Tag: project

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Feels Like Friday

Friday is not just the name of a day of the week, it is the name of a feeling. And sometimes, the whole universe feels this feeling with you (as evidenced by nothing going right and equipment often not working on a very particular day of the week).

This week, every day had been feeling like a Friday for some strange reason, and then I realized that this week really was the “Friday” of the year.

No wonder I have been running high on introspection – typical “Friday” mood. Not to mention, this “Friday” also marks the official mid-point of my PhD, which means that the time is ideally situated to look back on how far I have come and how to best manage the rest half.

So, upon the (partially) successful survival of my two years in Finland and in my PhD, I sat down to count my little successes along the way, which took me perhaps five minutes, not much there. I’m also pretty sure that I’m still navigating the unpredictable waters of culture shock and adjustment, but now I find myself on stable ground more often than not (I would probably put together my final thoughts on the subject, which are still worth about three to four blog posts). 

But there is light in the middle of this tunnel. Lately, I have finally been seeing some shape and form from my last two years of optimizations. Or that’s what I would like to believe (the human brain is really good at erasing information that causes it discomfort, so maybe I’m living in my little, custom-made, fantasy bubble).

Today, I did a little exercise. I made boxes for each week I was getting in the next two years (inspired in part by a part of this brilliant and funny TED Talk). Before this, I didn’t know how uncomfortable a task as simple as drawing and counting boxes, can be.

As of 29 December 2019, I have 105 boxes. Don’t look like all that much.

Really put things in perspective for me.

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Bat Signal

A couple months ago, while measuring some samples with an oscilloscope, I witnessed a never-seen-before phenomenon.

As is completely obvious, the results were undoubtedly a part of some bigger picture.

Source.

Is this a signal from the universe? Some kind of a message?

Is that you, Batman?

 

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How To Science

So today, I came across this very inspirational post and decided to hold onto it. It was a good reminder that discovering you are wrong is still science (if attempted scientifically).

(Source).

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The Glove Box

Lately, I’ve been interfacing with the glove box a lot, which is next to inevitable in my field of study.

If you have never seen or heard of a glove box before, I have got an exclusive, self-explanatory diagram of it to show. But like all things science, this story is not as simple as that.

… But suffer, one must: The bare-minimum illustration of a glove box. (If text too small, click on image).

If your glove box is big, in a looming sort of way, it can be quite intimidating at first. And it can seem so… fancy to be working in a glove box then. Like you had to qualify for it. Well, with more experience, you find out that the basic qualifications you need are: 1) having a piece of work that you need to do in a glove box; and 2) appropriate height (as in, tallness of a scientist) relative to the glove box (but let’s be real here, the second criterion doesn’t really exist – stand on a chair if you must).

Plus, having to wear thick big gloves of the “glove” box, it becomes plain clumsy to work in it. And my excuse of “I-am-still-new-to-working-in-the-glove-box” expired a long time ago (which I actually whined about for quite some time compared to normal, not-so-fussy people).

So now I have had to accept that I AM fully responsible for whatever clumsiness I commit – which makes me not-such-a-big-fan of the bumbling person who works in the glove box and cannot even pick up a bottle without first dropping it a couple of times.

The “person” who works in the glove box? Pfft! That’s not me! She is Qudsia Forcephands (secret note: that’s the name for my alter ego for when I have to work in the glove box). She had to be really pushed to start working in there and she kept complaining about how she was still new to working in the glove box even when it was her sixth time! (it’s UNBELIEVABLE what some people will say so they will not have to work, it’s really sad).

But I think, with time (and with MUCH encouragement and suggestions from me), Forcephands is learning the tricks of the trade and she has become waaay better at navigating inside the glove box now. And, as the name might give you an idea, she is now quite adept at using forceps almost as if they were extensions of her hands (or gloves of the glove box).

