Today I had a short opinion piece in Chemical and Engineering News on publishing negative results, a topic that I covered about this time last year in the Guardian on the occasion of the publication my lab’s first paper on an experiment that didn’t work out.
Basically, I think it’s a good idea. The practice will help to correct the positive bias in Continue reading
Walking in to the Babbage Lecture Theatre in the centre of Cambridge last week took me straight back to what I suspect was the first lecture I ever attended (or should that be endured?) in Cambridge as an undergraduate. I’m sure I must have been back in this particular lecture theatre since that time when I was a timid fresher, but I can’t remember Continue reading
On Wednesday of this past week I found myself in the presence of royalty and felt quite giddy. It happened at a Royal Institution shindig to celebrate the 80th anniversary of the first televised broadcast of their world-famous Christmas lectures.
As you can see in the photograph below the Duke of York was in the room but that’s not the type of roya Continue reading
I was thinking the other day that if academia were a mental illness, it would be bipolar.
One day it treats me well: a student shows me an experiment that shows great promise. I have a spirited chat with a like-minded collaborator about the great work we’d like to do together, and emerge from it buzzing with plans and ideas. I preside over a Continue reading
National academies of science serve a variety of purposes including recognizing the country’s eminent scientists and providing an impartial (usually) voice to government and other policy makers. If this voice is to be truly representative it needs to be inclusive. For too long academies have not lived up to this. This isn’t simply a case of Western Continue reading
Do we, poor misguided academics drink too much? I am sure many of us could do with drinking less but I was surprised to see the Guardian’s Academics Anonymous complaining that Russell group universities ply everyone with too much alcohol. In my experience – as a scientist so I cannot comment on whether other disciplines do the same – there is actua Continue reading
The hallway in front of my lab space filled with fans for drying the moisture.
Things have been a little hectic around here recently. And to make things even more challenging, there was a fire on the floor above me last weekend. The good news is that no one was hurt, and the fire was put out by the automatic sprinkler system fairly quickly. Continue reading
The subject of unconscious bias training has risen swiftly up the agenda at many organisations with the recognition that we are, almost without exception, guilty of it. (If you think you’re exempt, try the Project Implicit tests.) Be it that we fail to assume women are as competent at science or leadership as men – the manifestation in which I am m Continue reading
The admissions process to Cambridge can raise strong opinions. I’ve written about dispelling the myths behind the process and more recently about widening participation issues. But now I’m provoked to write about my own experience of applying to the university, an embarrassingly long time ago, by a book I’m reading. The book is Rachel Carson and he Continue reading
This is a post about professional anxiety and what might be done to alleviate it. Consider who asks questions after departmental seminars or conference talks: too often it is the usual suspects (although my impression is that this is getting less common). Years ago I can remember conferences where it was always the same half dozen senior professors Continue reading
