Magical literature professor reflects on the influence of witch trials on contemporary US politics, the Harry Potter novels and dealing with requests for exorcisms
The expert in outbreak medicine discusses overcoming early academic challenges, the UK government’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic, and how a chance meeting over bagpipes changed his life
Expert in online education long before it became fashionable discusses what can be learned from the gaming industry, common mistakes innovators make and why her own undergraduate experience was an unhappy one
Drug discoverer talks about her caravan childhood, her frustration with process inefficiencies and why researchers need to understand the business side
The mathematician and author talks about how her experience of racism and ‘not fitting in’ prepared her for being a woman in maths, and how abstract maths can stimulate empathy
International relations expert discusses Western dominance of the field, what can be gained from amplifying new voices and balancing her academic work with being mayor of a small town in Warwickshire
The Harvard refugee education expert discusses teaching classes of 200 pupils, living in post-apartheid South Africa and why she is optimistic for the children she meets in migrant camps
The human geographer talks about her work with stateless groups, the importance of collaboration and why the stereotype of a map-wielding explorer is important in confronting her subject’s imperial legacies
The product of a warm and happy childhood spent tinkering with computers explains how soft expectations created a personal drive that startled lab colleagues
Biomedical engineer talks about problem-solving, the importance of monitoring foetal cardiac health and why no one has got it quite right on STEM education for women
Cambridge professor discusses swapping engineering for history, why researchers overlook the Indian and Pacific oceans, and what it means to offer ‘an environmental lens’ on imperial history
The Nottingham historian discusses founding a library in the Indian village where he grew up and the need for alternatives to the ‘false promises of neoliberal education’
The winner of this year’s Leverhulme Medal discusses what it means to be a feminist historian and how contemporary politics, and a surprising find in Jamaica, changed her research
Ashoka University professor and novelist discusses academic life in the US and India, as well as his next novel, which explores ‘the ethics of education’
The former Austrian molecular biologist explains how a boring childhood was an advantage, why he switched careers and how designing board games is like basic research
Chemical weapons expert turned Cambridge don reflects on conspiracy theorists in academia, making safe a 60-tonne bomb with science and breaking the world press-up record
Artist and researcher Anthony Schrag on the importance of interdisciplinarity, how university changed him and why art will be even more important in the post-Covid world
The LSE management expert describes how workers can gain confidence to speak up, the culture shock of academia and what she learned from a drag king workshop
Winner of award for women in science in the developing world discusses growing up in a family of eight in Ghana and ‘feeling like Christmas’ when she is on a podium
One of the world’s leading experts on the carbon cycle discusses campaigning for Joe Biden as a teenager, the magic of the Amazon rainforest and why she will never give up fieldwork
The epigeneticist and new Max Planck vice-president on a global childhood, the pleasures of buses running on time, and why young researchers are more stressed than ever
The human rights barrister and author reflects on his path into international law, the university course that changed history and what the UK’s ‘lazy’ and ‘narcissistic’ prime minister could learn from Keir Starmer