An update

It has been quite some time since I updated this blog I have noticed. Research wise I have not progressed that much, but I feel that my project is getting a bit more shape, albeit not in the original direction I had been hoping for. Since the ATWARM summer school which was a great success, I have been to a conference in Crete on Instrumental Methods of Analysis (IMA 2011) in September. It was truly a new experience for me, as it was my first large conference. I really enjoyed that most of the speakers were not students but heads of research groups and people from industry, so I got to hear about a wide range of projects in each presentation rather than a detailed explanation of one project. The hospitality in Crete was also second to none.

I have also attended a networking event organised by the ISPE Ireland affiliate (An association of pharmaceutical engineers) held in Dublin earlier in the month. It was a good way to meet individuals from industry and I enjoyed the discussions. A high point for me was that I won the ‘Postgraduate student award’ for my poster presentation. I really appreciate what that meant.

On a personal note I have become secretary of the Biological Research Society and I look forward to a successful year of events. I think we are a good team of hard workers who just want to get the things done, so it should be a positive experience.

Hopefully more posts will be forthcoming in the next weeks.

ATWARM Meeting: May 2011

The second ATWARM meeting has come and gone. It was held from the 10th-12th May 2011, at the University of Duisburg-Essen. I had written about my first ATWARM meeting in November previously, and the format of the meeting was relatively similar. On the first two days, the QUESTOR meeting was held, and on the last day the ATWARM meeting was held. Since the ATWARM programme is coordinated by the QUESTOR centre we were all invited to all the sessions.

We traveled over to Germany on Monday evening, since the programme started on Tuesday morning. The first activity was a choice of 2 site visits, and I joined the Water Purification Plant site visit. We visited the RWW Mülheim Water Treatment Plant, where we had a shot introduction to the processes they use, namely the Mülheim method. They do not use chlorine during the treatment, but rather treatment is based on the use of a sand filter, activated carbon, ozone, UV etc. After the short presentation, we all went on a site visit of the plant.

After lunch, and a formal introduction to the QUESTOR meeting, a brokerage event was organised, for one-to-one meetings between the industrial members of QUESTOR, academics and researchers. I had requested meetings with three different companies, and it was a good opportunity to meet with them, discuss my project, how we could collaborate and see their opinions. In the evening a networking dinner was then held at the Museum der Deutschen Binnenschiffahrt (namely museum for German inland shipping). We had an opportunity to visit the museum, followed by a delicious dinner at the restaurant within the museum.

On the second day of the meeting, presentations by students and academics involved in QUESTOR funded projects, updates on the progress of new initiatives and also 2 ATWARM project presentations. In the evening, the QUESTOR industrial advisory board had its meeting, and therefore we had some free time, for some sightseeing.

The third day of the meeting was the ATWARM meeting. This was the most intensive day and the most productive. The first session was on the progress of the ATWARM programme and a discussion of issues related to the programme in general of interest to all researchers, academics and industrial members. After that came 10 minute poster presentations by each ATWARM researcher. This was the first time that all projects were represented, since at the last meeting not all researchers had been appointed or could make it. That made 16 presentations in all. We had all prepared a poster, and we had to present to all the other attendees what our project is about, progress made and future plans. This was followed by questions from the audience. I found this session to be highly interactive, with comments, queries and suggestions, including suggestions for collaborations and the like being discussed. I think the relaxed nature of the session, whereby people were standing/sitting informally on chairs helped for such an informal discussion.

Once all presentations were delivered, and lunch eaten, a session on the secondment process was held. This was followed by the student council meeting. During the student council meeting, all researchers meet to discuss aspects of the ATWARM programme which are of interest to them. Aspects discussed during this meeting included financial issues, how to acknowledge the funding agency and secondments. Once the meeting was reaching its end, an election should be held to elect the student council president and secretary for the next 6 months. Since during the previous 6 months the students were from QUB and UDE, we agreed to have representatives from DCU and Cranfield this time round. Francesco Ometto from Cranfield and myself were nominated to the positions, and therefore for the next 6 months I will be acting as student council president and Francesco as secretary.

