Plans & Prospects 2023

PLANS & PROSPECTS 2023
WORLD-CHANGING RESEARCH • STUDENT ACHIEVEMENTS • ALUMNI REFLECTIONS
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Summer 2023
Contents
12
14
16
20
22
The healing power of movement
Brennan Delattre, DPhil Psychiatry
On the road
Pedr Charlesworth, DPhil Materials Science
Quantum entanglement and reality
Dr Vlatko Vedral
Curiosity and risk
Dr Katya Kovalchuk
A global citizen
Dr Mootaz Salman
College news 4-7
Student profiles 12-15
Wolfson London Lecture 16-19
Fellow profiles 20-24
Development report 26-27
Financial report 28-29
Huw David
Development
Director
Alex Fels
Development
Officer
George Mather
Communications
Officer
Judith Palmer
Communications
Assistant
All information is believed to be correct at the time of publication (July 2023). Every effort has
been made to verify details and no responsibility is taken for any errors or omissions, or any
loss arising therefrom.
Unless otherwise stated all images © Wolfson College, University of Oxford. Every effort has
been made to locate the copyright owners of images included in this record and to meet their
requirements. The publishers apologise for any omissions, which they will be pleased to rectify
at the earliest opportunity. Compiled by George Mather, Femke Gow, Judith Palmer, and Huw
David. Cover photo by John Cairns. Printed by Seacourt Printers, a beyond carbon neutral
printer that uses no water or VOC contaminants and produces no landfill waste.
Many thanks to all of our members who have contributed to our publications.
Published by Wolfson College
© 2023 Wolfson College
Wolfson College, Linton Road
Oxford OX2 6UD
Telephone: +44 (0)1865 274 100
digicomms@wolfson.ox.ac.uk
www.wolfson.ox.ac.uk
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Credit: John Cairns
Welcome
Sir Tim Hitchens
President
It’s always important to remember that the heart of the Wolfson community is the sheer variety of extraordinary
people who emerge from here. Three alumni come to mind in particular, each so different, working in such varied
fields; but equally fascinating and compelling.
Karim Khan was a DPhil candidate at Wolfson; he left to serve on a number of international tribunals and was last
year appointed as the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court. This year, on 22nd February, he issued a
warrant for the arrest of Vladimir Putin on charges of the unlawful deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia.
Tim Palmer completed his Oxford DPhil on General Relativity from Wolfson in 1977. He shifted from outer space to
inner space, building weather prediction models (he is responsible for the modern weather forecasts by percentage
likelihood of rain) as well as key climate change models. This year he received the highest accolade from the Royal
Astronomical Society, its Gold Medal; he lectured back at Wolfson this summer.
Sara Paretsky was a Visiting Scholar at Wolfson in 1997. She is one of America’s leading crime writers, having
published twenty-one novels in the V. I. Warshawski series set in her home city of Chicago. “VI” is a hard-boiled
Chicago woman fighting both crime and social injustice. I was lucky enough to meet Sara while in Chicago this Easter,
having just finished reading her latest novel (Overboard, told against the backdrop of the windy city emerging from its
pandemic lockdown).
One of the great pleasures of my job is to meet those who started here and became eminent. Another is to know
those who are setting off from here now, and who look set to change the world. How do we help them reach their
potential?
First, we continue to search for scholarships to ensure that all those who are qualified to study at Wolfson can find
the funding to do so. Too often outstanding individuals have to go elsewhere or cannot take up the offer of a place
because of financial constraints. Second, we know that the experience of a new student, especially one arriving in
the UK for the first time, is significantly enhanced by living in college in their first year. We have 300 or so rooms on
offer, but that still means we can’t give a room to every new arrival. I want to redress that, and we have just received
permission to construct a new Garden Building with fifty new bedrooms on what is now the South Car Park.
And third, the pandemic has taught us that physical and mental wellbeing are critical to resilience and success at
Oxford. We offer a great community, wonderful grounds, a talented welfare team, and a small and dated gym. We
want to supplement that with an outstanding wellbeing centre and designs for that – to be built around the current
squash courts and next to our playing fields – are currently with the planning authorities. Again, more on that in due
course.
Balancing an intellectual environment, a built environment, and a social environment: that’s the way to support our
extraordinary students and help them go out and change the world - just as Karim, Tim and Sara have done. Thank
you for being part of that process.
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College News
Above: Hallucinations by Amaia Salazar Rodriguez
Wolfson’s first Arts Prize winners announced
Congratulations to the top three winners
of Wolfson’s first Arts Prize, whose
artwork will now be displayed around
college. The competition opened in
April and invited visual art entries from
members of the Wolfson community
in the form of painting, drawing,
photography, textiles, sculpture and even
experimental film. The entries were
judged by a panel of experts from our
artistic community.
New & reinstated research clusters
Law in Societies
A new permanent interdisciplinary
Research Cluster, ‘Law in Societies’, was
established at Wolfson in 2022 with the
aim of bringing together scholars with
an interest in the rules, both formal
and informal, by which social order
has been organised in different times
and in different cultures. Reflecting
on the most pressing contemporary
issues, the cluster will facilitate the
exchange of legal and social science
expertise to tackle questions of human
rights and international law in military
engagements, regulation and governance
of environmental resources, access to
justice and informal means of problem
solving, the emerging culture of
transnational laws and the regulation of
the digital domain, and other aspects of
the law.
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The first prize was given to Hallucinations
by Amaia Salazar Rodriguez, second to
Barbara Harriss-White for Ypres-Reims-
Raqqa-fascist-Toledo and third to Jean
Kearney for Exploring the borders.
Among those highly commended were
Harram Khurram, Kathrin Fischer,
Catherine Hauk, Rebecca Gowers,
Clara Tuffrey and Martino Bardelli. The
youngest artist, Demara Skach Groiser
(age 6), received a special mention.
Mind, Brain and Behaviour
Reinstated in January 2023, the Mind,
Brain and Behaviour Cluster will once
again provide a platform for members
of the college community interested in
the mind and brain and their interactions
with the body and environment, drawing
on the expertise of scholars across
neuroscience, neurology, psychology,
ethology, zoology, pharmacology, and
psychiatry.
Its work will mainly centre on ‘mutual
tutorials’, where two experts from
different backgrounds explain their
research to each other in front of other
cluster members. The goal is for each
expert to communicate the interest
of their research to the other, so
cluster members can forge connections
between the various strands of research
conducted by members of the college.
New Fellowships in
2022/23
Professor Nobuko Yoshida
Governing Body Fellow
Christopher Strachey Chair of Computer
Science at the University of Oxford,
Nobuko is an EPSRC Established Career
Fellow and an Honorary Fellow at
Glasgow University. Her main research
interests are theories and applications of
protocols, specifications and verifications.
Professor Rachel Wood
Governing Body Fellow
Associate Professor in Radiocarbon
Science in the School of Archaeology,
Rachel’s research centres on radiocarbon
dating. Having investigated the timing of
Neanderthal disappearance in Spain and
the spread of farming into South East
Asia, she is now exploring applications in
ecology and wildlife forensics.
Professor Pablo Mukerhjee
Governing Body Fellow
Professor of Anglophone World-
Literature, Pablo teaches and researches
on imperialism and colonialism,
postcolonial theory and literatures,
environmental humanities and world
literatures.
Zero Carbon project wins
Preservation Trust Award
We are delighted to announce that
Wolfson is now a two-time winner of an
Oxford Preservation Trust Award.
Every year, the Oxford Preservation
Trust awards prizes to buildings and
environmental projects which make
an outstanding contribution to the
character of Oxford. This year, Wolfson
won a plaque for the trust’s Green
category for our newly decarbonised
estate, having received an award in 2021
for our Buttery redevelopment.
The award once again recognises
Wolfson’s world-leading efforts on
sustainability. The President, Sir Tim
Hitchens said, “thanks to the support of
the government grant, the College’s own
input, and the expertise of architectural
and engineering consultants, we’ve
turned a 1960s building into a place fit
for the 21 st century. We’ve shown that
one of Oxford’s biggest emitters can
become net zero.”

