Science Dean's Awards

The Dean's Awards for excellence in the Natural Sciences and Mathematics were started in 1994. At this year's ceremony, the University Rector, Professor Roger Ellul-Micallef, presented 12 awards to students placing first, second and third in each of the four years of the B.Sc. (Hons) course during the 2002/3 academic year.

In congratulating the students on their achievement, the Rector also mentioned the new improvements and extensions to the science buildings at the University and the Dean of the Faculty, Professor A. J. Vella thanked HSBC Bank and Agenda Bookshop for sponsoring the event with book tokens for the students.

The awards went to Massimo Farrugia and Antoine Grech (Mathematics and Physics), Mark Anthony Caruana (Mathematics and Operations Research) from the first year; Andrew Duncan (CSAI & Mathematics), Marija Joan Sciberras (Mathematics and Physics), Rachel Theresa Decelis (Biology and Chemistry) from the second year; Nathalie Attard, Sarah Buttigieg and Joel Azzopardi (Mathematics and Statistics and Operations Research) from the third year; and Michael Caruana (Mathematics and Statistics and Operations Research), Pierre Sandre Farrugia (Mathematics and Physics), Fiona Farrugia (CSAI and Physics) from the fourth year.

The Faculty of Science comprises seven departments including the traditional sciences and the newer disciplines in Computer Science and Informatics; the most recent addition is the Department of Statistics and Operations Research.

Research is being carried out in several fields but particular areas of interest include marine biology, environmental chemistry, colloid science, molecular modelling, microwave applications, atmospheric physics, algebraic graph theory and combinatorics, systems analysis and design, multimedia authoring environments and statistical theory of non-stochastic processes.