Following the student council meeting, the supervisory board meeting was held. The previous president and secretary of the student council attend to bring forward any issues felt by the students, and the newly elected president and secretary attend as observers. It was interesting for me to attend the meeting, and understand the way the supervisory board functions, and how willing they were to take on board our opinions.

Alas, the meeting was now over, and we started making our way to the airport, saying our goodbyes to all our ATWARM friends, and looking forward to our next meeting for the ATWARM summer school, to be also held in Germany in July.

As all ATWARM meetings to date, this was a successful meeting. I feel honoured to be part of the ATWARM programme, and the QUESTOR centre. In particular I believe the strong industrial-academia partnership is extremely important as it allows for immediate and continuous feedback from individuals from industry and also academics from different institutions, allowing for more effective collaboration.

If I were to change anything in the meeting format it would be factors such as the short length of the student council meeting (we had 30mins scheduled and stretched it to 1 hour, however if perhaps it could happen at the same time as the industrial advisory board meeting, it could have been more successful, as we only end up talking about the more important aspects, and less about the possibilities for collaboration and the like). another aspect is the financial aspect. I believe that if for example, we shared rooms or so, we could have all stayed in 1 or 2 hotels (rather than being spread over 4 – due to the Eurovision being held in nearby Dusseldorf, most hotels were quite full) and also saved money from our funding.

However, overall, the meeting was extremely successful. I always feel energised coming back from these meetings, and being in the company of the ATWARM fellows, all of which are really nice and supportive.

Attending a conference without attending

I have been receiving the newsletter of the American Chemical Society ever since I moved to Ireland to start my PhD. I generally just read through it when I receive it in my inbox and archive it. However this week a notice grabbed my attention. An ACS national meeting has just been held, and all presentations were uploaded online, together with synched audio. More than 500 presentations are available for free, making it possible to feel like I attended the meeting without actually attending.

I had never even thought that such things are done, and was pleasantly surprised at the different topics covered during the meeting. I have now gone through the list of presentations and noted the presentations which are of interest to me. Hopefully I will manage to go through those that caught my attention (around 11 in all). Most are linked to the area I am currently researching, but some are in the wider area of science.

Today I decided to follow an easygoing presentation to start with:

Challenges and joys of an industrial career when “far, far away” becomes “just around the corner

Carolyn Ribes (DOW)

The presentation spoke about the challenges and strengths of women who take on international assignments within their company. Although I have not actually taken such an assignment, most of the things discussed within the presentation are highly relevant to my situation. I found it interesting to learn more about the topic and also to look at how other people prepare presentations and present their work. The presentation (you just have the powerpoint slide on view) and the audio are excellently linked. Overall I really enjoyed listening to it and I look forward to going through the remaining presentations on my list. However at 20-30minutes per presentation it might take some time.

I think such efforts are an excellent way to disseminate details from such a meeting or conference and should be a minefield to any PhD student for whom attendance to conferences is not always possible due to financial or time restraints. It is great that the content is made freely available, and I hope that more conferences go down this route. This is the first time I hear about this, but I will definitely keep my eyes open for similar initiatives.

ENVIRON 2011

From the 6th – 8th April, the 21st Irish Environmental Researchers’ Colloquium, ENVIRON 2011, was being held at University College Cork. This is organised by ESAI (Environmental Sciences Association of Ireland) and is a conference which our whole lab attends each year. During the first day of the conference, a number of relevant workshops were held, and since two of my lab mates and myself were interested in that on Geospatial Technologies, we made our way down to Cork a bit earlier. I had used GIS during my fourth year project, however I only had a basic understanding of this tool. However I hope to be able to make use of GIS further during my PhD, as I believe it will significantly help my research. The workshop consisted of 1.5hours on GIS and 1.5hours on remote sensing, and therefore we did not really get an in-depth knowledge of the software. However, it was a good refresher course to remember what I had done before. I really liked that the workshop was mainly practical based, in that during each session, we had a short introduction, followed by hands-on experience of carrying out a tutorial.