College News
Wolfson alumnus receives British Citizen Award
On Thursday 26 January at the Palace of
Westminster, 29 individuals from around
the UK were awarded the prestigious
British Citizen Award for exceptional
endeavours which have positively
impacted communities up and down the
country.
Among the 29 honoured was Adam
Tate (2014, MSc Nature, Society
and Environmental Policy) from
Nottinghamshire, who received the BCA
for Services to Healthcare.
In 2014, at the age of 22, Adam was
diagnosed with Fahr’s Disease following a
zip line accident. Fahr’s Disease is a rare,
genetically inherited neurological disorder
characterised by calcium deposits in areas
of the brain that control movement. In
2016 he set up a registered charity, Fahr
Beyond, to support other sufferers and
their families and to provide research.
Fahr’s Disease usually affects those in
their 40’s and above, and being diagnosed
so young inspired him to want to make a
difference.
As founder of Fahr Beyond, Adam
has provided a voice for people with
Fahr’s Disease. Importantly, his work
Above (L-R): TV presenter and BCA Patron,
Nick Knowles, Adam Tate and Rhiannon
Whelan, Head of Retail Operations from
BCA Partner One Stop.
has helped to bring together clinicians
previously working in silos. By showing
there is an appetite for more information
and better care for patients, his work
has led to clinicians working on a UK
diagnostic framework and a management
framework for Fahr’s.
The British Citizen Award was established
in 2015 to recognise exceptional
individuals who work tirelessly and
selflessly to make a positive impact on
their communities and society. The BCA
recognises true community heroes who
might otherwise be overlooked.
DPhil student named on
the 35 under 35 Young
Leaders List
Congratulations to Wolfson cyber
security DPhil Arthur Laudrain, who has
been named one of 35 promising young
minds in the Santander-CIDOB 35 under
35 List. The list recognises the work of
35 people under the age of 35 with the
potential to become future leaders in
their areas of expertise.
Arthur, who is currently on a placement
with the Department of Politics and
International Relations, was also
invited to speak at the Future Leaders
Forum, a platform for the exchange of
ideas among the 35 nominees and an
opportunity for them to discuss key
issues on the global stage.
Arthur spoke on his vision for EU digital
strategic autonomy,
expanding on what
this means for
the EU and how
European policymakers
should
respond to the
challenges of the
digital age.
Wolfson welcomes new staff
Dan Aldred
Academic Registrar
Managing the Academic Office, Dan joins
Wolfson bringing six years’ experience of
academic administration within Oxford.
Alex Fels
Development Officer
Working in the Development Office,
Alex supports alumni engagement,
regular giving, and administration.
Marta Aparicio Sánchez
Front of House Supervisor
Joining us as Front of House Supervisor,
Marta brings with her years of experience
but most importantly a big smile.
Joby Kizhakkayil Joy
Sous Chef
Having learned his trade in Kerala and
worked in the Middle East, Joby is an
integral part of the Kitchen team.
Matthew Reader
Chef de Partie
Matt brings a wealth of knowledge
to the Kitchen team - and a
profound love of country music.
Wyatt Downey
Apprentice Chef
Wolfson’s first catering apprentice,
Wyatt joined the Kitchen team straight
from school at the age of 17.
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Alumnus Wes Moore
sworn in as Maryland’s
first Black Governor
On 18 January 2023, Wolfson alumnus
and Rhodes Scholar Wes Moore made
history as he was sworn in as Maryland’s
first Black governor.
The New York Times best-selling author,
Rhodes scholar and former CEO of the
Robin Hood Foundation (an anti-poverty
association based in New York), Wes
Moore’s gubernatorial role represents
the first time he has held public office.
He nonetheless executed an impressive
debut campaign, holding a double-digit
lead in polling before winning the election
against Republican nominee Dan Cox
in November 2022, and garnered the
support of national Democrats and
celebrities including President Biden and
former President Barack Obama. His
inauguration makes him the country’s
third elected Black governor.
While studying as a Rhodes Scholar at
Wolfson, Moore earned a Master’s in
international relations and recently joined
us for an interview and Q&A, which are
both available on our YouTube channel.
Sir Chris Whitty becomes Fellow of the Royal Society
Wolfson Honorary Fellow and UK Chief
Medical Officer Professor Sir Chris Whitty
has been elected a Fellow of the Royal
Society, the UK’s national academy of
sciences.
Professor Whitty delivered the Haldane
Lecture at Wolfson in February 2022, and
was elected as an Honorary Fellow at
Wolfson in May that year. As a graduate
student he read for a BM BCh in Clinical
Medicine (1988) at Wolfson and was
Chair of General Meeting (1990-91). He
also represents the UK on the Executive
Board of the World Health Organization,
is a practising NHS Consultant Physician
at University College London Hospitals
(UCLH) and the Hospital for Tropical
In June, President Sir Tim Hitchens
along with Wolfson staff, students,
and representatives from architects
Original Field and lead contractors
Benfield & Loxley celebrated the
opening of our newly decarbonized and
refurbished Annex building. Not only
does it now run on electricity like the
rest of Wolfson’s original estate, but it
also boasts new kitchens, bathrooms,
windows, and a beautifully landscaped
garden for all to enjoy.
Diseases, and is a visiting professor and
Emeritus Professor of Physic at Gresham
College.
Wolfson completes Annex decarbonization
First acquired by the college in 1983,
having been St Luke’s Home for the
Elderly, the Annex became the home
for the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies,
which later moved to new offices near St
Catherine’s College. The Annex is now
home to our arts and music department,
Above: Annex Garden / Credit: John Cairns
creative fellows, and many students who
can now enjoy the fruits of their newly
refurbished accommodation.
New Margit Pengelly Scholarship established
Alumni news
For a full list of alumni news and
publications, head to:
www.wolfson.ox.ac.uk/alumni-news
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Wolfson College is pleased to announce
the establishment of the Margit Pengelly
Scholarship in support of research into the
diagnosis and treatment of ovarian cancer.
The award has been established thanks to
the generosity of the family and friends of
Margit Pengelly née Kail (1965-2022) in
honour of her life. The announcement of
this gift came on what would have been
Margit’s 58th birthday.
Margit was a stalwart of administration at
Wolfson College over a ten-year period,
playing a key role in the Bursar’s office and
management of the College’s estate and
housing provision. She was much loved by
her many friends and colleagues, for whom
her diagnosis with ovarian cancer in 2020
came as a shock. Her untimely death in
2022 made clear to her loved ones the
importance of research into the detection,
diagnosis, and treatment of this cancer.
The Margit Pengelly Scholarship will serve
as a much-needed source of support for
this crucial research, providing an annual
stipend to one research student for a
three-year period in the first instance.

College News
Dame Hermione Lee receives GBE in 2023 New Year Honours List
Dame Hermione Lee was appointed
Dame Grand Cross of the Order of
the British Empire (GBE) for services to
English Literature in the 2023 New Year
Honours List, the first to be awarded
by HM King Charles III. President of
Wolfson between 2007 and 2017,
Dame Hermione Lee is a multi-awardwinning
literary biographer and critic,
whose work includes biographies of
Virginia Woolf (1996), Edith Wharton
(2006), Penelope Fitzgerald (2013),
and Tom Stoppard (2020). She was
previously Goldsmiths’ Professor of
English Literature at New College, is
a Fellow of the British Academy and
the Royal Society of Literature, and an
Honorary Member of the American
Academy of Arts and Sciences.
In 2011, she founded the Oxford
Centre for Life-Writing here at
Wolfson. She was made a CBE in 2003
and a Dame in 2013. She is currently
working on a biography of the writer
Anita Brookner.
Junior Research Fellow wins A. Noam Chomsky Global Connections Award
Dr Jamie Lachman, Wolfson JRF and
research associate at the Centre for
Evidence Based Intervention, has received
a 2022 A. Noam Chomsky Global
Connections Humanitarian Award from
the STAR Scholar Network.
Dr Lachman’s research focuses on
the implementation and efficacy of
programmes that improve child and
family wellbeing in low- and middleincome
countries. During the COVID-19
pandemic, he co-led an emergency
response to support parents, resulting
in the development of digital parenting
programmes now used by millions in over
35 countries worlwide. Dr Lachman and
Emeritus Fellow Professor Lucie Cluver
were presented with an O²RB Excellence
in Impact Award recognising their work.
Dr Lachman currently leads the Global
Parenting Initiative, a five-year, $22 million
project expanding the evidence and
impact of parenting interventions in the
Global South.
Above: The Garden Building / Credit: Penoyre & Prasad
Plans for new on-site accommodation approved
Wolfson has received planning permission
from Oxford City Council for a new
three-storey accommodation building,
to provide on-site housing for a further
50 students. Once complete, this will
allow the college to house 70% of its
postgraduate students on site.
The building will sit on the current
location of the south car park, adjacent
to the original Grade II listed Powell &
Moya buildings. Designs for the new
block have been completed by Penoyre
& Prasad architects, who devised the
recent masterplan for the college estate.
The designs include en-suite bedrooms,
communal spaces and kitchens on each
floor. Landscaping plans feature layered
planting inspired by traditional hazelcoppice
woodlands, an avenue of fruit
trees, and meadow flowers and grasses.
The College is now exploring options for
funding the new building.
Get in touch!
We love hearing about your
professional and academic
milestones. If you’ve got news, please
send it our way so we can share it.
You can email us at
digicomms@wolfson.ox.ac.uk,
or tag us on social media.
7

