Even though we have all only been doing research in the HHRF program for 6 weeks, it has become evident to me why they call it “research.” Somewhere along the line, somebody probably searched for the answer to some question and didn’t get it, so they decided to search again . . . and again and again until they finally got it: re-search. 8 weeks is such a short timespan that it doesn’t really allow you to fail, fail, fail, fail and then succeed.
Coming into this program, I had this naïve idea about what separates a great researcher from bad one. It was this idea that if you could keep your area sanitary and prevent contamination, be diligent in your calculations and follow procedures accordingly, then you would always get (positive) results. But what I have learned is that failure is extremely common. If all of your research is successful then you are either repeating experiments that have been done before or manipulating the experiments.
Coming to terms with all of this, my research is going great. Sometimes not getting a result isn’t necessarily useless e.g. maybe your concentrations of certain reagents was too low and if you go above the threshold then you will get results. There is definitely joy when you see a result that is supposed to happen in order to agree with your hypothesis because it means that you were right and things are just going your way. It’s easy that way. But when things don’t go as according to planned is when research gets really interesting. If you predicted all of your experiments correctly, you’d be more of a fortune teller than a researcher. Finding out “what went wrong” is an experience in itself. As I am beginning the second project I can’t help but wonder: what’s gonna happen?
