Every year, G-Research runs a number of different PhD prizes in Maths and Data Science at universities in the UK, Europe and beyond.
Each prize is worth up to £10,000 and is open to final or penultimate year PhD students at specific universities, working across areas including Machine Learning, Quantitative Finance and Mathematics.
We’re pleased to announce the winners of the first prize of this year, run in conjunction with the University of Oxford.
We’re proud to announce that Desi Ivanova was unanimously elected as the winner of our University of Oxford PhD prize. Desi will receive £10,000.
Desi is a final year DPhil student in the Department of Statistics at the University of Oxford. Her main research area is Bayesian Experimental Design, where she focus on developing scalable and efficient strategies for adaptive data acquisition.
Her research interests also extend to uncertainty quantification, amortised Bayesian inference, and causality.
Desi said: “The generous G-Research prize will primarily provide funding for computational resources and also support my travel to machine learning conferences.”
As well as awarding a first prize, we are proud to announce our runner-ups, receiving £5,000 respectively.
Michael is a final year DPhil student at the Mathematical Institute at the University of Oxford. His research focuses on the intersection of machine learning, mathematical finance and stochastic control. In particular, it provides a novel view on the use of historical data for simulations and on aspects of gradient-based optimization in continuous-time stochastic control problems. For example, these findings can be applied to better understand optimal trade execution for financial assets.
Michael said: “I am very grateful to G-Research for this recognition of my work which will support me in finalizing my thesis.”
Michael’s research seeks to develop mathematical and statistical methods to solve real-world problems across a wide range of areas, including phylogenetics, epidemiology, camera-trapping and even football. His passion is in investigating novel approaches – even though these often fail – and he is always looking for rogue ideas to solve well-established problems.
Matthew said: “I’m very grateful to receive the G-Research prize, which will support me as I look to the next steps after my PhD.”