Student Awards & Achievements
Each year, Wolfson students reap the rewards of their hard work and enthusiasm with recognition at both College and University
level through various awards and grants. Here’s a roundup to celebrate the energy and talent of our community.
Tejo Jehart
DPhil Engineering
Science
Wolfson High Profile
Support Grant
Michail Mavrogiannis
DPhil Cardiovascular
Medicine
Wolfson High Profile
Support Grant
“I am honoured to have received
recognition from Wolfson
College, which supported me
in participating in the British
University Karting Championship”
“Being part of the Basketball team
was a great honour and I’m thankful
for Wolfson’s support. Plus, we beat
Cambridge (three times).”
Talah Anderson
DPhil Asian and
Middle Eastern
Studies
Shuchita Grover
MPhil Tibetan and
Himalayan Studies
Khyentse-Pritzker
Scholarship
“I have been awarded a Research
and Curatorial Fellowship at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art to
work on the Assyrian Sculpture
Court Pigment Project.”
“The Scholarship from the Tibetan
and Himalayan Studies Centre is
both financial support and
motivation to work harder. I’m
grateful to be a recipient.”
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College News
Stallworthy
Poetry Prize
The annual competition was set up
in memory of the late Professor Jon
Stallworthy (1935-2014), poet and
Fellow of Wolfson College, and is open
to any student currently enrolled in
postgraduate studies at the University of
Oxford. The funding for the prize was
provided by generous donations from
Jon Stallworthy’s many friends
and admirers.
The prize is awarded for the best poem
in English verse not exceeding 40 lines
in length, in 2023 on the subject of
‘Disgrace’. The value of the prize is
£1,000, and entrants are permitted
to submit up to three poems. The
judges for this year’s award included
the Oxford Professor of Poetry, Alice
Oswald.
The award ceremony took place in
the Leonard Wolfson Auditorium on
18 January where the winning poem,
‘Trente et Quarante’, by Jennifer Kim
was announced along with the runnerup
Paul Norris (Brasenose). The other
shortlisted poets were Eliza Browning
(St Hugh’s), Jordan Maly-Preuss
(Merton) and Eira Elisabeth Murphy
(Mansfield).
Trente et Quarante
After Lucian Freud’s The Big Man (1976),
painted to repay his gambling debts.
In Monaco, I’m afraid
you’ve lost the grand tableau again
and fled to our narrow suite above the tabac.
The Big Man who came brawling upstairs
neck tight in a howling ring
leans now in your weary armchair, waiting to be made whole.
Out of the corner, in drunk atonement, you pull your tricks:
palette knife, hog bristle,
eight tubes of lightfast oil.
If you asked, I could tell you how you will make me.
Sink his dark suit into the room
until every wrinkle struggles away.
Burn the impossible mirror white.
Suppose his flesh in peach and vermilion
worked up in crests that knuckle under your brush.
Last, where the light lands pale and arrogant, mark it –
pitch his forehead in Cremnitz, tumble it down his jowls,
whorl in opal the moon atop his chin.
I am your long apology,
your loss lured into the gorgeous.
Your expert hand slips varnish over my cadmium skin.
Rouge gagne et la couleur:
The game is fixed for you now
as you strike out your due on my angled face.
How spare, how silent the room must be to hear
the panting of your bristle against linen
every hue belonging to him before I can become myself.
Credit: John Cairns
About the winner:
Jennifer Kim is an MSt student in the History of Art and Visual Culture at
Exeter College. Her dissertation research focuses on twentieth-century British
portraiture and the nature of debt. She graduated summa cum laude with an
undergraduate degree in Anthropology from Harvard University in 2017. Her
work has previously been published in the Harvard Advocate.
9

Annex Refurbishment
Following hot on the heels of the decarbonisation of Wolfson’s original Powell & Moya buildings, the winter of 2022-
23 saw the renovation of another key Wolfson building to zero-carbon emitting standards. The Annex, on the corner
of Linton and Chadlington roads at the entrance to college, has been home to many generations of Wolfson students.
Not only is it now fully powered by electricity like the rest of Wolfson’s estate, it also boasts brand new kitchens,
windows, lights, carpets and flooring, plus a newly landscaped garden for all to enjoy. Before and after photos show the
transformation and summarise the key enhancements.
1
4
10

2
,
1
Windows - the old windows,
which were metal-framed, singleglazed,
inefficient and poorly
functioning, have all College been replaced News
with modern, thermally efficient
uPVC alternatives, which also
look more appealing.
2
Insulation - increasing the thermal
performance of the building was
a priority for the project and an
essential enhancement required
prior to decarbonising the heating
system; by adding new external
insulation, the aesthetics have also
been vastly improved.
3
3
4
Security - continuing our security
enhancement project, advanced
access control systems have been
installed on the main entrance to
the building.
Internal refurbishment -
improvements to comfort,
functionality, and general amenity
within the Annex were a key goal
of the internal refurb project;
the old 1970s style kitchens have
been replaced with ultra-modern,
space efficient replacements,
lighting has been modernised,
carpets have been changed
and redecorations have been
completed.
Credit: John Cairns
11

12
“What drew me
to neuroscience,
psychology
and psychiatry
is wanting
to facilitate
connecting
existing resources
to the people
who need them. ”

The healing power of movement
Student profile
Chatting with first-year psychiatry DPhil student and Oxford University salsa coach Brennan Delattre, it’s tempting to book
yourself into your nearest dance class. Brennan is the first holder of the Rachel Conrad Scholarship for the study of Clinical
Depression, a unique endowed scholarship established in 2021 thanks to a generous legacy from Reuben Conrad CBE, a longtime
member of Common Room. Her passion for helping others heal through movement is infectious and, with future plans to
work with the NHS on reducing waiting times for mental health patients, Brennan’s is certainly a career to watch.
DPhil Psychiatry, 2022
Back in Minnesota, where I’m from, my
aunt helped with cotillion. It was really
social and etiquette training dance - not
quite big southern belle dresses. When I
was about 10 years old, they didn’t have
enough young girls in my age category,
so my aunt persuaded me to sign up.
When I started it meant white gloves
(and not really wanting to touch the
boys), but as it was a family thing I stuck
with it, and I ended up teaching when
I was just 16. I continued right through
to when I was 18 before I went off
to Middlebury College in Vermont to
study neuroscience. It was there that I
got really into swing dancing and also
capoeira (a dancelike martial art from
Brazil, performed to the accompaniment
of call-and-response choral singing and
percussive instrumental music) which
I discovered through my orientation
trip for my undergrad. Members of
the university were teaching it in
Portuguese and I went in with no prior
knowledge or experience and just really
fell in love with it. I studied abroad in
Brazil and I was lucky enough to see
capoeira performed by people of many
sociodemographic backgrounds, races,
and genders.
People would walk into these capoeira
classes and they would walk out saying
that they felt better. And I started
hearing people tell me stories of how
“capoeira saved my life” or “it helped
me get through my divorce”. I was
studying neuroscience at the time and I
used to think I was going to be a clinical
psychologist, but that came with the
difficulty of needing to pick a country,
or a state because it’s really difficult to
get re-certified between places. And as
someone who loves to travel, it didn’t
make a lot of sense to me.
I really love research and my background
is neuroscience. I consider myself more
of a social psychologist and somebody
who’s interested in intervention efficacy,
but in socially-based interventions to
supplement pharmacologically-based
interventions. So as I was learning
about neuroscience whilst also watching
people in capoeira walking in and out of
these classes feeling better, I began to
wonder if that’s something that could be
harnessed into an intervention? What
is it about capoeira? Is it the singing? Is
it the dancing? Is it the interpersonal
movement in synchronisation? What is
it and how could that then be used to
benefit people en masse?
Its potential as an intervention is huge,
because it’s cost-effective, non-invasive,
and really quite accessible. As my PhD
has progressed I have moved from
capoeira to salsa dance, after interviews
revealed a preference in young people,
but the active component I’m most
interested in is the co-operative
movement, as it seems like a really
important avenue for research. This is
especially true given the current mental
health crisis that we’re in following the
pandemic.
Currently, if you try to find mental
health care through the NHS, waiting
times are really long. There’s research
that shows that as you wait, you will get
Above & Left: Brennan as coach for the
Oxford University Salsa Society /
Credit: BubbleGum Media
worse and you will most likely do worse
in treatment once you get it. There are
low-intensity interventions already in
use, like exercise or guided self-help, but
there are also a lot of people who are
teaching things like salsa and capoeira in
the community. Our theory is that these
things could be helpful in the same way
as other low-intensity interventions. If
the evidence backs the hypothesis, we
could then connect existing resources
in the community to an existing need,
getting people off the waiting list in a
way that could be really beneficial for
them and the healthcare system.
What drew me to neuroscience,
psychology and psychiatry is wanting to
better understand how humans work,
but also to facilitate connecting existing
resources to the people who need them.
Dance has been so good in my own
life and I have anecdotally wandered
through the world hearing similar stories
from lots of other people internationally.
So if the research my PhD is based on
says that it would be useful to have
something like this as part of NHS
treatments, then that would be amazing.
13

