A Day in the life
What is it like being a scientist? What is it like living in a country so far away? Here, I plan to share my adventures.
What is it like being a scientist? What is it like living in a country so far away? Here, I plan to share my adventures.
Hiked up Roy's Peak this past weekend and enjoyed some unbelieveable New Zealand views, including some very photogenic sheep. Also, as I make the transition from academia to the 'real' world, I have been focusing my efforts toward industry (still working on manuscript revisions!). Whether it is here in NZ or back in the States, I am ready for the next challenge. Still making the transition that December = Summer, but being in the bottom of the world, cooler weather still prevails this month.
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Let's see... I graduated with a Master's in Geological Sciences in August. I moved back to Houston, TX for a brief time, which included an exploration of the city ranging from Space Center Houston to The Houston Zoo to Battleship Texas, and to Brazos Bend State Park (and more!) I also checked out Perth in Western Australia and both the North and South Islands of New Zealand. I ended up ditching the city lifestyle to moving to the small town of Wanaka, New Zealand in October where there is no central heating or air and the dryer for laundry is called 'The Sun'. BUT the hiking and geology here is glorious. This is the last week of school! I have been completing my last homework assignments as well as study for my final exam scheduled for next week. I am continuing to go over all of my results from my experiments as well as calculate olivine dissolution rates. Being a scientist involves A LOT of writing! My thesis is coming along nicely. I have also started writing my paper to be submitted for publication soon. Finally, I am working on my abstract for the 49th annual Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in the Woodlands, TX. I am looking forward to sharing my science and meeting potential PhD advisors. I have my Technical Review scheduled mid-January and from there, I am hoping my committee members and I will get my defense date scheduled. On a side note, Laramie, WY was amazing. I met new scientists and learned about the current research that is going on in terms of habitability. I also got a tour of WIRO telescope and went into the room were Carl Sagan slept. Since the Accretion conference, I have been extremely busy with my experiments (no blogs). I had my first committee review in September, which went really well. As of October 8th, I have finished all of my experimental runs!! I am continuing to work on my thesis and organizing all of my results. I am retaking the GRE in November as well as looking at potential PhD programs.
For outreach, I gave two talks to an Earth Science class at a local high school. It was exciting to see the kids holding their first meteorite. I hope my talks have some of them thinking about a future to become a scientist! I am now preparing for the Habitable Worlds Workshop in Laramie, Wyoming in November. After all of my experiments, its is exciting to create poster to show it off. Photo credit: LPI twitter #1st1e9Accretion: Building New Worlds Conference Presentation On Tuesday, I presented my talk on how I use a combination of parameters to test the validity of the planetary embryo bow shock model. The take home message was that if porphyritic textures can be reproduced using parameters consistent with the planetary embryo bow shock model, then this model would be a viable chondrule formation mechanism. If not, then most likely this model is not responsible for the formation of chondrules.
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