The first three months (PhD life I)

Hello there! This post will talk a little about the first three months of my PhD, this could prove useful for people thinking about starting a PhD.

Towards the end of my degree in "Physics with planetary and space science" at Aberystwyth University, I applied to Leicester University to do a PhD. When I heard that a place was awarded to me, a sudden sense of worry appeared, worry that I hadn't felt since the first year of degree level physics.

You find in asking ex-supervisors and current/past PhD students, that this is a perfectly normal state of mind; they all say you feel very stupid for the first year. It is my pleasure to confirm that this (at least so far) is true.

The stupid-feeling, is derived not just from having to learn incredible amounts more or learning complex new techniques. The main reason is that you've just come from being in the comforting state of mind where you feel you know your subject well, only to suddenly find that every tiny piece of your subject is a subject in itself. The analogy 'big fish in a small sea' to 'small fish in a huge sea' has never applied so well!



Below is a list of some of the things I've got up to, with a brief description. (You will find that I like to write lists in my blog, they are often a much better way to disseminate information than a sentence - when there is a lot to say).

1. Seminars! This has been an eye opener, roughly once every three weeks we have a visiting researcher from another university to give a talk, they specialise in similar work to ours. It has been great to hear what they have to say in their seminars, although I only understand a small amount of their talk, I feel much is learnt each time. Plus every time one comes, our whole group has a curry and a beer with them...
   
2. Conferences! I've been to two conferences which have both been held at the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS), London. Essentially these appear to be similar to seminars, but with about fifteen speakers and chances to mingle in-between talks. These are great for seeing the latest research in your field, being on the frontier of science is a humbling experience. This has also been a good chance to meet people that do similar work to myself, I endeavour to get them following my blog!
   
3. Work!? I suppose I'd better say something about the work I've done, less my supervisor reads this and thinks my time is spent waiting for curries, beer and packing for trips to London. The main challenge in my PhD thus far has been programming, it has also simultaneously been the most rewarding.
   My first task was to arrange image files taken at the NASA Infra-Red Telescope Facility (IRTF) in Hawai'i. These were images of Jupiter taken in the Infra-Red band, it was my job to arrange these in order of their longitude, by which I mean; if you had images of Earth rotating - you would want it to rotate in the order the Earth does and not be centered on France in one frame and then suddenly India in the next. Below is a movie of this:
   
   

Jupiter through the IRTF, Hawai'i. 

A mini-conclusion to this PhD life post would be to say, I am really enjoying it, there isn't anything else I'd rather be doing. It is rewarding, interesting and let's face it - cool!


Thanks for reading, my next blog will appear within the next 10 days.
James