Three outstanding scholars at the start of their careers have been announced as the winners of the College’s prestigious 2020 Research Fellowship competition. Specialising in a diverse range of subjects, from astrophysics, art history and medieval history, they were selected out of several hundred applications for their exceptional academic and research records.

The new Research Fellows are:

Emily Sandford - Physics

Emily Sandford graduated from Yale University with a BSc in Physics, before undertaking both an MA and an MPhil in Astronomy at Columbia University. She has been involved in various research projects as part of her PhD thesis "Extracting Maximal Information from Transit Light Curves" at the Department of Astronomy at Columbia University. This has included periods of study at Pontifícia Universidad Católica, Santiago, Chile (March - April 2018) and the Cavendish Astrophysics group, University of Cambridge (April 2019 to present).

Christina Faraday - History of Art

Christina Faraday completed both her BA and MPhil in the History of Art and Architecture at St. John’s College, Cambridge. Her MPhil specialism was Tudor and Stuart visual and material culture, and her master's dissertation was on clocks and watches in British portraits, c.1530-c.1630. Christina stayed at St. John’s to complete her PhD dissertation, funded by AHRC, on "The Concept of 'Liveliness' in English Visual Culture, c.1560-c.1630”. In 2019, Christina was selected as one of ten AHRC/BBC New Generation Thinkers, a scheme which invites early career researchers to communicate their research by making programmes for BBC Radio 3.

Vedran Sulovsky - History

Vedran Sulovsky achieved a BA in History and Art History at the University of Rijeka in Croatia, followed by an MA in Comparative History: Interdisciplinary Medieval Studies at the Central European University in Budapest. Following this, he spent one year studying Latin and ancient Greek through primary sources at the Accademia Vivarium Novum in Rome before completing his PhD in History at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge. His thesis, entitled “Saint Charlemagne and sacrum imperium: The Sanctity of the State under Frederick Barbarossa (1152 - 1190)”, dealt with the concept of political sanctity in the Holy Roman Empire.

The new Research Fellows will be formally elected in the autumn.