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Month: July 2019

Grappling graduation fears

July 12, 2019July 12, 2019Posted in anxiety, Mental HealthTagged anxiety, graduation, Mental Health, mental health chat1 Comment

Graduation time is fast approaching many of us! It’s a time of celebration, but can also be a source of worry.

Continue reading “Grappling graduation fears” →

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Evening! - What did you guys get up to today? I had a few things on my to do list but postponed all the things that involved walking to the glasshouses as the weather was crazzzyyyy! 😂 - Instead I lurked in the lab and did a starch extraction-part of which is shown in the short video. - This involves mushing up some wheat grains in water with a mortar and pestle, before filtering. The next steps involve a solution called percoll-this seperates out the starch granules from the proteins in the extraction mix. Finally I washed the starch many, many, many times! - This starch extraction will be used for lots of different things- I will have a look at the overall starch makeup in my wheat lines (the ratio of large A granules to small B granules), and can look at any morophological changes in the starch granules. - - 🤞 the weather is better tomorrow, and I can get to the glasshouses without ending up like a drowned rat! - - #instascience #postdoc #plantscience #plantbiology #biology #academia #scicomm #womeninstemm #womeninscience #scientistsofinstagram

SEM time 🔬 - - The scanning electron microscope (SEM) is amazing! - This is a type of microscope that produces a image by scanning the surface of a sample with a focused beam of electrons. - The SEM is so good because it can distinguish points that are super close together (in the v.low nm range). This also means a SEM has great resolution, enabling us to take very zoomed in photos in high resolution of extremely small things-like in my case starch granules. - I 💖 doing microscopy. Before my postdoc I had never used the SEM before, and everytime I use it I am amazed by the images it can take. - The only thing I don't like is how cold the room is. Which is kept at a regulated temperature, which is slightly cooler. It's not even that cold 😅 just when you are sat not moving you can get quite chilly! By the end of a session I have bundled on so many layers and am like a living iceman ⛄ (swipe right!) - - #postdoc #postdoclife #scicomm #scientistsofinstagram #biology #plantsci #plantbiology #instascience #sciblogger #womeninstemm

#Timetotalk - Today is the official time to talk day. Mental health affects 1 in 4 people. Mental health comes in all shapes and sizes and can affect anyone to any degree- anxiety, depression, OCD, Bipolar disorder, schizophrenia... the list goes on. - - I myself have generalised anxiety disorder. This is also accompanied by mild depression, OCD like symptoms and panoc attacks. I started openly talking about my mental health a few years ago. And I have seen so many benefits linked to talking openly about my mental health- both to myself and others. - It has helped friends and family understand "me" a lot more, and I have even had a few people come to talk to me about things like counselling, ways to get help, and to just generally chat. - I am also a part of the newly formed mental health and wellbeing committee at my work place @johninnescentre and it has been so amazing talking to other like minded people and helping to change how people talk about mental health. - At first talking openly about my anxiety was hard, and at times it still is- especially trying to explain why I am feeling anxious or what I am feeling exactly, but now I feel a lot more comfy about it, and the benefits far outweigh the bad. - So lets talk more about our mental health and experiences- starting with today, and continuing on everyday 💕 - - - #TimeToTalk #mentalhealth #anxiety #wellbeing #timetochange #shinealightonmentalhealth #letstalk #wellbeingwarrior #scientistsofinstagram #scientist #biologist #academia #postdoclife

4 months later and my wheat plants are ready for harvest! 🌾🌾 - - This is my 3rd generation of plants- wheat plants take a while to get from grain to grain! - Today I had like 120 plants to harvest today 😅 but luckily a lovely labmate helped me with the harvesting and so we managed to get everything harvested in just 2 hours 🤗🤗 - - The next job will to be thresh them all...!! But, I am leaving that for a bit! - - I also have some other plants growing at the moment- for another experiment, and will be collecting grain at a earlier timepoint (before they have fully matured like these ones) unfortunately those plants decided they want to be harvested at the weekend, so I am in work again over the weekend! - - Have a great weekend guys! - - #biology #plantscience #postdoclife #instascience #science #scienceselfie #scientistsofinstagram

I'm Learning R!! 👩‍💻 - - - For anyone who doesn't know, R is a programming language used for statistics and graphics. - I didn't learn R in my PhD, and a lot of the people I knew didn't really use it either... so I never really thought about it.But, last year a new postdoc in the lab, who was pretty darn good at R, made me realise how good it is! - So, this year I decided to sign up to a beginners introduction to R. My first session was monday, and my second part is this afternoon. It is going to take a while to fully get it, but I am already beginning to get the hang of it... maybe?! With the help of a few others I have successfully made my first graph in R! 😁 - So right now, I am feeling pretty successful and chuffed!! - I am looking forward to getting more stuck into R and learning even more! - Are you guys learning anything new this year? - - #science #instascience #instascientist #biology #plantscience #postdoc #postdoclife #learning #newskills

Happy New Year Everyone! - - I am back in the lab after having a very nice relaxing xmas holidays. I decided to also to have a complete break from all social media 🤳 across the holidays so sorry for the lack of posts/ responses, but I am now back! - - On todays agenda: - remembering what I was doing before my break 🤔 - writing a to do list for the week of my most important things - easing myself back into work by doing a few of the quick experiments 👩‍🔬 (as photographed- running a few starch samples through the counter counter... basically cataloguing starch granule number and size) - wrestling with my computer trying to make it realise that it also is back to work - copious amounts of tea drinking - - What are you guys getting on with on your first days back? - - - #postdoc #postdoclife #academia #science #plantscience #biology #scicomm #instascientist #instascience #whatascientistdoes #womeninstemm #womeninscience

