• Question: What has been the best experience through your job?

    Asked by 488thaf44 to Christie, Sian, Dawn, David, Dan on 13 Jun 2016. This question was also asked by mason.
    • Photo: David Robertson

      David Robertson answered on 13 Jun 2016:

      Oh, really difficult question.

      The most exciting was certainly at 04.04am on 3 December 2015 when a satellite, with something we’d built inside it, was launched into space. It is quite terrifying watching at least 10 years of work on top of a very large firework. Fortunately everything worked perfectly! ( https://www.elisascience.org/ )

      The most fulfilling was probably the announcement that gravitational waves had been directly detected for the first time ( https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/news/ligo20160211 ). I’ve been working in the field for at least 20 years, and I know people who have been chasing gravitational waves for 40 years, so to finally have a direct detection was beyond wonderful.

      I also really enjoy teaching students in our experimental labs.

    • Photo: Dan Lewis

      Dan Lewis answered on 13 Jun 2016:

      Hmmm that is a very difficult question. I think as I’m still very young into my career the best is still yet to come, but looking back over the past couple of years I think maybe a couple of projects I have worked on that will be important new drugs to patients in the next few years and the fact I know they will be very beneficial and life changing for so many makes all the hard work pay off in the end.

    • Photo: Sian Thomas

      Sian Thomas answered on 13 Jun 2016:

      I am going to cheat here and pick a few! Recently, it was presenting the Norovirus (winter vomiting disease) predictive model which uses Twitter data and presenting this back to an audience of social media analysts at Twitter (with the Dalek!). I was one of three inaugural speakers and it was such a cool venue.

      Previously I have been involved in social science research to understand food attitudes,knowledge and behaviour – the data showed that your circumstances (whether you live at home, with a partner, your gender, whether you have children) are more important to food safety behaviour than income or educational achievement. Basically, your food choices are influenced by those around you and are habitual. This was contrary to conventional views.

      And further back I did some research that was used to get a safe level for a chemical which ultimately was used in making the legislation. That was quite a highlight.

      But I think that working with others – and a broad range of others across government, academia, think tanks and the tech world is the best experience.

    • Photo: Dawn Lau

      Dawn Lau answered on 13 Jun 2016:

      This is a toughie but I really like the aspect of engaging with members of the public about our work. We hold an Alzheimer’s disease open day each year and invite the public to come and listen to talks and experience lab demonstrations. Many of these people either care for someone with dementia or know a loved one with dementia, and speaking to them reminds me that the work I do is important and rewarding. They are always so excited by our research and it is such a great motivator.

    • Photo: Christie Waddington

      Christie Waddington answered on 14 Jun 2016:

      Well technically I’m still studying, but since I get a grant I guess its a job! My best experience has been working with Mitochondrial Disease patients to produce some artwork that represents their disease and how it made them and their family feel. I presented their work, as well as some of our pieces at a conference in London and got to stay in this very fancy hotel! I’ll also be presenting the work in front of the Wellcome Trust in July which will be exciting! So overall, I get to chat to and work with patients, and I get to present our work all over the UK to all sorts of people!

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