Loughborough Institute of Advanced Studies Podcast

IAS Residential Fellow  Professor Danny O’Brien  delivers a seminar on their research - The Surfing Association of Papua New Guinea (SAPNG) initiated an innovative program called “The Pink Nose Revolution” that uses surfing to raise community awareness about gender-based violence (GBV), which while a scourge worldwide, is particularly rampant in PNG. This research uses qualitative methods to analy...

IAS Alumni Fellow (from the 2023-24 academic year)  Dr Alison Barnes  delivers a seminar on their research - Street and house name signs in Paddington, Sydney, function as material articulations of the settler colonial project. Both hide in plain sight, yet in diametrically opposed ways. Drawing on a survey of 315 house names and 128 distinct street names, the research develops a taxonomy of namin...

IAS Guest Speaker  Dr Everardt Burger  delivers a seminar on their research - Urban transport infrastructure is typically planned and evaluated through technical performance measures such as efficiency, capacity, and operational reliability. Yet the real-world success of mobility systems depends fundamentally on how people experience, interpret, and use them in everyday life. This talk introduces...

Joint Loughborough-Leicester IAS Fellow Dr Yolandi Burger delivers a seminar on their research - How do places named after Nelson Mandela operate as narrative infrastructures through which memory, identity, and civic meaning are negotiated? Building on the Named after Nelson (NaN) project, this IAS–LIAS fellowship complements the Gauteng City-Region Observatory's project on urban places as narrati...

This event is made possible with thanks to the Biddle Family Scholarship. The  International Academy for Body Image, Eating Problems and Health  is formed of a group of researchers focused on understanding more about the development and occurrence of body image concerns and eating problems. Current members are from Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Spain, the United States of America and the United...

Externally Funded Fellows  Associate Professor Sumiko Miyata  &  Professor Takamichi Miyata  each deliver a seminar on their research - Associate Professor Sumiko Miyata - Incentive-Driven AI Networks for Future Road Safety  To achieve fully autonomous driving, "cooperative perception" via V2X (Vehicle-to-Everything) is essential for eliminating blind spots and improving recognition accuracy....

IAS Residential Fellow  Professor Danny O’Brien delivers a workshop for Postgraduate Researchers (PGRs) - In this workshop, we explore the often challenging task of responding to reviewers (or examiners as the case may be). Navigating this process is a vital skill for academic publishing, yet it remains an aspect of scholarly life that many researchers find difficult. Even when reviewers seem hars...

Joint Loughborough-Leicester IAS Fellow Professor Anongnat Somwangthanaroj delivers a seminar on their research - This talk shares a cross-sector journey in translational materials research spanning industrial epoxy materials for flip-chip electronics packaging, biodegradable plastic bags for fresh-produce preservation, health-protective innovations, and emerging zinc-based energy storage systems....

Seán McCabe is the Head of Climate Justice and Sustainability at Bohemian Football Club (Bohemians FC) in Dublin Ireland, He works at the intersection of football, community development, and climate action focusing on how clubs can act as catalysts for Community Wealth Building (CWB) and broader social change. In his talk, he explores how football clubs can serve as anchors for Community Wealth Bu...

IAS Residential Fellow Professor Mark Bevir delivers a seminar on their research - At the heart of an interpretive social science is opposition to social-scientific naturalism. Yet, there is much confusion about what this entails, with many scholars treating the opposition as one over methods. This seminar will begin by focusing on the philosophical or theoretical content of interpretive social sc...

IAS Residential Fellow Dr Robert Emmett Alexander (aka Barefoot Bob) delivers a seminar on their research, fully titled "Community Engaged Communication for Reduction of Disaster and Climate Risks Using the Arts" - This presentation explores processes of locally appropriate communication of disaster and climate risks and good practices to address them through steps of first external and local know...

IAS Visiting Fellow Professor Anne Stiles delivers a seminar on their research - This talk addresses bestselling British novelist Marie Corelli (1855-1924) and her admiration for Nobel prize winner Marie Curie as a paragon of feminine scientific accomplishment. Though Corelli was neither a feminist in the traditional sense nor a scientific materialist, she viewed Curie’s discovery, the element rad...

