Directory

All my life, I've been captivated by the wonders and conundrums of complex diseases. Why do viruses mutate in unpredictable ways? And why would a man mistake his wife for a hat? With a quantitative mind, I longed for mathematical tools I could use to investigate these captivating mysteries and found them in machine learning—dedicated to the discovery of complex computational patterns in a range of applications. At Cambridge, I will have the opportunity to contribute my machine learning background to an ongoing effort to determine the genes involved with pain. Capturing complex relationships among genes and with their environment, machine learning has the potential to discover not just single genes, but how they interact to cause observed symptoms. Ultimately, I hope to pursue an MD/PhD so that as a scientist, I might help further our understanding of complex diseases but as a physician, I might never lose sight of the real patients I’m trying to help.

For as long as I can remember I have been interested in science. In college I majored in chemistry, completing a total synthesis of the natural product ineariifolianone in the lab of Prof. Erik Sorensen for my senior thesis. While I ultimately plan to pursue a PhD and academic career in the sciences, over the last year and a half I have found myself becoming increasingly curious about the process of scientific research and thought – questions such as how we are able to know what we (claim to) know, how competing theories can be tested against each other, and the ways in which scientific research is shaped by the wider society and vice versa. This coming year I will be pursuing those interests by studying the history, philosophy, and sociology of science, technology, and medicine at Cambridge.

Bart M.J. Szewczyk (SHEF-chick) is an Associate-in-Law at Columbia Law School. Previously, he was a senior associate at WilmerHale and an adjunct professor of international law at George Washington University Law School. He is a term member at the Council on Foreign Relations, member of the Executive Council at the American Society of International Law and fellow at the Truman National Security Project. Bart clerked for President (then Vice-President) Peter Tomka and Judge Christopher Greenwood at the International Court of Justice and for Judge Leonard Garth at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. He was a visiting fellow at the EU Institute for Security Studies and a consultant in the UN Office of Strategic Planning. He has published in the American Journal of International Law, Harvard International Law Journal, Columbia Journal of European Law, Polish Yearbook of International Law, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, and International Herald Tribune.

I was born and raised in Kingston, Jamaica where I navigated two cultures of care. This foundational experience, coupled with the knowledge and understanding gained from research and personal healthcare challenges, has shaped my passion for cultivating high-quality healthcare in the Caribbean. As an undergraduate studying Anthropology and Global Health at Princeton University, I developed an appetite for understanding the health narratives of people and contexts of diseases. During my MPhil in Health, Medicine and Society, I plan to conduct research on maternal health, violence and humanized birthing practices in low resource contexts. I will explore the effects of obstetric violence on maternal and child health and prioritize quality of care for women during pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum. I believe that it is essential to center the voices of women in an effort to reimagine birthing possibilities and will take a multidisciplinary approach to my work. I am honored to be joining the Gates Cambridge community and look forward to approaching global health as a collective effort. 

Previous Education

Princeton University Medical Anthropology 2023

Evolutionary science and medicine are becoming increasingly intertwined. Human bodies are not merely a product of our current biology, but also of deep evolutionary history that informs an understanding not only of how they work but why they developed this way. My main interests lie in the evolution of bipedal locomotion and how this relates to the modern human body. At Cambridge, I undertook an M.Phil. in Human Evolutionary Studies within the Division of Biological Anthropology examining evolutionary relationships between bipedality, energetics, encephalization, and cephalopelvic disproportion with the hope of applying the research to the pressing global health issue of maternal morbidity and mortality. I am also very interested in pediatrics and ontogeny, particularly in order to understand how to harness a child's natural growth patterns to treat or prevent skeletal disorders.

Through my travel experiences in Romania and Southeast Asia, I realized how the environment critically determines human development conditions, such as health, safety, and economy. My passion for climate change mitigation motivated me to study Civil & Environmental Engineering at Princeton University, where I quickly recognized the multitudinous benefits of renewable energy solutions. During my summer internship at the World Bank, I discovered how clean energy could help low income countries become energy independent, improve human quality of life, and reduce global carbon emissions. As an MPhil in Energy Technologies at Cambridge, I seek to address the trade-offs of deploying bioenergy in the transport sector, investigated through the lens of environmental sustainability and energy efficiency. I am honored to be joining the community of Gates Cambridge scholars and look forward to exploring the applications of energy technologies towards global development.

