Author Archives: Erika Cule

I am one year and one month into my PhD, and next month I have my Upgrade examination. At many – although not all – UK universities, new PhD students are registered as Masters (MPhil) students in the first instance. … Continue reading →

I was surprised to discover that there are at least two research groups at UK universities dedicated to the study of parapsychology. There is even a short course you can sign up to. However, whether or not parapsychology can be … Continue reading →

Wikipedia tells me that they are know as Construction and Management Simulation games. (Who knew? I didn’t!) I used to love playing them, and if the image of an 11-year-old kid engrossed in SimCity seems a little incongruous, perhaps that … Continue reading →

When I took my GCSE science exams, sometimes the questions were set in the context of an experiment. John and Sarah are investigating the effect of temperature on the rate of photosynthesis. or A physicist was investigating this or that … Continue reading →

I had a great time at (my first) #ukscitweetup last night. I promised some people some links to some of my favourite articles, things I have not blogged about before on the assumption that they were old hat. The importance … Continue reading →

Why can’t they just write clearly ? Disgruntled Postdoc A threw the paper down on his desk in frustration. A non-native speaker of English, he had spent the morning studying an aspect of a new collaboration that he was less … Continue reading →

In order to upgrade from MPhil to PhD student status, research postgraduates at Imperial College are required to undertake a certain amount of Transferable Skills Training. One option for obtaining the majority of the required credits on one go, and … Continue reading →

This week, an unofficial, but to me not insignificant, milestone in my PhD studies took place. A poster abstract I submitted to the European Mathematical Genetics Meeting (EMGM) had been accepted, and the meeting took place in Oxford this week. … Continue reading →

At the end of my last post about the then-newly-launched Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs, I indicated that I planned to attend an interview and question-and-answer session hosted by Imperial College Union Political Philosophy Society. Below I reproduce, with permission … Continue reading →

Have you been “media trained”? Until recently, I was skeptical of the value of specific media training for scientists, imagining such training to be similar to other transferable skills training – how to manage your time/supervisor/self – occasionally useful, often … Continue reading →