• Question: how did you become a sicentist

    Asked by cark532faux26 on 16 Dec 2025. This question was also asked by hams532abas58, arks532tugs73, raga532swob55, rosy532mown62, pean532gene76, kefs532myna25, merc532swob55.
    • Photo: Charlotte Gale

      Charlotte Gale answered on 16 Dec 2025:

      I was mostly inspired by my science teachers, who explained to me how the world works and taught me to ask questions to find out more. I love learning about how things work, and that’s still what I do today! I studied science at school then at university, and now I work in research

    • Photo: Oleg Kozhura

      Oleg Kozhura answered on 10 Mar 2026:

      I studied MPhys Physics with Astrophysics (it’s an integrated masters scheme) and my masters thesis was in theoretical physics. After that, I applied for a bunch of interesting PhD projects and did my PhD in Astronomy & Astrophysics. From there, I started working in atmospheric science, as I wanted to do something “closer to home” and wanted to contribute to a positive change, fighting against climate change and trying to improve people’s lives.

    • Photo: Martin McCoustra

      Martin McCoustra answered on 11 Mar 2026:

      I always like science at school… At high school, I realised I was good at it and as I grew up around the petrochemical industry in Central Scotland decide to pursue chemistry at university. There I realised that I liked doing research but wasn’t keen on being told what to research as I would have to do in industry. So I aimed at becoming an academic with the ability to study what I liked. If finally got on that ladder when I got my first academic position at UEA in Norwich in 1988 at the age of 25.

    • Photo: Michael Capeness

      Michael Capeness answered on 13 Mar 2026:

      I always enjoyed doing experiments at school, and learning about why things happen. I had some great teachers that put up with my endless questions, eventually I took the sciences for A-level, found that I preferred biology and chemistry over physics (too many equations!) and then I got a job in a microbiology lab, while I did my degrees.

    • Photo: Michael Gillin

      Michael Gillin answered on 13 Mar 2026:

      I was inspired by my Year 9 Chemistry teacher, Mr Dunkin, who taught us how to find science fun and always went the extra mile to make it enjoyable. From there, I did fairly well in my GCSEs, studied Chemistry at A-Level, and then decided to go to the University of Liverpool to do a Chemistry BSc (Hons).

      Since AI and other digital tools are becoming more important in science, I studied for a Digital Chemistry MSc, which taught me how to use these tools in a chemistry sense. Now, I am in my first year of my Chemistry PhD, where I am researching one tiny area of chemistry to a very large extent.

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