• Question: What are the highlights/downsides of being a scientist?

    Asked by taylm140 to Emma, Jimmy, Janet, Niall, Simon on 9 Mar 2013.
    • Photo: Simon Park

      Simon Park answered on 9 Mar 2013:

      A good question. The best bits are discovering new things that no one else has ever seen. If you’re naturally curious about how the world works, it’s a great job. The worst bit is having to find the money to let you do the research.

    • Photo: Janet Daly

      Janet Daly answered on 9 Mar 2013:

      I agree with Simon that probably the most stressful bit is having to write grant applications to get money for the research – and often being rejected. There can sometimes be long hours and some work to do at weekends – you often have to keep your experiment fed and watered (either literally or figuratively). I quite enjoy the travelling I get to do…at the moment I am in Dublin, Ireland having been at a 2-day meeting with people from all over the world (Europe, North and South America, China, Russia…)

    • Photo: Niall Crawford

      Niall Crawford answered on 10 Mar 2013:

      Often the writing and other boring bits (the bits where you are not doing science!) are the worst, but it can be a bit annoying when you’re experiments or research isn’t working and you haven’t figured out yet how to solve the problem.

      Best bit is travel, and getting to go to cool places fairly frequently. Also, being a big fan of animals, it’s awesome getting to work with them a lot.

    • Photo: Emma Ashley

      Emma Ashley answered on 11 Mar 2013:

      I really like researching and bringing new technology into the lab which you know will help the patient and improve their their treatment. Like the others however, I sometimes have to work long hours and have to manage my time well because during my training I had to study for my masters and work in the lab at the same time.

    • Photo: James Holloway

      James Holloway answered on 11 Mar 2013:

      There is sometimes a lot of paper work to do.. Which is annoying. Also sometimes a deadline can popup and you have to work really hard to make it.

      That being said you get to do different things all the time and meet lots of new people, its a surprisingly social job.

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