Previous Education

Princeton University

I am a scientist and singer pursuing an MPhil at the Cambridge Centre for Music and Science. At Princeton University, I majored in neuroscience with a certificate in vocal performance. As a student of both neuroscience and music, I have always been interested in the scientific study of music’s effects on mind and body. While a dominant narrative within music and medicine focuses on music’s therapeutic effects during the illness state, I am interested in further exploring its impact on healthy individuals, from the perspective of music as a tool to enhance community health. One of the most unique stages of life during which music can exert its effects is in early infancy, when mothers and families of infants can expose their children to an enriching musical environment, which has been shown time and again to have benefits for infants along various developmental avenues. At Cambridge my research will specifically examine the reciprocal effects of infant-directed singing on mother and child, looking at how such music modulates physiological arousal/stress. I plan on pursuing a medical career and hope to engage with community music programs that operate out of healthcare settings throughout my life. In my time at Cambridge I also look forward to participating in its vibrant choral tradition.

Previous Education

Princeton University

Ben is a journalist and writer from Los Angeles. As an undergraduate at Princeton, he used breaks to shadow scientists in Alaska, visiting the largest glaciers in the American Arctic, living off-grid in winter to research permafrost, and walking and packrafting across the Brooks Range to study the boreal forest’s poleward migration. His forthcoming nonfiction account, North to the Future (Grand Central, July 2025), recounts a scientific, philosophical, and attentional journey to understand how one of the fastest-warming corners of the planet is changing. His writing has also appeared in the LA Times, National Geographic, Smithsonian, Scientific American, Literary Hub, Washington Post, and other publications. As a PhD candidate in Polar Studies at Cambridge, he plans to research environmental perception under the mentorship of Professor Michael Bravo. In spare time, he runs trails, surfs, and volunteers as an ocean therapist.

Previous Education

Princeton University English 2020
University College London English 2018

Before freshman year, I participated in Princeton University’s Bridge Year Program in Urubamba, Peru. During this time I shadowed a group of archaeologists from the Ministry of Culture seeking to protect Inca terraces from both tourists and local farmers alike. This paradox revealed to me the complicated mechanics of heritage; like museum displays with transparent glass, objects and sites are also encapsulated in political motives and legal decrees that remain publicly invisible. These questions motivated me to pursue Anthropology, with certificates in Archaeology, Latin American Studies, and Urban Studies. Through internships at the Penn Museum of Anthropology and Archaeology and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I learned more about creative ways to display history and the complications that arise in doing so. With a research grant I traveled to Peru this fall to explore the aftermath of Yale’s return of artifacts to Cusco after their removal from Machu Picchu in 1911. My research analyzes a new collaborative museum between Yale and the Ministry of Culture, and to unravel the forces that dictate how the story of the artifacts is told. Through an MPhil in Archaeology in the Museum and Heritage Studies track, I hope to better comprehend how heritage politics function in museum practice, and to broaden my understanding of the role of museums both past and present in shaping public perceptions of culture.

Previous Education

Princeton University

I am interested in questions of belonging and marginality, particularly with regards to those who exist within, and help define, the periphery of the nation-state. My current research examines the long-term sociopolitical impacts of Hindu mob violence targeting Muslims in India, which implicates questions of Indian secularism, citizenship, and national identity. I studied moral and legal philosophy at Princeton University; my senior thesis examined the nature of our obligations to obey the law. Throughout my undergraduate years, I also worked as a freelance reporter across West, South, and East Asia, covering everything from the aftermath of the Hong Kong pro-democracy movement to the Armenian diaspora in East Jerusalem. At the University of Cambridge, I hope to draw upon my experiences as both a philosophy student and a journalist to inform my historical and ethnographic research in the MPhil program in Modern South Asian Studies.

Previous Education

Princeton University Philosophy