2018 Winner of the Capstone Editing Laptop Grant for Postgraduate Coursework Students
We are happy to introduce the winner of the Capstone Editing Laptop Grant for Postgraduate Coursework Students, Jiaheng Xie. He is a self-professed biological sciences enthusiast—and has been ever since he was young. He chose biological sciences as his field of study without hesitation upon entering his Bachelor of Science course at Zhongkai University of Agriculture and Engineering (ZHKU) in China.
He became interested in extracurricular activities, joined the College of Life Sciences student union at his university and, as a result of his excellent work, was awarded the 2014 ZHKU Excellent Leader Award. Under the supervision of Professors Shenggen He and Hongmei Li, Jiaheng completed his thesis in plant genetics and bioinformatics, in addition to leading a group of students in a university creation funding project in plant physiology. Obviously demonstrating a trend in excellent work, he was also awarded the 2014 ZHKU First-Class Scholarship (an award given to the best student in the college), the 2014 Top 100 Students of ZHKU—the Morality Star and the 2015 Top 100 Students of ZHKU—the Study Star. Jiaheng clearly values striving for excellence—which is why we are honoured to help him progress in his studies.
Jiaheng experienced real science research in the last two years of his undergraduate study and realised the inkling he’d had throughout his life—that the path of science was what he desired to pursue. After graduating from his undergraduate degree, he joined Dr Patricia Jusuf’s research group and began his masters study at The University of Melbourne in 2017, undertaking a multidisciplined research project using zebrafish as a model to link genes and visual behaviour, while also being under the supervision of Dr Patrick Goodbourn from the Melbourne School of Psychological Science and Associate Professor Bang Bui from the Department of Optometry and Vision Sciences.
The Capstone Editing Laptop Grant for Postgraduate Coursework Students will assist Jiaheng in the research component of his studies, as he requires a laptop that can process high-quality images for the psychophysical research methods he will be using. Having a suitable laptop that can allow Jiaheng to process the data he needs will allow him to do what he does best: excel in his work.