That evening, a wine reception followed by the opening speeches were held. I was particularly interested in the keynote speech by Professor Michael Depledge. He touched upon a million and one things during his presentation, but he managed to make it accessible to all, yes still scientific enough. The next morning, the ‘conference proper’ was to start. After an initial plenary session, the various sessions of presentations were held. 4 different sessions were held at the same time, and one chooses which session he attends. Such sessions were to be held over the last 1.5 days, since the conference ended at lunch on Friday.

During the first session of ‘Water Quality’ I was to present a 1 minute oral presentation on my poster. I am glad I got to present my work and my slot was at the start, since a number of people came up to talk to me after that. I was pleasantly surprised at the number of students coming up to me to ask about my research and that they would be interested in my findings, since it could add something to what they are already doing. Therefore it is encouraging to see that IF my method works, it will find some use. Alas, it is an IF. It was also slightly unsettling, that some people are doing quite similar work to what I am doing. But that is research, and hopefully the work they will be doing will not be too similar.

I was particularly excited when my supervisor told me that a person from the EPA was interested in my work. I had been trying to contact people at the EPA, but it seems as if my messages were not going through. However I now have his contact details, and I will get back to him next week. If I can get the support of the EPA, it will certainly add some essential backing in relation to the relevance of my research.

As with the other conferences/meetings I have been at, I have found that it is not the actual presentations which are most useful, but rather the discussions held during the other activities, such as poster sessions, lunch or dinner. ENVIRON 2011 is over, and I look forward to ENVIRON 2012.

CASi 2011: My First Conference

During the past two days, I have been attending my first actual conference: CASi 2011 (Conference on Analytical Sciences: Ireland). It was being held at DCU, and so it did not involve much travel or other expenses, making it ideal for my first conference attendance. I had heard about it a couple of months ago, and had asked to send in an abstract for a poster presentation. My supervisors agreed, and after some months I heard that I got accepted. Therefore the past two days have been filled with conference related activities.

Overall I can say that this conference has been really useful to me, even though just one oral presentation was directly related to what I am doing. However the opportunity to talk to other people was the most beneficial aspect. In particular I got talking to three individuals, who have given me some good insights into my project, and I look forward to perhaps collaborating with them, and have some friendly discussions.

I am also glad I made it to the conference dinner yesterday, since I got to meet other scientists in Ireland, who are mainly in the same boat as myself, in that most are PhD students or post-docs. By having attended a DCU organised conference, it was also good to meet other people working in the University, particularly students from the School of Chemistry. This is because my research is largely chemistry based. However, I am situated in another school which makes interaction somewhat problematic.

Furthermore, since the conference was sponsored by the RSC (Royal Society of Chemistry) publishing division (amongst others), we got access to a couple of hard copy journals relevant to analytical science. I generally just access journals online, and have only looked at really old journals which would be unavailable online, in print. Therefore it was something of a novelty to get to see and flip through actual journals, and see how they are presented, rather than looking at a pdf.

It was also interesting to see all the different approaches to presentations (oral and poster) other people take, and I hope that I have taken something of that with me. I look forward to my next conference (hopefully in April), which should be more directly related to my area of research. However, this was a great start.

School of Biotechnology Research Day

Last Friday the School of Biotechnology at DCU had its annual Research Day. I did not know what o expect from it, but I must say I was pleasantly surprised at the amount of research happening within the school. This is even though I could not understand most of it, since I am not doing biotechnology as such, I really liked the presentations I listened to. There was one of the guys in our lab, who presented his work. He is in his final year of his PhD, and it was good to understand a bit more about what he is researching.

There were also a considerable number of poster presentations, over 30 in all. These gave a small insight into all the other research happening in the department. My presentation was included with them, and I am happy with my poster, although I have noted some changes I will make for the next poster I will make.

What I really liked about the Research Day was the presence of a number of suppliers. Apart from the various freebies they gave out, it was good to meet the people I have communicated with via email and also others I did not know. In Malta, we generally buy from around 3 agents. And our link is with the agent not the actual company. Here you need to know all the different companies in order to make an order, so sometimes it is a bit more of a hassle.

A successful research day I must say. Well done to the School of Biotechnology and the Biological Research Society at DCU, who were instrumental in its organisation.