#postdoc

[miss-biophys]

Did we kill them?

Looking at what concentrations my antibiotics killed resistant Staphylococcus bacteria.

Higher antibiotic concentrations are on the right side, where there is clear liquid with no bacteria growth. It works!

#women in science #research #postdoc #stem #biology #academia #microbiology #antibiotics #drug resistance #fighting antimicrobial resistance #lab #exciting #original content

[thatwizardofearthsea]

Also PhD and PD periods are super hard on one's mental and physical capacities. There is huge instability. You're constantly expected to fight for having a funding in order to do your job but also live. That is insane. That is an inhumane system to continue. Nobody can be a genius under that kind of pressure. There is a reason of brain drain from academia.

#phdblr #academia #academic burnout #postdoc #life sciences #leaving academia

[therunningphysicist]

what is going on with you? you are here, but don't post anything. is everything okay?

hello friend! yes I mostly just lurk these days. I've taken a step back from social media over the last year or two, as far as how much I post. but there are people here on tumblr that I have followed for a while that I still like to keep up with and see how they are doing! one of these days I will probably start posting on here more again, but in the meantime here's some updates:

I got married in September! it was in Chicago, and was absolutely perfect with all my favorite people there with us

I'm still living in the DC area - about to complete my postdoc at NIH and am in the process of being promoted to Research Fellow in the same lab

my research has been going really well the last year or two - I have two projects I'm spearheading that I'm SUPER excited about, and in the last year(ish) I published three papers, gave talks at two research conferences, and wrote a chapter for a textbook

earlier this year, my husband and I were looking at buying a house and actually had a place under contract. but the housing market has gone to shit (especially in the DC area) so we are just going to rent for the foreseeable future and keep saving money

I will be running the 2024 Chicago Marathon! so you will probably see some running posts in the future as I start training for that

thanks for reaching out and asking how I'm doing! things are going well, just very busy the last year with work, family, and planning a wedding - but I promise I'll be around more in 2024!

#personal #running #updates #research #postdoc

[lastlovelasts]

Coming tomorrow!! 👩🏻‍🏫👩🏻‍💻

My dissertation publication/article is still in edits but once it comes out you can bet your body I'm going to continue to let it disseminate and flourish!! To grow and give birth to a publication isn't a cute little hobby; it’s an academic’s dream and scholarly journey.

Writing is life. A 141-pg bound dissertation transformed into 16 pages is a piece of my soul fabric made tangible, and I'm honored to hear about and read your relevant scholarly work too!

#dissertation #published #author #phdresearch #postdoclife #writingforpublication #nursing #science #STEM #WomeninSTEM #STEAM #WomeninSTEAM

#dissertation #phd #writing #publication #author #phd research #academic #postdoc #nursing #science #STEM #women in stem #STEAM #Women in STEAM

[lonewolflink]

.

#PLEASE #LET ME #GET #THIS #POSTDOC #A;LEKRMG;ALEKRMGA;LEKMR #my last fly out interview this year #please let this be the one PLEASE #i want to live here #i want to be near my best friend and her DOG #also this school seems great for me #;eaklrgm;lerkmg;alerkmg #delete later

[tautonic]

fuck this academia. pissed-as-hell academia. let-me-take-a-swing-at-my-collaborator-just-once academia.

#bro what would the tag for this even be #academia shitpost #maybe #academic burnout #postdoc #academic shitpost

[thescrcservices]

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#chemistry #dissertationproblems #phdstudentsofinstagram #biology #stem #academicwriting #postdoc #roadtophd #mastersdegree #gradstudents #dissertationdone #student #womeninstem #studentlife #gradstudentproblems #dissertationcoach #professor #phdmemes #college #doctor #medicine #phdlifestyle #study #phdwriting #phddone #covid #thesisproblems #scicomm #gradstudentlife #laboratoryequipment

[miss-biophys]

A scientist in his laboratory is not a mere technician: he is also a child confronting natural phenomena that impress him as though they were fairy tales

Marie Curie-Skłodowská, Nobel Prize winner in both Physics (1903) and Chemistry (1911)

#motivation #university #postdoc #research #science #women in science #stem #physics #chemistry #role model #brave women #Nobel Prize #childish #fairy tale #impressed #impressed by science #love my work

[thatwizardofearthsea]

I've seen some people on Twitter shaming Yuzuru for speaking up about the wrong doings. They demand the silence. In parallel there is now the trend of shaming PhD students and postdocs for talking about their bad experiences. Not shocking at all to see each toxic environment depends on the similar dynamics. They want to support and keep the status quo so badly.

