BNA Scholarship for Life Sciences MSci student Oluwaseyi Jesusanmi

This inaugural scheme has been launched to improve representation, diversity and equity in neuroscience, to support students from currently under-represented ethnic groups in neuroscience and build a supportive community through networking opportunities, bursaries and mentorship.

Oluwaseyi was one of seven individuals to be awarded the three-year scholarship. There were 78 applications in total.

“One of the most exciting things for me about the programme is the opportunities to present my work to a wider audience, and the networking opportunities. In April I gave a short virtual presentation of my work at the BNA Festival,” explained Oluwaseyi. 

Oluwaseyi has been supervised by David Martin, Senior Lecturer from the School, and Ros Langston, Lecturer in the School of Medicine, during his honours and MSci projects. Both were delighted to hear of the scholarship award.

David said "Seyi is an outstanding student and this award recognises his potential. It is well deserved and a great start to a very promising career."

Ros said, "I am delighted that Seyi has won this opportunity to build himself a wider neuroscience network- I have always considered the BNA my "neurofamily" and I know Seyi will be warmly welcomed and supported as one of their new family members."

This award follows his highly commended placing in the Life Sciences category of the 2020 Global Undergraduate Awards. He was also given an Honourable Mention in the SLS Award for Innovator of the Year for developing from scratch a system to automatically quantify animal behaviour from video. The panel said that this was “a thoroughly amazing piece of work."​

Oluwaseyi will start a Neuroscience 4 year PhD programme in September at the University of Sussex. The programme will allow him to continue with his dual interests of neuroscience and computational biology.

About the BNA Scholars Programme

The purpose of the BNA Scholars programme is to support students from underrepresented ethnic groups to thrive in neuroscience, and build a supportive community through networking opportunities, bursaries and mentorship.

BNA Scholars will remain on the programme for three years.

The scheme is supported by the Gatsby Foundation and MSD.