On the road
If you’ve seen the OxBikes pre-loved bike depot here at college, which
aims to address the city’s high demand for bikes and its termly bike
waste problem, you’ll be pleased to learn that Wolfson DPhil student
Pedr Charlesworth is one of the brains behind the operation. Here, he
tells us how his global cycling adventures shaped his approach to the
annual cycles of academia and work and his involvement in OxBikes.
DPhil Materials Science, 2020
How reading The Moods of Future Joys by
Alastair Humphreys in my first year of
university shaped my direction
My first cycling trip was when I was
doing my undergraduate degree in
Bristol. I was half-involved in the cycling
team but more committed to my
DJ-ing at the time - until I overheard
a conversation on a bus between two
mates talking about how one of them
went cycling through Norway over
the summer. I liked the idea, did some
research, and settled on Sweden for a
slightly less hilly adventure. On this trip,
I read a book called The Moods of Future
Joys by Alastair Humphreys about how
the author rode around the world for
four and a half years and never took a
plane. At the time, I was on my first little
three-week cycling holiday.
That book started my cycling snowball
and by the time I came to the end of
my undergrad, I didn’t know if I wanted
to go on to do a PhD anymore. I hadn’t
found anything I was incredibly passionate
about in chemistry, and I felt like I’d just
be doing a PhD without any meaningful
thought or direction. So I spent the third
14
year of my degree working, and teaching
lectures in the mornings and evenings as
part of a special course I was on, which
meant I had enough money to travel for a
little while.
My idea was to try to ride a bike from
London to Sydney in 12 months. It all
got cut short because of COVID-19, but
until that point I was very locked into
a 12-month mindset, as many of us are
through education and work. I thought
if I was going to travel, I’d give myself a
year. Everything was all blocked out and
planned. But when I got about six months
into that trip, my mindset really started to
shift as I travelled through Central Asia.
Meeting a kid called Jake from Montana
in Khorog, Tajikistan
Well into my travels by now, I was in
the ‘stans, a congregation of mountains,
stepped grassland and desert tucked
between India, Russia and China.
Overlanders, people who travel by car,
motorbike or bike, come here with a
partner or a few friends for a oncein-a-lifetime
trip after a great deal of
preparation and with all the right gear.
It all revolves around a route called
the Pamir Highway, which is part of
the journey that people do to get to
Mongolia. It was on this well-travelled
route that I met 17-year-old Jake, who
had spent the summer working on his
parents’ farm before flying from Montana
to Kyrgyzstan on his own. With only
three previous motorbike rides under his
lean teenage belt, he bought a bike from
a Scottish guy at a market for $1,000
and decided to ride all the gnarliest
routes without a care in the world.
He was just a kid with a motorbike
and no safety measures other than a
spanner (which wasn’t even adjustable).
When I asked him what he would do if
something went wrong, he said he’d just
figure it out. He’d ask for help, he’d find
a hostel, he’d find a solution. And I just
loved his mentality. Here we all were,
with our expensive bikes, pre-planned
routes and backup plans and there was
Jake, saying he’d just figure it out. Maybe
that’s a luxury only a 17 year-old boy can
afford, but it really revitalised a feeling in
me of just letting things be.
When I came back to the UK, I
appreciated so many things but I also
had a different sense of this block-year
university and grad scheme thinking we
have. I fall straight back into it some
ways when I’m here, but I do think that
experience with Jake, and a few other
moments on that trip, allow me to bring
a different perspective to my life in this
highly organised society that we live in.
I feel less fear of the unexpected, more
open to strangers and unpredictable

Student profile
“As an entrepreneur, there’s
a genuine fear of failing.”
encounters. I found it such a healthy
mindset to adopt while living in an
incredibly privileged place, studying
amongst amazing people, and just being
safe day to day.
When OxBikes took off
I think that mentality is partly what I’ve
tapped into to keep driving OxBikes
forward. As an entrepreneur, there’s a
genuine fear of failing. So again it’s about
pushing past that. We’ve got to put
ourselves in that position and just say
why not? I got involved in OxBikes in my
second year at Oxford. We provide love
for bikes that get thrown away. Oxford
is a very transient place, with people
coming and going, needing bikes when
they’re here and then wanting to get rid
of them when the academic year is out.
There’s apparently a tradition amongst
leavers to ride their bike to the Radcliffe
Camera on their last day in the city
and just set it free because they know
someone will take it.
There’s a clear need in this city to
organise the chaos around bikes, and
when I joined OxBikes, all we had were
a few bikes from Trinity College and we
were just checking them over and selling
them on. We built up slowly from there.
We started to build a website with
some makeshift code that made sure
we weren’t selling duplicate bikes – that
was the level at the time. We were
running a few ads on Facebook and,
next thing you know, I got a call from
someone saying they’d seen an ad and
wanted to invest. So then we wanted to
buy 100 more bikes, which would triple
our fleet at the time. We’d make sure
they were in good functioning order
then sell or rent them on.
Then one day I was just sitting on the
bus driving through London on the day
of the marathon. I get a notification
every time we make a rent or sale,
and on this 10-minute bus journey, my
phone was buzzing non-stop and I just
couldn’t believe it. People were actually
interested in this funky little website
we’d made. It was just a case of pulling
things together bit by bit until it really
became something.
Since then, we’ve been pitching at the
Saïd Business School for more funding,
and there’re are few different directions
we want to go next. We want to get
into more colleges and we’d like to get
to Cambridge. I want it to be like the
AirBnB of bicycles. When you travel to
Amsterdam or Copenhagen, you could
rent a bike from someone who lives
there.
It’s ideas like this that make you wonder,
why hasn’t anyone done this sooner?
15