IAS Guest Speaker Professor Ama de-Graft Aikins (The London School of Economics and Political Science) delivers a seminar on their research - Arts-based global health interventions in African settings - for HIV/AIDS, malaria, Ebola, COVID-19 - employ conceptual approaches that have been described as ‘instrumental’. Typical projects lead communities (and artists) into ‘participatory’ and ‘co-create...

Council For At-Risk Academics (CARA) Research Fellow  Dr Nataliia Tofan  delivers a seminar on their research - Hypertension and cardiometabolic disease are commonly managed through pharmacological control of clinical targets. However, achieving numerical targets through pharmacotherapy does not always correct underlying molecular abnormalities. My early research in clinical pharmacology examined...

IAS Residential Fellow  Mr Sumit Dugar  delivers a seminar on their research - This format builds on a successful session I had facilitated at the ‘Global Dialogue Platform on Anticipatory Action,’ in collaboration with colleagues from the University of Reading, UN Agencies, and the Red Cross. The seminar will explore how to openly discuss research failures and challenges in evidence uptake within...

IAS Residential Fellow  Dr Ashley Ajumoke Stewart  delivers a seminar on their research - This seminar will explore my ongoing interdisciplinary research on civic graphic heritage from Nigeria, focusing on how visual communication artifacts—such as signage, public information materials, and typographic styles—can be repurposed through design-led inquiry and AI tools to foster community wellbeing a...

IAS Residential Fellow Dr Amelia Carr delivers a workshop for Postgraduate Researchers (PGRs) - This hybrid event is held jointly by the LU School of Sport, Exercise and Health Sciences and Deakin University’s School of Exercise and Nutrition Sciences and has a primary focus on sport performance research in female athletes. The event is held online to facilitate opportunities for real-time communi...

IAS Residential Fellow Dr Amelia Carr delivers a seminar on their research - Olympic Games, Paralympic Games, and World Championship events are increasingly held in challenging environmental conditions, particularly hot and humid weather, exacerbating the physiological demands for athletes. These environmental conditions can interact with athletes’ use of evidence-based nutritional interventions....

IAS Visiting Fellow  Professor Yan Yin  delivers a seminar on their research - Hydrogen energy is widely recognized as a key pillar for global carbon neutrality and sustainable energy transition. Polymer electrolytes play an important role in improving performance of ionic membrane-based fuel cells and water electrolyzers, which are key enablers for smooth conversion between green electricity and...

Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellow  Dr Eilis Lanclus  delivers a seminar on their research - Trail sports – hiking, running, off-road cycling – are gaining increasingly in popularity in Western contemporary societies. These sports are often celebrated as ways to immerse oneself in “wild(er)” landscapes and to measure personal endurance against nature. But the climate crisis has begun to un...

IAS Visiting Fellow  Dr Cristina Perdomo Delgado  delivers a seminar on their research - This talk will present recent advances in the use of social robots as supportive tools in interventions aimed at older adults. I will examine how these devices can enhance emotional wellbeing, autonomy, and social participation, as well as their potential to complement the work of healthcare and care professio...

IAS Residential Fellow Dr Mario Panico delivers a seminar on their research -  This seminar will present the first results of my research project on the use of artificial intelligence-generated imagery in contemporary conflict contexts. Through examples drawing from contemporary wars, I will address two questions: (i) how these visual texts activate specific emotional rhetorics, iconographic patte...

Royal Society Wolfson Fellow  Professor José Ferreira Alves  delivers a seminar on their research - Fractals and chaotic dynamics reveal how complex structures emerge from simple rules, often exhibiting self-similarity across multiple scales. This talk offers an accessible overview of the mathematical foundations of fractals—self-similarity, scaling laws, and fractal dimension—illustrated with cla...

IAS Residential Fellow  Dr Gemma Sou  delivers a seminar on their research - Small island developing states (SIDS) are disproportionately affected by climate change yet have been marginalized within the global climate regime. Often overlooked are their purposeful collective efforts to reform global climate governance to increase self-determination over their climate futures. Drawing on interviews...

With thanks to the generosity of the Biddle Family Scholarship, the IAS is hosting The Simon Marshall Lecture - Sport is full of challenges and is constantly changing. One of the biggest challenges facing sport is coming from climate change. Whilst news stories have rightfully focused on the ecological damage and the impact on sport facilities, the impact on those participating in sport is often o...