It is a pleasure to supervise PhDs and a fantastic learning experience for us too, as supervisors. It’s one of the highlights of my week and my working life to be able to work with these great scientists.
Professor Richard Dobson, Head of the Department of Biostatistics and Health Informatics
08 June 2026
King's researchers awarded for best PhD theses 2024-25
Five outstanding researchers were awarded prizes for the best PhD theses in the Biostatistics & Health Informatics and the Social, Genetic & Developmental Psychiatry (SGDP) departments. The awards were presented on the 20 May in the SGDP Centre at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN)
The prizes were awarded to the PhD students who completed their studies to an outstanding level in 2024 and 2025. Candidates were nominated by their supervisors who were required to outline the merits of their thesis, (originality and importance of the research); the student’s contribution to the thesis research and the student’s potential as a researcher. The nominations were then rated and reviewed by two panels of academic staff to select the final winners.
The SGDP Gottesman-Shields PhD Prize winners were:
- Dr Elisavet Palaiologou, for her thesis: ‘Investigating the developmental heterogeneity in anxiety symptoms and conduct problems from early childhood to emerging adulthood’. Her thesis was supervised by Professor Thalia Eley, Professor of Developmental Behavioral Genetics and Dr Ewan Carr, Reader in Biostatistics.
- Dr Xinyang Yu, for her thesis: ‘Integrating neuroimaging and multi-omics approaches to study eating disorders and disordered eating symptoms’. Her thesis was supervised by Professor Sylvane Desrivières, Professor of Biological Psychiatry and Professor Ulrike Schmidt, King’s College London
- Dr Lachlan Gilchrist, for his thesis: ‘Investigating biological links between psychiatric disorders and neurodegenerative diseases using genetics’. His thesis was supervised by Dr Petroula Proitsi, Reader in Genetic Epidemiology at Queen Mary University of London, Professor Cathryn Lewis, Professor of Genetic Epidemiology & Statistics, King’s College London and Professor Sulev Kõks, Head of Genetic Epidemiology Research at the Perron Institute.
The BHI winners were:
- Dr Gordon Forbes, for his thesis: ‘Personalised Predictions of Outcomes in Adolescence and Adulthood for Autistic Children’. His thesis was supervised by Professor Daniel Stahl, Professor in Medical Statistics and Statistical Learning, Professor Emily Simonoff, Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Professor Andrew Pickles, Professor of Biostatistics and Psychological Methods, King’s College London.
- Dr Linglong Qian, for his thesis: ‘On AI Frameworks for Healthcare Time-Series Analysis: Missingness, Dynamics and Representation.’ His thesis was supervised by Dr Zina Ibrahim, Senior Lecturer in Artificial Intelligence in Medicine and Professor Richard Dobson, Professor of Medical Bioinformatics at King’s College London
The prize ceremony was followed by a spring social event with an excellent lively piano performance by Dr Hubertus Himmerich. This successful event achieved highly positive feedback and was an inspiring occasion for the current PhD students to see the best final theses of the previous years showcased.