Quantum entanglement
and reality
You probably already know that, at subatomic scales, we enter the strange world
of quantum physics, governed by counterintuitive laws very far from the classical
mechanics of the human-scale world. But did you know that quantum physics provides
our most complete description of reality, and that we can even observe quantum
effects in living creatures? Professor Vlatko Vedral, a Governing Body Fellow, brings us
up to speed on his research into the “ultimate logic of everything”.
Vlatko Vedral
Vlatko Vedral (BSc, PhD, Imperial
College) is a Professor of Quantum
Information at Oxford. He has
published over 400 research papers
on various topics in quantum physics
and quantum computing and is
one of the Clarivate Highly Cited
Researchers. He has given numerous
invited plenary and public talks during
his career. These include a specialised
talk at a Solvay meeting (2010) and a
popular one at the International Safe
Scientifique (2007). He was awarded
the Royal Society Wolfson Research
Merit Award in 2007, the World
Scientific Medal and Prize in 2009,
the Marko Jaric Award in 2010 and
was elected a Fellow of the Institute
of Physics in 2017 and a member of
the European Academy of Sciences in
2020. He is a consultant to the World
Economic Forum on the Future of
Computation. Vlatko is the author
of 4 textbooks and 2 popular books
(Decoding Reality and From Micro to
Macro). He gives regular interviews to
the media and is actively engaged in
popularisation of physics in pieces for
New Scientist, Scientific American and
major UK and overseas newspapers.
16
Isaac Newton, who discovered what
we now call classical physics, thought
that everything is made up of particles.
However, various aspects of light
could not be explained if light was
also made up of particles. Ultimately,
James Clerk Maxwell - standing on the
shoulders of Huygens, Young, Faraday
and many others - proved that light is
actually an electromagnetic wave. At
that point the world (still classical) was
understood to be made up of two kinds
of entities, particles (constituents of
matter) and waves (things making up the
electromagnetic field).
Then came Albert Einstein who
(seemingly, but not really) reverted back
to Newton and said that light is, after all,
made up of particles (photons), though
he did admit that they can also behave
like waves (which is how we can account
for the interference of light). This was
the beginning of quantum physics.
Finally, Louis de Broglie hypothesized
that material quantum objects (such as
electrons) can also behave like waves.
This led to a unification (everything
is a wave and a particle) and inspired
Bohr to talk about complementarity,
namely the fact that all entities can
manifest their particle-like or wave-like
nature depending on how we “look at”
(experiment with) them. This is at the
heart of the famous wave-particle duality
of quantum systems.
So, then, what is the right ontology
when it comes to reality? Is the world
made of particles or waves or things
that sometimes behave like particles or
waves? According to quantum physics,
everything is actually made up of waves.
But these are quantum waves (or
q-waves for short), meaning that the
entities that are doing the waving are
what Paul Dirac called q –numbers (as
opposed to the ordinary c-numbers, “c”
being classical). This picture emerged
through the work of Heisenberg, Mott,
Schrödinger and Everett (all standing on
the shoulders of William Hamilton).
Let me explain why everything is a
q-wave and why this presents us with
the best picture of reality at present.
First there was a problem. If particles are
waves, the key phenomenon to explain
in the 1920s was the observation of the
alpha-particle decay in a cloud chamber.
This experiment seemed to present a
paradox for quantum physics.
An alpha-particle is a Helium nucleus
(two protons and two neutrons) and
it sometimes gets ejected in a nuclear
decay of a larger nucleus. A cloud
chamber was a great invention to
observe such particles (worthy of several
Nobel Prizes), though nowadays you can
make one in 15 minutes in your own
house with everyday kitchen utensils
(there are many YouTube videos on
this). The idea, as the name suggests, is
to have a particle travel through a gas
that can readily be ionized by collisions
with the particle. As the particle collides
with the gas molecules, it ionizes

Alumni lecture
17
Credit: Freepik

Will a quantum logic of
“everything everywhere
all at once” prevail or will it be
replaced by something else?
Below: Professor Albert Einstein / Credit: Getty Images
them in succession. Ionisation attracts
neighbouring gas which condenses
around the ionized molecules. Therefore,
the travelling and colliding particle leaves
a track of condensed vapour in its wake.
So far so good, but the problem was
that the tracks are always straight
lines. If, as quantum physics suggests,
everything is a wave, why do we get
straight lines from alpha-particles? Why
not concentric circles, just like waves
spreading in a pond when we throw a
stone in it?
The explanation was provided by
Neville Mott in 1929. He actually set
the scene for what is now called the
Many Worlds Interpretation of quantum
mechanics (which should actually
be called “Everything is a Q-Wave
Interpretation”). Mott said that a single
particle simultaneously traverses all the
tracks in all directions (as a wave would),
meaning that all trajectories exist in a
superposition and at the same time. A
single alpha-particle takes all the paths
simultaneously and in all the directions,
it’s just that when we look at it, we can
only see one of these trajectories.
The reason for this is that even though
everything is a q-wave within which
things exist at the same time, when we
interact with this q-wave we can only
reveal some of its aspects, one at a time
(this is where Heisenberg’s Uncertainty
comes from). But we ourselves are
also a collection of q-waves. It is
when our q-waves correlate with the
q-waves of the alpha-particle that
c-numbers emerge. These correlations
between q-waves are called quantum
entanglement and so the classical
world owes its existence to quantum
entanglement. In quantum physics,
even a collision between two particles
is actually described as an interaction
between two q-waves. This constitutes
our most accurate description of
nature, called quantum field theory. A
particle in this theory is just one stable
configuration of the underlying q-wave
(or, a single excitation of the quantum
field, in a more formal language of
quantum field theory).
Erwin Schrödinger, in lectures given
towards the end of his life, clearly spelt
out the same picture that everything is a
q-wave. He advocated this view not only
because it avoids the confusion arising
18

Alumni lecture
Above: Dr Vlatko Vedral
Below: Sir Isaac Newton / Credit: Pixabay
from the dualistic wave-particle language,
but also because it contains no collapses
of the wave-function, no abrupt
discontinuities due to measurements and
no quantum jumps (he was particularly
keen to avoid quantum jumps, about
which he said that if they turned out to
be true he had wished he was a plumber
and not a physicist).
How far have we tested this q-wave
picture? Schrödinger of course envisaged
a by-now legendary experiment leading
to a cat being simultaneously dead and
alive, much like the alpha particle takes
two different paths at the same time.
But Schrödinger’s thought experiment
is too hard to do simply because more
complex objects are exceedingly hard to
control quantum mechanically. However,
all subatomic and atomic particles,
and even some simple molecules, are
capable of existing in many states at
once. There is evidence that some more
complex chemical processes are also
fundamentally quantum mechanical. And
now, we are starting to experiment with
living systems.
My colleagues and I have performed a
sequence of experiments to entangle a
single living bacterium to light, as well as
another set of experiments to combine
a tardigrade with two superconducting
quantum bits. These experiments
succeeded in showing that living systems
can behave quantumly, though they are
still very (very) far away from the states
Schrödinger had in mind.
Will a quantum logic of
“everything everywhere all at
once” prevail or will it be replaced
by something else? We don’t have
a clue at present, though all bets
are still on quantum physics in
the foreseeable future. And it is
extremely exciting for humanity
to be in a position to grapple with
the fundamental mysteries of the
universe in order to understand
the ultimate logic of everything.
19

Curiosity and risk
Dr Kateryna Kovalchuk is a Ukrainian medieval historian whose research focuses on Byzantine legend. She
joined Wolfson College in 2022, her two-year stay made possible thanks to the generosity of the many alumni
who responded so generously to our Giving Day appeal for at-risk scholars in May 2022. She sat down with our
Communications Team to discuss her work for an edition of Wolfson’s Pivot Points podcast.
Visiting Scholar, 2022
Dr Kateryna Kovalchuk values her
curiosity. Without it, “everything
becomes insipid.” Curiosity, she says,
is “quintessential” to her research into
the legends and myths of Byzantine
civilisation; but as becomes apparent
over the course of our conversation, for
Kateryna, curiosity isn’t something that
can safely be indulged in the security of
the library. The way Kateryna describes
it, her curiosity involves real risk, and
has led her into the unknown on more
than one occasion over the last three
decades.
Coming of age in post-Soviet Ukraine,
Kateryna’s first academic passion was
for the literatures of ancient Greece and
Rome, and she recalls how she would
have stayed in Lviv to pursue a doctorate
in Classical Philology were it not for a
series of chance encounters. A brochure
caught her eye in the library one day,
“and flicking through the pages, I saw
the programme in medieval studies, and
my heart started pumping. I melted.”
She had been working as amanuensis to
20
one of her professors, who at the same
moment was contacted by colleagues
in Hungary seeking a deserving student
to enrol on a medieval studies course.
Circumstances had conspired to direct
Kateryna’s attention towards the world
of the Byzantine Empire, famous for
its lavish iconography, mosaics and
intricate goldwork, and origins shrouded
in myth; her curiosity was hooked. In
the first of many migrations, she found
herself studying at the Central European
University in Budapest. “It was extremely
hard, excruciatingly hard, because it
was the first time I had done something
in English,” she tells me, “the level of
scholarship was higher. I was deprived of
sleep. But it was absolutely fascinating.”
At the time, travelling abroad to study
was an unheard-of rarity, and it meant
leaving behind family for the first time.
But Kateryna took the risk, and she
speaks fondly of her years in Budapest:
the department was welcoming, tightknit
and egalitarian, with her professors
insisting on students calling them by
their nicknames, and the intensity of the
programme encouraged close friendships
among the students. Her curiosity had
paid off. Kateryna is keen to emphasise
that curiosity isn’t an easy thing to
come to terms with; even in her early
career, regularly moving countries took
its toll. “I did have to make choices, and
they were hard choices.” Judging from
the intertwined strands of her life and
research, Kateryna’s academic curiosity
has been a source of strength in the
face of the enormous challenges she,
her communities, and her home country
have had to confront in the last few
years. It has given her ways to live with
what she calls “bewilderment,” quoting
the poet Rumi; sometimes even to
embrace it.
Kateryna’s work principally concentrates
on Byzantine narratives of church and
monastery foundations. Nowadays, she
says, we have a tendency to dismiss
the more fanciful accounts set down
in the manuscripts: “they are based on
events, people, coordinates that exist

