Rayleigh-Knight Competition 2026

The Faculty Board of Mathematics is pleased to announce arrangements for the Rayleigh-Knight Competition 2026. The Competition's purpose is to recognise the highest quality essays on mathematical research topics carried out by PhD students in Mathematics at Cambridge.

Up to six prizes will be awarded for essays on any subject in Mathematics and its applications. A prize-winning essay will be an excellent and accessible exposition of important research results which represent a significant contribution to the underlying subject area.

Submission

All entries must be received by 23:59 (GMT) on Friday, 19 June 2026 - the final full day of Easter Term.

Students submitting essays should carefully follow the format outlined below:

• Essays must be up to 4 journal-style pages in length, and be written only by the candidate.
• Each essay should normally reference a single paper that is permanently available in the public domain (e.g., via a repository, arXiv, or journal). This paper should be original research, and if it represents joint work then the candidate’s individual contribution to the paper must be clearly and explicitly described.

A standard LaTeX template will be provided.

• Essays must be submitted in PDF format via Moodle by the stated deadline.
• Students are required to self-enrol in the Moodle course to access the submission portal.
• The portal can be accessed here

Eligibility

• Submissions are accepted only from PhD students registered at DAMTP or DPMMS.
• Each student is permitted a single submission to the competition during their PhD registration.
• Students may submit at any point during their PhD, up to the date of their thesis submission.

Awards

All submissions will be assessed by a committee from the Faculty of Mathematics. The evaluation committee will meet and award the prizes early in the following Michaelmas term. In the interim, members of the evaluation committee will solicit “reports” on the essays usually from within the faculty.

The winners will be invited to give short presentations to the Faculty of Mathematics on the topic of their essays shortly after the prizes are announced.

Enquiries may be directed to phd-admin@maths.cam.ac.uk