Victoria scoops top student award
Aberystwyth University zoology graduate Victoria Franks is the Science Engineering and Technology Awards (Europe) Biology Student of the Year for 2011. The announcement was made at a glittering awards ceremony attended by hundreds of academics, industry executives, and senior figures from government, scientific and technical institutions at the Millenium Hotel in London. Of 600 nominees, Victoria, who studied at Aberystwyth’s Institute of Biological, Environmental and Rural Sciences (IBERS), was one of just three finalists, selected on the basis of a synopsis of her honours project. Titled “Brains or daring: shoaling fish follow the leader”, Victoria investigated social learning in tropical guppies. The finalists were judged by five leading scientists on the basis of a presentation and interview, held at the Society of Biology in London. Accompanied at the Awards ceremony by her project supervisor, IBERS Lecturer in Animal Behaviour Dr Rupert Marshall, and her mother, Victoria was st...