Alumni profile
Above: Kateryna working as an interpreter
with the OSCE at the war area in Donbas,
Eastern Ukraine
Right: Taken in May 2012 at Dumbarton
Oaks, Harvard Research Centre
Left: During a first trip to Oxford as a visiting
doctoral student at Keble College, Oxford
in real life, but the rest is not what we
call the empirical. Historians would
discard these legends on the basis that
they don’t contain facts and details
that are reliable in the conventional
sense.” Yet Kateryna’s work demands
she suspend her empiricism, even if
briefly. She wrote her dissertation about
the legendary origins of Hagia Sofia, a
narrative popularly attested to in more
than eighty manuscripts in Byzantine
Greek, and countless others in Latin,
Persian, Turkish, Old Slavonic and
Georgian. “The legend is what people
actually wanted to hear. This what they
loved, and this is what was welcomed.
And that, in a way, realistically reflects
their mentality, how they saw the
world, how they perceived their past,
how they perceived the past of this
church. Now we differentiate between
historical memory and imaginative
origins; but for them, they didn’t have
this distinction. They couldn’t image
their past without the intrusion of
God, without the appearance of angels
and miraculous events. It was a part of
them.” What sparks Kateryna’s curiosity
is the peculiar accuracy of documents
that relate not to events, but to how
contemporary individuals thought, felt
and operated in Byzantine society.
“I did have to make choices,
and they were hard choices”
Legends, Kateryna says, are just as
important today as they were in the
Byzantine Empire. “I’m confronted with
the same thing in Ukraine, because
people go through the experience of
war, and it traumatises them.” The
same kind of stories – which nowadays
we think of as “urban legends” – are a
means for cultures and communities
to process and retain traumatic
experiences. She describes parallels
between contemporary and medieval
memory (and for interested readers she
recommends Mary Carruthers’ 2008
work The Book of Memory: A Study of
Memory in Medieval Culture). Speaking
to Kateryna, one gets the sense that,
as risky an enterprise as following one’s
curiosity can be, remaining curious
allows one to face those risks. “It’s like
a kind of natural ignition”, she tells me.
“Not everybody has it, but we can
discover something like it. It’s a little bit
of work.” Curiosity encourages us to
seek out new ways of thinking and living;
perhaps it equips us to survive things we
could never have anticipated.
21

How it started
I was an undergraduate at the University
of Mosul, as a clinical pharmacist. I was
fascinated by the idea of developing a
drug. When I was a patient after a road
traffic accident, I saw first-hand the lack
of treatment options for people coming
into A&E with traumatic brain injuries
and oedema, which is the swelling of
the brain. There was one drug being
developed about 70 years ago, but
patients treated with it developed
resistance within 24-48 hours. So I knew
I wanted to work in this space, and for
a while. Returning to Sheffield Hallam
University for a Masters in Pharmacology
and Biotechnology, followed by a PhD in
Cell Biology and Neuroscience, I joined
a team of brilliant people who were all
biochemists, and I found I was always
the one trying to take it from the bench
to the patient. So I decided I wanted to
apply my research. I now focus on central
nervous system disorders, in particular
neurodegeneration such as Parkinson’s
disease and Alzheimer’s using cuttingedge
technologies including developing
humanised 3D models of brain-on-achip,
patient-derived stem cells and gene
editing tools such as CRISPR.
A Global Citizen
A Junior Research Fellow at Wolfson and Group Leader in Cellular Neuroscience,
Mootaz Salman has travelled around the world in the name of research, but has never
forgotten the experience which inspired it all, when he found himself in a hospital bed.
PhD MSc BPharm MRSB
Below: Mootaz after his PhD viva with his supervisors and examiners at Sheffield Hallam
University
22
I feel privileged because my journey
in this field started from the ward
itself, and now I’m on the molecular
and cellular side but the thing I find
important is staying connected to the
human impact of our work. It’s especially
important that our junior scientists keep
this in mind, as they are the ones really
making most of the breakthroughs.
They need to see that they’re not just
dealing with cells, but that the cells
come from people and those people
have families. Giving the current rate of
disease progression, one in two people
will get dementia after the age of 80.
The aggregate societal cost of this is £3.3
billion per year in the UK, with a total
annual economic burden of £20,000 per
household. As the population ages, this
number will increase year-on-year.
We arrange open days and invite
patients to join our research group
for tours to show them that there
are people dedicating time and effort,
spending nights and weekends working
to find cures. I want to give them hope,
but a real one, so that even when they
feel things are slow, they can know
things are happening behind the scenes.
It’s an ongoing process. It’s a journey.
It’s tremendous if you think about how
far we’ve come as a species in the last

50 or 100 years. The things we’re doing
now were just dreams back then. But
I know that’s very difficult for families
and patients to keep in mind. There isn’t
a single family who won’t be impacted
in some way by these diseases and
it’s about time we all come together
as scientists, government and as a
community to do something about it
From Sheffield to Harvard
After my undergraduate degree in
Iraq, I gained exposure to science and
clinical practice in the Middle East. Then,
after my further degrees in Sheffield, I
went on to do my first post-doctoral
fellowship at Harvard Medical School
and Boston Children’s Hospital, before
finding myself here at Oxford.
It’s important for me to count myself
as a global citizen. With my varied
academic experiences in different
parts of the world, I feel I have a good
understanding of what it takes to
communicate and achieve in science
in the East and West. When I was in
Mosul, the clinical aspect there was
quite good, similar to India and Pakistan.
If you look into our NHS here, much
of the leadership is from India, Pakistan,
the Middle East and Eastern Europe.
Yet when I came back to Sheffield for
my Masters and PhD, I could see that
the research facilities available to me in
Mosul were not as advanced as we have
here. Then when I wanted to develop
my independence and take my next
steps, it felt important to go to the
places “where the sausage is made,”
like Harvard and Oxford.
“You need to dream big but
remember the hard work that it
takes to get there”
Below: During his post-doctoral fellowship at Harvard Medical School
Alumni profile
It was a big jump to go from Sheffield
Hallam University to somewhere with
such a brand like Harvard or Oxford,
but for me, it’s not about doing branded
science. It’s about doing the right science
with the right people in the right,
supportive environment. It’s all about the
research. If my research question could
be answered better in a different city,
then I’d go there without hesitation.
So for a Yorkshire lad, the red brick, Ivy
League and golden triangle were quite
a scary experience. I think it always
comes down to the motivation of a
person and the support around them,
and I’ve always had such a supportive
team around me. And I was driven to
achieve and leave my own mark. Harvard
was such a stimulating environment, not
just because of the university itself, but
because Boston is such a special city. It’s
a biotech hub of the world with Harvard,
MIT and all the big biotech pharmas.
Everyone’s firing with all cylinders so it’s
a really different pace.
When I came to Oxford, I knew I
had to be associated with a college.
I joined during Covid and what I was
really searching for was a community.
I found that in Wolfson. I was looking
for a college that aligned well with my
vision and values. In my research about
Wolfson, I came across the college
motto: “humani nil alienum,” or “nothing
human is alien to me,” and that’s exactly
23