Forcephands is still somewhat lazy and I often have to give her pep-talks, and even now, she keeps dropping everything in the glove box (are all those forceps inside the glove box there for nothing? Tut tut). But what can you do, some people will just remain at their level no matter how much you try. She has, though, become quite independent at working in the glove box now and, I have to admit, I am somewhat proud of her.

(But I still don’t completely trust her).

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#3: This Week in Science: Eclipsed

So this particular week in solar cells (some weeks ago), I finally managed to make my own batch of solar cells – after which I started to consider myself qualified enough – in the capacity of an independent solar cell researcher ^_^

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Our Very Selfish Reasons

In one of our group meetings, a professor raised a very interesting question for us to think over: Why you are doing what you are doing and what is the importance of your work?

In research, this comes up a lot, especially when you are writing grants or research papers, or when you are presenting at conferences. At these times, you are expected to communicate the impact of your work and your motivation to get a doctoral degree (same stuff is supposed to work for both, pfft – after all, why would anyone be motivated to work on something if it wasn’t making an impact on the society and the world).

This time, when the question got popped all of a sudden, I was baffled.

I mean, I know why I am getting a PhD and why it is important (or at least I think I do). In fact, on better days, I have been known to drone on and on about why I am doing what I am doing. On regular days, however, I just trust that when we chose to enter this catastrophe, we had a very logical reason for it (even if we can’t remember it right now) and we were extremely passionate and excited about this new chapter.

Just as right now, when I am trying to pen it down in hopes that it’ll clear my own vision, I am completely clueless. But I do remember it was for some very selfish reason that I decided to take this path.

One of the reasons is probably that I want to continue in academia and nobody is going to let me in if I don’t have a PhD (a very self-centered point).

Of course, I would also like to have my own research group and students that I can squeeze scientists out of (I can only hope for the poor souls and myself).

Another (very selfish) reason that I can think of is the training that a PhD can offer. If I get through to the other side, I would expect myself to be quite good at doing some things, be more mentally tough, and to have grown considerably on personal and professional levels.

So I do think about this and I am completely aware that I should have a well-prepped answer for this for a time like when-a-professor-may-suddenly-throw-this-question-at-me. I should have a very good idea about the impact my work is making.

But on regular days, I don’t worry about it too much. I think that impact is over-rated for regular-day science. But then again, are we all not making an impact every day (positive or negative)? Don’t we all ruin or make someone’s day depending on how we interact with them? And when you are working interdisciplinarily, with all these other people, every little bit of science not only has an impact on your own work but also on the work of the people around you.

And more on a scientific level, wouldn’t I end up making some kind of impact anyway if I end up completing my degree? Even if I was planning on not making any? It may be very small, but it would have added something to the knowledge of the world.

But aside from all this glorious philosophical ranting, I do realize I need to have a well-prepared answer for difficult times (but then aren’t all humans selfish by nature and whatever we are doing, isn’t it all self-serving in some way?).

Right, yes, we need to focus on writing down a good response to this one that we can pull out of our hat in times of need (but then again…

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Square Tomatoes

Some days ago, I found out about the square tomato.

In short, the “cultivar VF-145” was developed at UC Davis to get to a more sturdy kind of tomato that wouldn’t squish so easily and wouldn’t roll of conveyor belts. It is not really square, but just “less round” than a more round tomato.

Anyway, many different ways to look at, and solve, a single problem (and all the subsequent problems that arise because of that). Less manpower – Get in a machine to do it. The tomatoes roll off and get crushed by machines – Change the tomatoes.

Or perhaps it depends on the person you bring the problem to. Changing the tomato would probably be the first thing that comes to the mind of a plant breeder – but not necessarily to the mind of a solar cell researcher (not that solar cell researchers are the best people to solve tomato problems… It’s probably a good idea to leave them to tomato experts). But it does make one wonder: would the solution be still the same had someone else been on this task? Someone with a slightly different background and technical expertise?

I have had times in research when I was stumped by a mundane, and most of the times non-scientific, problem (which is, of course, mundane only in retrospect – no problem is too stupid, too mundane, or too small when it is in the phase of being a problem). I only had to move around, sometimes up and down some stairs, throwing the question at people I knew – and one of them would reply with an obvious solution that would leave you in a speechless why-didn’t-I-think-of-this state.