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Evening! - What did you guys get up to today? I had a few things on my to do list but postponed all the things that involved walking to the glasshouses as the weather was crazzzyyyy! 😂 - Instead I lurked in the lab and did a starch extraction-part of which is shown in the short video. - This involves mushing up some wheat grains in water with a mortar and pestle, before filtering. The next steps involve a solution called percoll-this seperates out the starch granules from the proteins in the extraction mix. Finally I washed the starch many, many, many times! - This starch extraction will be used for lots of different things- I will have a look at the overall starch makeup in my wheat lines (the ratio of large A granules to small B granules), and can look at any morophological changes in the starch granules. - - 🤞 the weather is better tomorrow, and I can get to the glasshouses without ending up like a drowned rat! - - #instascience #postdoc #plantscience #plantbiology #biology #academia #scicomm #womeninstemm #womeninscience #scientistsofinstagram

SEM time 🔬 - - The scanning electron microscope (SEM) is amazing! - This is a type of microscope that produces a image by scanning the surface of a sample with a focused beam of electrons. - The SEM is so good because it can distinguish points that are super close together (in the v.low nm range). This also means a SEM has great resolution, enabling us to take very zoomed in photos in high resolution of extremely small things-like in my case starch granules. - I 💖 doing microscopy. Before my postdoc I had never used the SEM before, and everytime I use it I am amazed by the images it can take. - The only thing I don't like is how cold the room is. Which is kept at a regulated temperature, which is slightly cooler. It's not even that cold 😅 just when you are sat not moving you can get quite chilly! By the end of a session I have bundled on so many layers and am like a living iceman ⛄ (swipe right!) - - #postdoc #postdoclife #scicomm #scientistsofinstagram #biology #plantsci #plantbiology #instascience #sciblogger #womeninstemm

#Timetotalk - Today is the official time to talk day. Mental health affects 1 in 4 people. Mental health comes in all shapes and sizes and can affect anyone to any degree- anxiety, depression, OCD, Bipolar disorder, schizophrenia... the list goes on. - - I myself have generalised anxiety disorder. This is also accompanied by mild depression, OCD like symptoms and panoc attacks. I started openly talking about my mental health a few years ago. And I have seen so many benefits linked to talking openly about my mental health- both to myself and others. - It has helped friends and family understand "me" a lot more, and I have even had a few people come to talk to me about things like counselling, ways to get help, and to just generally chat. - I am also a part of the newly formed mental health and wellbeing committee at my work place @johninnescentre and it has been so amazing talking to other like minded people and helping to change how people talk about mental health. - At first talking openly about my anxiety was hard, and at times it still is- especially trying to explain why I am feeling anxious or what I am feeling exactly, but now I feel a lot more comfy about it, and the benefits far outweigh the bad. - So lets talk more about our mental health and experiences- starting with today, and continuing on everyday 💕 - - - #TimeToTalk #mentalhealth #anxiety #wellbeing #timetochange #shinealightonmentalhealth #letstalk #wellbeingwarrior #scientistsofinstagram #scientist #biologist #academia #postdoclife

4 months later and my wheat plants are ready for harvest! 🌾🌾 - - This is my 3rd generation of plants- wheat plants take a while to get from grain to grain! - Today I had like 120 plants to harvest today 😅 but luckily a lovely labmate helped me with the harvesting and so we managed to get everything harvested in just 2 hours 🤗🤗 - - The next job will to be thresh them all...!! But, I am leaving that for a bit! - - I also have some other plants growing at the moment- for another experiment, and will be collecting grain at a earlier timepoint (before they have fully matured like these ones) unfortunately those plants decided they want to be harvested at the weekend, so I am in work again over the weekend! - - Have a great weekend guys! - - #biology #plantscience #postdoclife #instascience #science #scienceselfie #scientistsofinstagram

I'm Learning R!! 👩‍💻 - - - For anyone who doesn't know, R is a programming language used for statistics and graphics. - I didn't learn R in my PhD, and a lot of the people I knew didn't really use it either... so I never really thought about it.But, last year a new postdoc in the lab, who was pretty darn good at R, made me realise how good it is! - So, this year I decided to sign up to a beginners introduction to R. My first session was monday, and my second part is this afternoon. It is going to take a while to fully get it, but I am already beginning to get the hang of it... maybe?! With the help of a few others I have successfully made my first graph in R! 😁 - So right now, I am feeling pretty successful and chuffed!! - I am looking forward to getting more stuck into R and learning even more! - Are you guys learning anything new this year? - - #science #instascience #instascientist #biology #plantscience #postdoc #postdoclife #learning #newskills

Happy New Year Everyone! - - I am back in the lab after having a very nice relaxing xmas holidays. I decided to also to have a complete break from all social media 🤳 across the holidays so sorry for the lack of posts/ responses, but I am now back! - - On todays agenda: - remembering what I was doing before my break 🤔 - writing a to do list for the week of my most important things - easing myself back into work by doing a few of the quick experiments 👩‍🔬 (as photographed- running a few starch samples through the counter counter... basically cataloguing starch granule number and size) - wrestling with my computer trying to make it realise that it also is back to work - copious amounts of tea drinking - - What are you guys getting on with on your first days back? - - - #postdoc #postdoclife #academia #science #plantscience #biology #scicomm #instascientist #instascience #whatascientistdoes #womeninstemm #womeninscience

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