The Three Minute Thesis competition challenges Caltech graduate students to explain their research in an engaging and clear three-minute talk intended for a non-specialist audience. Given Caltech’s prominence in science and engineering communities, we feel it's important to give Caltech graduate students the opportunity to practice communicating their science in ways that will resonate and inspire.

The event will take place on April 21, 2026 at 5:00 pm in-person at the Chen Neuroscience Research Building (Chen Room 100), and online via livestream. The YouTube link will be posted to this page before the event begins. A reception will follow for in-person attendees.

2026 Finalists

• Calvin Rusley, Geobiology
• Omar Saleh, Chemistry
• Victoria Tobin, Biology (1st Prize)
• Preksha Naik, Physics
• Victor Vescu, Mechanical Engineering (2nd Prize)
• Katelyn Horstman, Astrophysics
• Jayden Zheng, Computation and Neural Systems
• Canran Wang, Medical Engineering
• Yutian Li, Biology
• Karteek Dhara, Electrical Engineering (Dana Roth People’s Choice Award)
• Sam Rose, Astrophysics (3rd Prize)
• Jee Won Yang, Chemical Engineering
• Philip Woods, Geobiology
• Dohyeon Kim, Applied & Computational Math

Competition Information

Prizes

There will be four prizes awarded:

• First place
• Second place
• Third place
• Dana Roth People’s Choice Award as chosen by attendees

The Caltech Library invites you to make a contribution of any amount to sponsor the Dana Roth People's Choice Award for the 3MT competition.

General Rules

• Caltech 3MT is open to all Caltech graduate students in good standing who are G2 and above, except for the first place winner of a previous competition who is thus ineligible to participate.
• 3MT presentations must communicate original research to a non-specialist audience in a clear and engaging way.
• Presentations should be spoken work (e.g., no poems, raps, or songs) with no additional props or additional electronic media (e.g., sound and video files) other than the prepared static background slide.
• The winner cannot have won first place in a previous 3MT competition.

Submission & Selection Process

• To enter the competition, graduate students must submit a three-minute (maximum) video file of their presentation. You may use a single static slide or some kind of poster in the background to illustrate your talk, but you must be visible and speaking to the camera during the whole presentation.
• Submission entries must be received before midnight (Pacific) on deadline date. 
• All entries will be reviewed by a panel of Caltech administrators and librarians, and finalists will be notified at least two weeks before the event. At that time we will also ask finalists to send us a copy of their final static presentation slide to be added to the slide-deck for the final event.
• The final event will be hybrid with presentations given to a pre-registered in-person audience and streamed live on YouTube.

Please Note: Submissions will not be judged on video recording quality or editing capabilities. Finalist selection will focus on the presentation and the ability to communicate research to a non-specialist audience. Final presentations will be judged on the presentation and the ability to communicate research to a non-specialist audience.

Final Presentation Rules

• Final presentations must include one slide as a background. Presenters may refer to this background during their presentation, but the background slide must remain static during the presentation.
• Final presentations are limited to three minutes.

Final Judging Criteria

• the speaker's ability to clearly convey their thesis and the significance of the results to the audience
• how well the presentation provides context to the research question
• the speaker's stage presence, eye contact, vocal range, pacing, and confidence
• how well the background slide enhances the presentation

Key Dates

• February 5, 2026: Submissions Open
• March 22, 2026: Submissions Due
• April 3, 2026: Finalists Notified
• April 21, 2026: 3MT Competition

Sponsors

We are pleased to partner with Caltech Theater and Public Programming for the event. We also thank the following generous sponsors for making the competition possible.