to get the anti-cancer drugs where they need to go,鈥� he said. 鈥淏reaking it down like that, in a way that鈥檚 applicable and easy to understand, really helped my presentation come together.鈥�

Abdelmohsen decided to participate in 3MT to practice public speaking and challenge herself to stand in front of a group of people and explain her work.

鈥淚鈥檝e always had a fear of public speaking, but I wanted to get better at it,鈥� she said. 鈥淗ow can you make an impact if you can鈥檛 help people understand what you鈥檙e doing? Communicating your research is so important.鈥�

The Ph.D. student researches sickle cell disease, specifically ways to predict stroke in adult patients with the condition. Breaking this work down for a general audience helped her improve her science communication 鈥� and she also saw it as an opportunity for advocacy.

鈥淥ne of my goals today was to represent patients with sickle cell disease,鈥� she explained. 鈥淪ome people have never heard about the disease, so it's really important that we can communicate the importance of our research, and what we are doing for different communities, to people who are not in our field so that they can offer support for what we're doing.鈥�

Ten Three Minute Thesis finalists stand on a stage in a line. They all look into the camera.

For Pyne, winning the People鈥檚 Choice Award was a great honor.

鈥淭he Three Minute Thesis competition is all about presenting your research to a general audience, so I鈥檓 glad I was able to communicate with the audience in the auditorium and that they voted for me,鈥� he said.

Last year, Pyne watched three of his friends and fellow Mellon doctoral students compete in the 2025 championship, and that鈥檚 when he knew he wanted to participate. When the preliminary registration was announced he got to work crafting a talk about his microbiology research of bacteria and drinking water systems.

鈥淥ne of my primary goals, both in pursuing a Ph.D. and also as a long-term career goal, is to make science more accessible,鈥� he explained. 鈥淚t really inspired me that this platform challenged me to cater my talk to be understood by anyone and everyone. You don't need to be an expert in my subject to benefit from the knowledge of what I鈥檓 doing.鈥