Times like these are when you find out who your real friends are – They are the ones who will not hesitate to break you out of your tunnel vision and bring you play-doh to seal your glassware airtight when you need it.

However, my biggest concern is completely unrelated to this now: Have I been eating square tomatoes all my life, thinking they were round when there were probably rounder tomatoes out there? Have I even seen a truly round tomato ever?

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Other Stuff

A while back, I came across this post about how science can make you feel stupid.

I shared it, thinking I understood perfectly what it meant and felt like. I actually didn’t then, because now I know what it means and feels like. (And yet, I am not exactly sure how it feels like. Stupid can take so many forms).

When I started off my PhD, I was like any normal person, motivated about starting a new “project” that they are excited about. It’s just like new year, and we all know how that goes:

1) You start off with a long list of resolutions;

2) You start following through on almost all of them immediately;

3) You feel so good that you are following through, and how this year did not turn out like last year (and we all know how that went);

4) You start realizing how by starting everything, you broke all rules of developing new habits, and how this is not sustainable at all (did you really even want all of this?);

5) You start going back to your normal routine, and your resolutions start feeling less important to you now;

6) New year, and you have almost forgotten (almost) how last year went and are ready for a new cycle of highly-motivated-to-back-to-“normal”.

But of course, everybody knows these stages, everyone has new-year moments. And when I started my PhD, I knew I’d face some kind of a slump some of the times. People-on-the-internet told me that the PhD dip is inevitable, and it is not a question of if you will come across it but when you will actually experience it (although they also told me that this phase comes sometime around the second year and I am still in my first, so am I just going through a trailer for the actual movie that will be officially opening in months to come?).

The thing is, despite knowing this, I didn’t really plan for this time (that is another kind of stupid right there). Because, like any normal person motivated about starting a new “project” that they are excited about, I wanted to be laser-focused on my PhD and on things that would take it forward.

So if I needed a break from lab work, I could read or catch up on literature, and if I needed a break from reading, I could take some online course. I did like doing other stuff, but all of that could wait until I had my PhD a little more on routine (a thing, that I am finding out only now, was not as easy as I supposed it was, but that could be for another time).

And this is the importance of comparatively-dumber-sounding other stuff.

Because when you are doing something as crazy as a PhD, where you can go months running around in circles finding your way back to square-one’s, feeling-stupid does become inevitable. And when you see it’s been a while since you last made progress, or learnt something new, or developed a new skill, or added something to you, yourself, as a person, that can be eexxttrreemmeellyy demotivating.

But other stuff can help you here.

Because if you have a little something going on the side, like learning a new skill that may not be completely related to your PhD, it is some progress that you can, at least, show to yourself: So, yes, I still haven’t been able to decide if zinc chloride is better or if I should go for zinc acetate for my solutions, but I have completed six-hundred-and-eighty-five blog posts! That should be a milestone!

So that’s why I have started to think about starting other stuff this new semester. Like taking a language course (I have always wanted to learn another language and now might be a perfect opportunity), or starting to draw (I have some half-developed scripts for a comic on how my PhD stuff is going), or taking up other random workshops and activities where I can just change my environment and see what else is up in the world.

And there is another reason why the other stuff can be so complementary to your PhD: so now when you are moving about progress-less, you can blame it on the other stuff, and how, because of other stuff, you probably have not been able to focus on your PhD.

But the other stuff was your stupid idea, wasn’t it?

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Breakdowns

Recently, the hotplate I had been using was glitching a lot (it was fine when I was not using it this much). And then I saw this in my social media newsfeed and this seemed to hit right on point:

Currently, I think we have both started to understand each other more, so we have been getting along better. Now, I have nothing but honest praise for the hot plate.

Dear hotplate, you are the best! 🙂

(I took the image from this link but could not find whose brilliant theory this actually is).