Seven weeks, nine awesome faculty talks, I certainly enjoyed all the “cool” science —from signal transduction pathways of pattern formation in Drosophila, mechanisms that enable the perfect balance of survival and growth in sea elegant, to social behaviors and their significance in the course of evolution in Baboons and developing new NMR technologies for biochemical and biomedical research. However, (to be honest) what’s left in my brain instead of my notebook after all the talks was mostly the interesting life stories and unique paths that lead them into a career in science. Applying what we learnt from textbook to understanding the science behind their research is awesome, but gaining some valuable insights beyond textbook, like what it’s actually like to be a scientist, is way cooler.
I especially enjoyed Dr. Willard’s talk—Instead of focusing on his fascinating research on X chromosome inactivation, Dr. Willard talked about his lifetime in science.
“the path into science is not linear”—this makes me feel okay about not knowing what I want to do. After all, not all scientists start with a clear commitment into a particular area or even science. But do keep an open mind and explore as many options as possible.
“the path is unpredictable”—fate combined with some passion and curiosity launched him off into a life time research of X-chromosome. I guess sometimes determinism plays a little role in science. Had it be a different page of that casual flip, or a little less waiting time in the library, it would have been an entirely different story. But once again, this shows the importance of always keeping an open mind.
“be inquisitive, ask open ended questions”—questions are what push science forward. and therefore, in science, it is important that we “focus on the questions but not techniques”, so that we can “wonder freely” and not be caught up by details.
“be resilient”—hypothesis fail; experiments don’t always turn out as expected. So resilience, a lot of resilience is necessary; and trust your instincts—confidence is also important in science.
“wake up early in the morning” – I’ve always been wondering what is passion, now I guess I have an answer—it’s what keeps you waking up early in the morning, excited, and can’t wait to get to the lab to discover the results. In fact, passion I think is the one thing that all the faculty speakers shared in common—and therefore I believe it’s what makes a life time in science worthwhile and rewarding.
His talk somehow made me feel relieved, yet more determined and oriented towards a career in research. I know lots of downs and struggles of research has been omitted (as i have only briefly experienced so far), but despite all these, life as a research scientist—“a career based on questions cant yet conceptualize using methods that hasn’t yet been discovered”, still sounds really appealing to me!
Finally, I want to thank all the faculty for the inspirational talks about their research and their life in science.
