On the 17th of May 2013, the College of Life Sciences PhD student association (PiCLS) held their 4th annual international symposium. The 2013 symposium, held at the Dalhousie Building, was organised by a committee composed of 8 PhD students, including GRE’s own Alistair Davies (Swedlow Lab), Sara Carvalhal (Griffis Lab), Daniel Bandarra (Rocha Lab) and Nancy Giang (Barton Lab). GRE sponsored the career talk by Dr. Alan Schafer, while OME and Glencoe Software (Swedlow Lab) sponsored the plenary lecture by Prof. Sir. Michael Berridge. The full-day event has become one of the highlights of the College of Life Sciences Research Calendar.