Exploring Life Through Science

It startles me to see an article that draws an analogy between the cobra effect and academia - Interesting parallels. The emphasis on - how metrics like impact factor, h-index, grants, and tenure tracks have overshadowed the purpose of doing science is the central point of discussion. Towards the end, the article leaves you with a question of where collectively restructuring is required to enable real progress. But, how to do that? In other words, how to resurrect the dying "soul" of academia and get over "pretentious" science? Here are my thoughts: I think the answer lies in where it all started. Ask oneself the following question- What enabled the concept of doing a Ph.D.? Back in the day, the excitement to understand takes the front seat, which has been instrumental in the pursuit to discover things, and the by-product of this process is a Ph.D. What's happening now? Vice versa? Relatively speaking, we have reached a stage where every lab is equipped with en...

It’s been sometime into my Ph.D. – a roller coaster of emotions – last of the phrases that could sum up my journey. Before I delve more into it, the pandemic toppled my health, like any other, and found it incredibly difficult getting back to normalcy. Although, I tend to stray away from repenting on that, and perhaps wearing it like armor helped me to move forward. On the other hand, during the pandemic, I researched more on why people started the concept of a Ph.D. and what it takes to be a Ph.D. student. As far as my understanding goes, it’s a framework designed to study the observations that were made, and obtain a structure while understanding nature’s play. In fact, I also thought more about the expansion – The Doctorate of Philosophy, and that gave me a profound sense of a gap. The framework has been quite instrumental in amassing your thoughts and connecting the dots with the observations. The gap that haunts me - the advent of peer-reviewed journals, tenure tracks, and things ...

Why do we need this? All the Aspiring Researchers out there! This is posted by keeping all the undergrads in mind.  Most of the Undergrads work in a project where PI drives the idea and we work mainly to execute them in the lab (Of Course, there is nothing wrong about it). Ever wondered how satisfying it is to execute your own idea? The ideas/interests that we might have accumulated over time are very vague or not concrete enough to execute them. I hope you can relate to this. I was thinking of a forum/platform where we can devote our time exclusively to build an idea (of someone) based on papers they might have read or the field that we are interested in. Building an idea takes time for anyone! If we try to put in cumulative efforts (different perspectives can help maybe!) solely to construct an idea of anyone, I think it would be great. This could also lead to the emergence of new ideas! The bottomline : Narrowing down to a specific idea and learn to frame hypothesis. Strategy (m...

Ever since I started pursuing science, there has always been some kind of doubt. The question of “Am I heading in correct direction or not?” “Is it what I truly desire? “ “Would I have done better in something else?” “Did I not explore that?“ Kept bothering me. Since few days, I really enjoyed the way I found joy in exploring small things. I also realized that there is nothing else which gives me the great pleasure other than doing science. I get fascinated with things that I read and see. This fascination drives me to understand more. As i get fascinated with different things that I see, somewhere down the line, I strongly believe there’s a beautiful story which is stitching together while exploring it. This current mindset which I have to find joy in small things found the pleasure in something which made my day. I don’t know for what reason that is driving me since morning. Never have I ever had a hassle free day, this one subtle euphoria (which remains constant) ke...

Understand what you do!  Be precise about anything that you write/say. Don't be superficial. Get into deeper layers of Understanding. Richard Feynman once said:                                                                                     "I don't know anything.                   But, I know that it will be interesting              if you go deep into it." Feynman was one of the great scientists of all time, a much-loved professor at Caltech and a curious character who mastered thinking and physics. Singapore hosted a brand new exhibition on Feynman's Curious Life: All possible paths to celebrate 100 years of his life. I spent some time there, learned about his con...

Writes every day.  Helps everyone.  Hustles hard! This one is about a Lab technician from my college. I always look up to him. He helped me whenever I face difficulty in handling instruments. I've learned so much about principles and instrumentation of every experiment that I perform. I thought he is leading an ordinary life who wishes to keep his family happy.  A monotonic happy life. 9-5 Job. 20k salary. I've seen him writing but never really asked him. One day, He left that book open and went to see his boss. I Opened it. BOOM! Completely blown away. Things that drew me: Newspaper cuttings, Scribbled stories, Scientific sketches, and Technical content. It was full of innovative sketches which include facts and history. I asked him why was he so secretive about this. He replied that people will laugh at me when they see this. He always pushed his boundaries. But, we as a society, made him think in this manner. I didn't judge him but never expected this much ...