Blog

Professor Joe Cain publishes blog posts on many subjects related to his research interests.

Graduates celebrating after UCL ceremony.
Blog

Letters of Reference and Recommendation

Students ask for letters of reference and recommendation. Writing them is an important responsibility for tutors. It’s something we take extremely seriously. But what goes into a letter of recommendation? Top Tips When Requesting References […]
Top Tips for Induction Week 2026
Blog

Top Tips for Induction Week: Software Discounts

Professor Joe Cain shares a practical money-saving tip for students joining the Science Communication MSc program at UCL. He highlights how students can access major educational discounts on software suites, focusing on the Adobe Creative […]
Proceedings of the Seventh International Genetical Congress held in 1939 and published in 1941.
Blog

International Genetical Congress (1939, Seventh): Queries using LLM

What work can large-language models (LLMs) do for historical researching? They offer tools for voluminous compilation of data ready for complex human analysis. They can organise and reorganise data. They can extract data from source material. They can be set to search for trends. We’re coming to grips with LLM tools for historical researching, and we’re quickly moving well beyond the LLM-as-author model so distrusted in our community. Historians must push ourselves to be as creative and demanding of LLM resources as those in our sister disciplines.

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