PhD thesis LIVE!

Today, a courageous PhD candidate defended her thesis while cameras were rolling, her presentation beaming live over the web.

Danielle Lee, a PhD student in biology at the University of Missouri, St. Louis, presented her thesis research in a talk entitled "An Investigation of Behavioral Syndromes and Individual Differences in Exploratory Behavior of Prairie Voles, Microtus ochrogaster." She webcast the defense live on her blog, Urban Science Adventures!. Lee also encouraged readers of her blog to send her questions via Twitter, which she says she'll answer "after the smoke clears."

(Her research, which involved studying how prairie voles respond to novel items in their environment, reminded me of our March cover story, Odd Man Out: Do fish have personalities?.)

Do you think you would have the confidence to live webcast your thesis defense (past, present or future) and then answer questions from the Twitter hoards?

Bob Grant -- Associate Editor, The Scientist

Live Theses defences at Wageningen University have been posted at WURTV for many years already. They are especially popular with our overseas PhD student who have their families the thesis defence live over the Web. Check some of the thesis defences at http://wurtv.wur.nl/ [only works in IE]