Congratulations to the four Gates Cambridge scholars heading for Darwin in the autumn. Across the University as a whole, 68 students from 25 different countries will make up the class of 2026, 25 years after the scholarships were founded to support outstanding international postgraduates.
The Darwinians-elect are:
- Anna Rullan Buxo, PhD Chemistry
“I look forward to researching iron additive effects on the efficiency of Vanadium Flow Batteries (VFBs), and finding new, sustainable ways to store energy at a large scale. VFBs provide easily scalable energy storage, all while decoupling power and energy production. By utilising in-line NMR and EPR to analyse the mechanisms by which iron additives stabilise Vanadium cations at high temperatures, we can make VFBs a viable alternative for large-scale renewable energy storage.”
- Jihad Hami, PhD Sociology
“My academic work is shaped by my lived experience as a Kurd, and my displacement due to the Syrian war. My research focuses on nationalism, state violence, political belonging, and alternative models of democracy beyond the confines of nation-states. Alongside my academic work, I have published articles on the Kurdish question and the political theory of the Kurdish movement. I have also co-edited, with (Darwin Fellow) Thomas Jeffrey Miley, a book titled Rojava in Focus: Critical Dialogues (AK Press, 2025).”
Cassandra Vega, MPhil Education
“The quality of one’s education is a key factor in social mobility, community cohesion, and the health of democracy, and yet it is largely and unjustly determined by geography. In the age of social media, people have been able to circumvent this limitation with unprecedented access to information, particularly benefitting marginalised communities whose stories and histories continue to be rewritten or suppressed. Through the MPhil in Education (Knowledge, Power and Politics) I aim to understand how we can leverage different education systems to build a politically informed public capable of holding institutions accountable and advancing a more empathetic and equitable society.”
- Peter Granston, PhD Management Studies
“As a CJBS PhD student and a Gates Cambridge Scholar, I am creating a theoretical framework that reframes constructive deviance as a mechanism of organisational resilience. This research explores how breaking from traditional norms can help organisations survive and develop. By studying instances from the Global South, notably Jamaica, we may better appreciate how organisations can benefit from constructive deviance.”
Congratulations to them all, and we look forward to welcoming them.