what I wanted, and that’s what I still
love about it here today. We don’t have
upper and lower common rooms, we
have one mixed room. We don’t have
a high table. I just felt I was amongst
my own people. I felt a shared vision,
common interests, and more or less the
same values.
Above: Mootaz with his Oxford Colleagues
Below: Receiving the Young Neuroscientist of the Year Award from the International Society of
Neurochemistry in Honolulu, Hawaii
Wherever life takes you,
don’t go alone
Regardless of the institution, working in
science research comes with challenges,
setbacks and cumulative achievements
that you simply can’t reach on your
own. Back when I was a PhD student, I
went to my supervisor with a proposal
to work on a huge paper that could
be a game-changer. Like anything
in life, there are certain journals in
academia that are more popular than
others. In the field of science, it’s three
journals called Cell, Nature and Science
(scientists tend to collectively call them
CNS as they are the central nervous
system of science and discovery), and
they were what we were aiming for.
With three main authors, it took us
five years to complete this paper with
contributions from 13 institutions. We
submitted it, and after all that hard
work, we got rejected. It was such a
heartbreaking moment.
But there was something in me that
decided to stand up and not take no
for an answer. We agreed to try again
together and we were determined to
24
earn it. And guess what? We fought, and
got in. It was such a team effort. More
importantly, we currently have a drug
candidate that is about to start phase I/
II human clinical trials. Between the three
of us as authors of the paper, we’ve got
three fellowships, three major honours
and more than 250 citations in just three
years and I am sure that more will come
in the future.
For anyone wanting to go into the
world of scientific research, I’d say make
sure you’re doing it because you are
passionate about it. To be honest, it’s
not the most financially rewarding job,
and many people talk about the cons
of this kind of high-pressure work, but
there are so many pros. It’s like buying
a house; you’re not just paying for the
bricks, you’re paying for the view and
the neighbourhood. For the community.
In science, you’re always surrounded
by people who are motivated, driven,
passionate, and smart. It’s rare to find the
same mass density in other professions,
so it’s such a stimulating environment.
Meeting people, exchanging ideas, and
having your own ideas challenged: these
aren’t just trials to overcome but a
privilege and relief. You need to dream
big but remember the hard work that it
takes to get there. Success is just the tip
of the iceberg, so enjoy the journey and
make some friends along the way.

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25

A year in Development
and Alumni Relations
Development Director Huw David reflects on a year of both continuity and change, in
which Wolfsonians continued to invest in the relationships, research and resources at
the heart of our community, whether at Linton Road or further afield.
As we begin the long vacation, it’s
satisfying to reflect back on what the
President referred to in his recent
Foundation Dinner speech as “a normal,
extraordinary year” at Wolfson. Normal
in the full resumption, for the first time
in three years, of the regular patterns of
lectures, seminars, lunches and dinners
that are the hallmark of Wolfson life;
extraordinary for the accomplishments
of our students and fellows, the
generosity of our alumni and friends, and
the progress of our decarbonization and
other building projects around College.
Once again, Wolfson benefitted from
remarkable philanthropic support. For
the Zero Carbon project, the Wolfson
Foundation’s grant of £500,000 enabled
us to complete the replacement of
the remaining single-glazed windows in
our original Powell & Moya buildings.
From September, Wolfson will have
Oxford’s first electric minibus thanks
to a donation of £86,000 from an
anonymous alumnus, eliminating many
tonnes of diesel emissions as it shuttles
back and forth to Broad Street. With
Wolfson’s crest emblazoned on the side,
it will also be a powerful embodiment
of the College’s commitment to clean
energy and, we hope, a catalyst for other
institutions to electrify their fleet.
While the Zero Carbon project has
specialised in transforming Wolfson’s
hidden infrastructure – the heating,
plumbing and electrics that make the
College run – other building projects
have a much more visible impact. Over
the winter, the Private Dining Room and
Coffee Room were amalgamated and
comprehensively redecorated to create
a bright modern space overlooking
Harbour Quad. The Levett Room, as
it is now named in gratitude for the
generosity of Honorary Fellow Christian
Levett, has become an outstanding
space for events, art exhibitions, and
entertaining. Two other projects in the
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coming months will similarly transform
much used but tired spaces, both thanks
to exceptional gifts: the Music Practice
Rooms underneath the Marble Hall and
the Lower Common Room. Across
the Cherwell, in Wolfson’s floodplain
meadows, the generosity of the Aspen
Foundation in memory of the late Sir
Martin Wood is restoring and enhancing
the biodiversity of these SSSI grasslands.
Wolfson’s vibrant research clusters have
also attracted some tremendous gifts.
For the Oxford Centre for Life-Writing,
we are hugely grateful for two donations
of £100,000, one from the Dorset
Foundation and one from an anonymous
benefactor, and for the support of
OCLW’s many friends in sustaining
its outreach work with disadvantaged
communities and neurodivergent young
people. The new Law in Societies
cluster revived Wolfson’s longstanding
expertise in sociolegal studies thanks to
significant philanthropic support. We
were once again indebted to Honorary
Fellows Lorne Thyssen for enabling
so much outstanding research under
the Ancient World Research Cluster’s
aegis and Simon Harrison for his
remarkable support for the Boat Club,
towards our planned new Sports and
Wellbeing Centre, and for scholarships
in Physics and Quantum Computing.
In January we established the Baruch
Spinoza Scholarship in solar physics,
named in honour of the Enlightenment
philosopher and inspiration to Isaiah
Berlin, thanks to a kind gift from alumnus
Matthew Levy.
Physics – of the quantum kind – was at
the heart of this year’s London Lecture
given by Vlatko Vedral, of which more
can be seen across the centre pages
of this magazine. Attended by a rapt
capacity audience at the House of
Lords, it was one of several memorable
alumni events throughout the year.
September’s alumni reception in College
Credit: Femke Gow
was for the first time preceded by a talk,
livestreamed for Wolfsonians across
the world, on ‘The Unfolding Story of
the Hittite Empire and its Collapse’ by
Christoph Bachhuber. Our Christmas
reception at the Oxford & Cambridge
Club in London as ever brought together
alumni of many eras. And following
three years of Covid confinement to
British shores, the President and I were
delighted to travel to the US in March
to meet alumni and friends in Chicago,
Washington, New York and Boston,
where a drinks reception brought
Wolfsonians from across New England
together at Tufts University thanks to
the kindness of Tufts’ President Tony
Monaco and his wife Zoia Larin Monaco,
an alumna.
With a full programme scheduled for
2023-24 we look forward to meeting
you on our travels or to welcoming you
back to College soon. Thank you again
to everyone whose generosity, at all
levels, helps to make Wolfson the special
place it is.
Would you consider supporting
Wolfson’s students by establishing
a bursary or scholarship?
Please contact Dr Huw David,
Fellow and Development Director,
to discuss how your support
can help Wolfson’s students and
postdocs thrive.
E: huw.david@wolfson.ox.ac.uk

