University of Oxford Speciality : Mathematics
programme: Mathematics

David Hirst’s answer is great. I can perhaps add a chemistry-related question that I was asked during one of my interviews.

“I have this substance,” he said, placing a small phial of white powder on the desk in front of me, “and I want to know what it is. What tests can I perform on it?”

I’ll give my best recollection of my answer below, but maybe have a think about it before scrolling down…

Me: “You could burn some of it and see what colour the flame is.”

Him: “Do you know what that is called?”

“Measuring the emission spectrum”

“Ok. Anything else?”

“Perform X-ray diffraction on it.”

“What does that do?”

(Slight hesitation, as I didn’t know in detail) “It tells you where the different atoms are in space with respect to each other.”

“What else?”

“Put it in a mass spectrometer.”

“How does that work?”

Bingo. I’d recently learnt about mass specs in A-level physics. Cue a hand-drawn diagram and descriptions of the ionisation chamber, the velocity selector, the detector, and which regions have electric and/or magnetic fields in them.

I’ll freely admit I got a bit lucky there!

One of the other questions I was given in that interview was “what do you think is the difference between a good Cambridge student and a great one?” It’s important to remember that not all the questions (= opportunities to impress) will be technical.

Good luck!

I generally like the Oxford education system. College-based lifestyle and having the brightest students as my friends and in my day-to-day life.

I had a truly exceptional experience learning so much in my own subject that is mathematics as well as learning so much about life.