#figure skating #yuzuru hanyu #postdoc #phdblr #academic burnout #I know Twitter is super strange place but this is even over the top for FS twitter #also stop with this toxic positivity people

[econsociology]

Dive into this abundant list of Great Academic Opportunities: 10 jobs, 10 calls for papers, 5 PhD fellowships, 4 visiting posts, 2 postdocs, and a grant in economic sociology, political economy, and related fields with deadlines till October 30. Good luck!

#phd fellowship #postdoc #sociology #economic sociology #political economy

[frustrated-researcher-diary]

#1 Introductions

Hello everyone,

It seems a little bit strange to write my thoughts and make them public, but here goes.

Ever since I started university back in 2012, I sort of knew that I wanted to stay in academia and become a researcher. The thought of studying and learning being the main tasks of my job made me feel very privileged. That, and also the possibility of being a teaching assistant and helping students out. All of this has led me to pursue a PhD. Boy, I did not know what I was going on in for. Doing PhD and a Master of Science are two completely different things - and I really underestimated the challenges that were ahead of me.

In the latter, you are basically walking on a threaded path, so to speak. You get assignments, study on textbooks you are given, pass exams that you need to take within specific deadlines, and the grades should give you enough of a validation of the good job done. Everything has been organized for the students, whose sole requirement is to ... """basically""" (I am using many quotes to stress the fact that I know it is not easy - been there, folks) follow the path laid out for them and study, I guess.

On the contrary, when you start a PhD, you are walking in uncharted territory. Of course, your supervisors make sure that you do not fail spectacularly, but at the end of the day you are the master of your fate. (Almost) Nobody gives you a schedule, a list of things to do, or a set of deadlines. You need to build them on your own and stick to them. You need to work on your research, devote some time in the middle to side activities (teaching, projects, contracts with industries), publish papers, and yadda yadda yadda.

Although it was pretty rough, I actually managed to finish my PhD in January 2022. Then, my supervisors (I also call them bosses from hereafter) asked me to my surprise if I ever considered pursuing a post-doc. My instantaneous reply was that I had to think about it.

And I really did. It took me some months to actually convince myself that research was "still" the path for me. I am using the quotes because, sure, during the PhD you learn a lot and build many useful skills, but you also grow to hate what you do from time to time. This can happen for different reasons. In my case, sometimes the research was too complicated, and I realised I was not as smart as I hoped I was. Oftentimes, imposter syndrome kicked in, and I believed that everybody but me had what it takes to deserve to stay in academia. In multiple occasions, I just wanted to know where Reviewer #2 (who heavily criticized the n-th paper that I submitted to a journal) lived, reach their house and hurt them with every fiber of my being. Other times, I just thought that I could have avoided the hassle of doing the PhD in the first place and started working right away in the industry to save enough money to get a house - or save myself at least multiple headaches and recurring episodes of me questioning my life choices.

I knew that becoming a post-doc implied accepting an unsteady job that might not lead to me becoming a professor. I also knew it meant having a lower wage than the one I would have gotten if worked in industry, which inevitably makes the purchase of a house much harder. I also knew it meant mostly anybody around me among my friends and family would have understood what I really do for a living. Nonetheless, I decided to go for it. Despite all, I felt that I was a somewhat decent teacher and that I could have improved in the research department in the future.

So, I applied for the post-doc call in November 2022, which I luckily ended up winning. And boy, even in this case, despite me thinking about it for months, I did not expect it was going to be so hard. Just as a Master of Science is different from a PhD, also being a post-doc is different from being a PhD candidate. During the Phd, my bosses made sure that research was going well, that it was scientifically sound and feasible. On the contrary, during this first year as a post-doc they have given me more freedom in this regard - perhaps because they expect me to become independent and learn that I will not always have them by my side. I think their "experiment" failed. Very much. Indeed, it is almost the end of my first year as a postdoc now, and I can not stop feeling unmotivated and disappointed. I am also afraid that my bosses, who put so much trust in me, feel the same.