Development
Above: The President Sir Tim Hitchens and the former Vice-Chancellor Professor Dame Louise Richardson
celebrate Wolfson’s Zero Carbon Project. / Credit: John Cairns
Wolfson 1966 Fund
Supporting expertise, today and tomorrow
From climate change to global
pandemics, never has the world needed
expertise more than now. Since
Wolfson’s foundation in 1966, our
students and post-doctoral fellows have
made ground-breaking discoveries and
brought fresh light to bear on some of
the world’s most intractable challenges.
As Oxford’s most international and
family-friendly college, Wolfson is a
special place in which to study, learn
and live. But we want to do more to
help our students and post-doctoral
fellows thrive – and your support will
be essential in doing this. That’s why
the Wolfson 1966 Fund is dedicated
to providing direct support for our
students and post-docs through
scholarships, research and travel awards,
hardship bursaries, and better library,
sports and nursery facilities.
If you would like to support today’s
students and postdocs through the
Wolfson 1966 Fund or to find out
more, please visit:
www.wolfson.ox.ac.uk/wolfson-
1966-fund
Arrivals and departures Syme Society Newsletter
In July 2022 we welcomed Alex
Fels as Development Officer. In
May we bade farewell to Jessica
Dunham, who joined the central
university after two years as Senior
Development Officer. In the
Communications Team, Femke Gow
left Wolfson to move to Nairobi,
Kenya, and we welcomed George
Mather as her successor
as Communications Officer.
The Syme Society commemorates
one of Wolfson’s most
distinguished fellows and
benefactors, Sir Ronald Syme.
Those who pledge a bequest to
Wolfson in their will and notify
the College are invited to join the
society, and to a summer lunch at
Wolfson. For further information,
please see wolfson.ox.ac.uk/
leave-legacy.
Wolfson’s termly e-newsletter,
The Wolfsonian, offers alumni and
friends regular updates on College
news and events. If you’re not yet
on the mailing list but would like
to be, please contact the Alumni &
Development Office at
alumni.office@wolfson.ox.ac.uk.
We’ll be happy to forward you the
latest edition and sign you up so
you don’t miss the next one.
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Financial Report
College Bursar Richard Morin reflects on Wolfson’s achievements in a challenging financial year, and looks ahead to some of the
exciting developments being made possible by the generosity of alumni and friends.
This has been another challenging year
for the College finances as inflation has
continued to spiral and the increase
in the cost of borrowing has brought
about the inevitable write down of
investment values. Nevertheless, the
underlying health of the College finances,
along with our prudent and cautious
approach, has enabled us to just about
balance the books once again. Thanks
to the kindness of alumni and others
we have continued our decarbonisation
programme and have managed to
establish a new, permanently endowed
research fellowship in memory of Sir
Isaiah Berlin. This endowed fellowship
has been created from the amalgamation
of small donations received for this
purpose over many years, and shows
that even the smallest of donations can
grow into something substantial and
important over time.
The adjustment in asset prices because
of the increase in the cost of borrowing
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has resulted in a substantial fall in the
value of our investments, with both
public and private equity, as well as
property, being challenged by the
changing landscape. A predicted sharp
drop in inflation has yet to happen, but
it is still generally believed that inflation
will diminish by the end of this calendar
year (as a result of lapping itself if for
no other reason), and, of course, this
assumes no other major catastrophes
befall the economy.
One of the saddest impacts of the
current cost of borrowing is that we are
no longer able to raise the £14 million
that we had hoped to raise through
the private markets to fund a new
‘Garden Building’ to accomodate 50 new
student rooms on our south car park.
The design has now been completed
and planning permission achieved, and,
originally, we had intended to borrow
the money and service the debt through
the income that the new rooms would
have generated. The rise in the cost
of interest rates unfortunately means
that this is no longer possible, and we
are therefore looking at other options,
including fundraising, to fund the finance
gap. It would be terrific to be able to
complete this important project, as it
would enable another 50 students to
live on site and be immersed in the full
Wolfson experience.
We have also been working on
completing the design for a new sports
and wellbeing centre, and we hope to
submit this for planning permission in
the coming months. This work has been
instigated and supported by the kindness
of a generous donor, to whom the
College will be eternally grateful. While
full funding is not yet in place for the
building phase, we are hopeful that more
funds can be raised and construction can
start as soon as finances allow.
With the value of our investments

Financial report
“This has been an incredible
and challenging programme
of work for the College”
Credit: John Cairns
having fallen by around 4% over the
last 12 months, the College’s buying
power has been reduced, especially
when set against inflation of 10%,
but with very careful budget and cost
management we achieved a small
surplus at the end of the last year: that
small surplus was committed to the
extensive decarbonisation programme
as per Wolfson’s five-year plan. The
decarbonisation programme is almost
complete, with the whole of the main
site now zero carbon emitting, with
no fossil fuel heating. Our houses in
Garford, Linton and Chadlington Roads
are also almost fossil fuel heating free,
with the last few properties being
insulated and having heat pumps installed
this summer. This has been an incredible
and challenging programme of work for
the College, and so many people have
told me how proud they are to be a
member of a college so committed to
being truly zero carbon at a time when it
is most needed.
Having reached net zero this year
and having completed the current
programme of decarbonisation works,
we are now looking for funding for the
next stage, which will be to increase the
number of photovoltaic panels on our
flat roofs, so we can generate more of
our own electricity locally. We also need
to put more insulation in place in the
remaining uninsulated parts of Wolfson’s
estate and want to buy a large storage
battery so that we can draw down
electricity from when it is available in its
greenest form and store it for later use.
There is also work underway in College
amongst staff, fellows and students
to reduce our own individual carbon
footprints wherever we can.
We are currently offsetting those
residual individual carbon footprints,
as well as the carbon footprints of
our operations, by reinvesting in green
initiatives at the College.
Other, smaller projects completed
across College include the refurbishment
of the Private Dining Room through
the kindness of a donor (now renamed
the Levett Room), and the purchase
of an electric minibus (again through
the kindness of a donor), which is due
to arrive in September and will ensure
carbon free travel for our members
between the College and town.
So, despite all of the challenges, there is
much to be pleased about in terms of
the progress being made. The day-today
running of the College continues
to be blessed by an amazing team of
managers and staff who look after us all
so very well. Our Head Chef, Michael
Godfrey, an award winning international
executive chef, and his team, including
Sofia Miron Sardiello, recently promoted
to be the new College Steward,
continue to produce the most dazzling
catering experience, and an environment
in which the academic magic continues
to happen.
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@wolfsoncollegeoxford
Join us on social media for events, news and inspiration
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Pakistani journalist Cyril Almeida delivers Wolfson’s
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175
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Make a gift
Scan the QR code with your
phone camera to make a
donation to the College online
Supporting Wolfson
Gifts allow Wolfson to offer scholarships to reduce the cost of studying in Oxford, travel
awards to facilitate students’ research, bursaries for students who encounter unexpected
financial hardship, and much more.
Online giving
Our recommended method – if you
are resident anywhere except the
USA, please donate online at www.
development.ox.ac.uk/wolfsoncollege.
You can set up regular giving
there, or make a single gift with a credit
or debit card.
In the USA, you can donate tax
efficiently through Americans for
Oxford (AFO), the university’s 501 (c)
(3) charitable organisation, at www.
oxfordna.org/donate.
Giving by post
You can use the donation form enclosed
with this magazine or download the
form at www.wolfson.ox.ac.uk/
make-gift. Please send the form to
the Wolfson Alumni and Development
Office, Wolfson College, Linton Road,
Oxford, OX2 6UD.
Tax efficient ways of giving
Depending on where you live and
whether or not you are a taxpayer, there
are several ways you can increase the
value of your gift to the College.
UK taxpayers
Please make sure to cover your donation
under the Gift Aid scheme to increase
the value of your gift by 25%, courtesy
of HM Customs and Revenue. Higher
rate tax payers will get a further
deduction from their taxes.
USA taxpayers
Gifts to Wolfson in the United States
can be made through AFO. Gifts to AFO
qualify for an income tax deduction to
the full extent allowed by law. Gifts can
be made online at: www.oxfordna.org/
donate or by cheque sent to Americans
for Oxford, Inc., 500 Fifth Avenue, 32nd
Floor, New York, NY 10110. Please
include clear instructions that your gift
is for Wolfson College, including postal
address (Linton Road, Oxford, OX2
6UD).
Continental European residents
Tax efficient giving is available through
the Transnational Giving Europe Scheme.
For full information, go to:
https://donate.transnationalgiving.eu/
landing/wolfson_college
Canadian taxpayers
The University of Oxford is recognised
by the Canadian Revenue Agency
as a prescribed institution under
Section 3503 of the Canadian Income
Tax Regulations. On receipt of your
donation, we will ensure that you
are sent a receipt for Canadian tax
purposes.
Wolfson is a registered charity, no. 1141446
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Upcoming events
Saturday 23rd September 2023
Wolfson Alumni Lecture & Drinks Reception
Thursday 12th October 2023
Annual Wolfson Art Tour with Sir Tim Hitchens
Thursday 26th October 2023
Japanese Dance: “Rey Camoy” by “Nanika Tarinai”
Thursday 2nd November 2023
Syme Lecture
Thursday 16th November 2023
Sir Ben Bradshaw MP on Religion in British Politics
Thursday 23rd November 2023
Sarfraz Pakistan Lecture
Thursday 30th November 2023
Oxford Lieder Concert
Tuesday 5th December 2023
Wolfson Alumni Drinks in London, Oxford and Cambridge Club
All events in College unless otherwise specified.
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