Ramblings of a Drug Discovery PhD student who should really be in the lab or writing her thesis.
I’ve been dabbling in various creative projects during UK lockdown to pass the time. This little project was inspired by embroidery Science A-Zs created by Lauren/@stitching_hew and Breann Abernathy/@biochemist.b on Instagram. Fiona holding up her finished A-Z cross stitch on an A5 panel of material Every morning (roughly!) in May, I asked my Instagram followers …
Selfie of Fiona in a mustard yellow top smiling and waving I’ve been neglecting this site of late - apologies! Quite a bit has happened since my last post - global pandemic and protests against racism aside. I’ve written my thesis, defended it, corrected it and now I’m waiting for the official bit of paper …
Most people have a desk as a place of work. I’m lucky enough to have three workspaces as a chemist: my desk, my lab bench, and my fume hood, all for different aspects of chemistry research. Today I’m going to give you a tour around my lab bench! My lab bench is used to carry …
2019 marks the UN’s International Year of the Periodic Table or #IYPT. It’s 150 years since Dmitri Mendeleev presented his organisation of chemical elements to the world. The periodic table is used daily by chemists and other scientists as reference resource for the ingredients of the universe. Ancient Greeks defined “elements” as one of the …
Continue reading "What do the numbers on the periodic table mean?"
Increasingly, universities are offering integrated masters science degrees over bachelor degrees. These normally include an additional year of study and/or a placement year in industry or an academic research group. In this post I’ll tell you about the science I did on my placement in Switzerland and how it is linked to a major drug approval that happened a few months ago.
I find people’s routines really interesting. Everybody’s different. Some people are early birds while others are night owls. Some people work long hours and others manage to fit a lot of work into a short period of time. In this post I chat about what a typical day looks like for me and the various …
I spend my days in a chemistry lab making drug-like molecules. A lot of these end up being small quantities (less than 0.1 g!) and usually have the appearance of a white/off-white powder. Occasionally I get a colour which is very exciting. The question a non-chemist might ask is “how do you know you’ve made …
Continue reading "How do I know I’ve made the right molecule?"
The Chemistry of a PhD 