I submitted two papers to different journals. One of them got rejected: reviewers said that the paper was not novel enough, which is ironic, considering that it required me one year to actually finish it. I think the other paper is doomed as well. Some might think that, after a Phd, I should be accostumed to paper rejection, but it sadly seems that I have not reached that level of maturity. Now I just think that whatever I do is pointless and will get rejected anyway, so why bother?

To make things worst, there is this constant reminder that in order to have good chances of becoming a professor I need to have as soon as possible a good H-index, get awards, do some side activities (that I could not be less interested in). There is a conundrum. On the one hand, you are privileged to do research, and people understand that research is a risk-related activity - meaning that its outcomes may not always be valuable. On the other hand, you are expected to give valuable research results to become an academic.

As you might understand from this excruciatingly long rant (sorry), I am not feeling very well (and you may also believe that I am overdramatic - which may be true). I am questioning my choice of pursuing a post-doc and my whole life as well (I said I am aware of being overdramatic). I am 30 now, and I hoped that by this age I had everything figured out, from my working life to my romantic one (which is a whole other story). Instead, I am none of the sort. I still live with my parents trying to save enough money to eventually get a house, still trying to find a partner, and still trying to figure out what I really want to do in the future. A true testament to this is the fact that I am writing this on a Saturday night, as if I had nothing better to do.

I wanted to talk with someone about my feelings over this last couple of weeks, but I could not find somebody who could relate that much. As I said before, friends and family do not exactly understand what I do. I could talk to my bosses at Uni, but I am afraid of their reaction. There are my colleagues, but I feel everybody has a lot on their plate, and I do not want them to give them another issue. In any case, I do not want to give up. I need to find by myself the spark that pushed me to go on with this job. Eventually, I will find again the motivation and excitement that convinced me (and also my bosses, apparently) that becoming a post-doc was not a bad idea after all.

I decided to write this post (or should I say rant?) for two main reasons. The first one is to use this as a reminder in the future of the things that I felt. Maybe this post could be followed by other ones on a regular basis as an entry for a diary to keep track of my progress, I don't know. The second one is to be hopefully of aid to whoever reads it. If you, too, are a frustrated researcher (be it a PhD or a post doc) you are not alone. It may sound cheesy, but I believe that there are not enough posts and websites dealing with this. Everybody in academia goes through similar struggles and if they say otherwise.. they are lying. Hardly nobody has everything figured out, even in their 30s.

D.

Ps: English is not my mother tongue, so I apologize for any mistake. Doing my best here 😅

#university #postdoc #research scientist #rant post #phd life

[phdingifs]

Explaining to your friends and family what a postdoc is

#phd #phd life #postdoc #academia #college #university #back to school #kill me #higher ed #writing #publishing #grad #grad school

[the-weerdo]

Oh, I passed the EPPP. :)

#postdoc #phdblr #clinical psych #psychblr #gradblr #phd life

[acsec]

finally got my récépissé (extension of my current residence permit while they process the new one) 🥰 thankful to the Préfecture du Haut-Rhin for accommodating our request to « accelerate » the issuance of the récépissé because our research project would be greatly delayed if I stop doing experiments (and we have a publication deadline for next month and the project is government funded also) 💙🤍❤️ omw back to Mulhouse from Colmar… I have a research meeting at 10am with our German colleagues, I might join the meeting in a cafe somewhere in the Gare coz I won’t reach home or lab before the meeting starts (also I am in télétravail mode today 😅) —- busy day haha 😅 #amazingadventuresofbeaujethro #hautrhin #prefecture #colmar #mulhouse #research #grandest #france #alsace #filipinoscientist #scientist #postdoc #researchengineer #biomaterials (at Colmar, Alsace, France) https://www.instagram.com/p/CnoYkzxNRox/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

#amazingadventuresofbeaujethro #hautrhin #prefecture #colmar #mulhouse #research #grandest #france #alsace #filipinoscientist #scientist #postdoc #researchengineer #biomaterials