Alireza Pourhassan, a Ph.D. candidate in civil engineering from Iran, won first place in S&T’s seventh annual Three Minute Thesis (3MT®) competition on March 1.

Pourhassan impressed the judges with his research presentation titled “The Use of Tire-Derived Aggregate for Chip Seal Pavement Construction.” He will advance to the regional 3MT competition hosted by the Midwestern Association of Graduate Schools in Milwaukee ,  where he will compete for a chance to present his research at a national competition.

Varuni Abhayaratne, a master’s degree student in environmental engineering, was named the runner-up. Abhayaratne’s presentation is titled “Use of a Network of Low-Cost Multi-Pollutant Air Quality Sensors to Evaluate Environmental Justice in Twin Cities, Minnesota.” The People’s Choice Award went to Sambad Regmi, a Ph.D. student in mechanical engineering, with a presentation titled, “The Present and the Future of the Physically Interactive Robots.”

Additional finalists who competed this year include Ashley Raster, a master’s degree student in nuclear engineering, and Ogbole Inalegwu, a Ph.D. student in computer engineering.

Judges included Rolla community members John Butz and Sue Eudaly. Judges from S&T included Shari Hill, Dr. Jossalyn Larson, and Doug Roberts. Additional community and campus members were involved in preliminary judging rounds. The 3MT competition originated with the University of Queensland, New Zealand, and is now held annually at over 900 universities worldwide.