Tweezers, but my annoying hairs come under my chin (I have 5 of the buggers).

My dad recently told me “stay in that field. This field is going to be taking off in the future. Then you can sit in a nice comfy chair in your own office and fart"

QT - tell your dad he just became my hero - although my dad can belch for Europe.

There is a book (with a tile something likw Calculations for A-Level Chemistry) that I found really helpful. Unhelpfully I forget the exact name of it and I'm not in the lab this week, but next week I'll post the details, unless someone else can remember it.

It can take years to get used to certain calculations (some people can do them without thinking; most of us can't). I know elderly profs who confess to struggling and having to spend whole afternoons going over them. Better you ask for help than try to blag your way through - any supervisor who doesn't realise that is failing as a supervisor (and is a jerk).

Yes, depending on the area. Several Pharmacy Practice lecturers I know don't have PhDs (although they usually study for one whilst teaching, on a part-time basis).

Your supervisor's a jerk.

I'm in pharmacy, but I also write for a historical website and have published on historical stuff. I've always had encouragment to do this; even at inteview stage I have found potential employers liked the idea that I had broader interests. And although the two subjects seem different, I'm starting a collaboration on history of medicine which I'm hoping will lead somewhere (funding! Money!).


I don't think it's a simple question of less or more publications in one field or another: as Shani says, do as much as you can without compromising your PhD. I would suggest taking every chance you can to publish.

49's not "very mature"!

With me it depends on whether the "property" was obtained as a direct result of the industry sponsorship, or accidentally. In the former case, the sponsor owns the property (if there is more than one sponsor, then they share ownership according to how much they invested). If the latter, the university owns it. As far as I know, the student never gets ownership, annoyingly.

I messed up results that a lot of people were waiting for. I still worry about doing it again; it is human to want to do well. But it is not the end of the world if people have to wait for you to re-do something: they need to allow you to make mistakes. Don't allow people to put unreasonable expectations on you: if necessary, talk to your supervsior. It does not seem reasonable to me to expect the first yeat student to perform critical analyses (although I had to do that, it nearly drove me insane...and I don't think it was really fair).

Not sure I'd agree, Pup: it's not always easy to be honest with yourself. I think feedback and a bit of healthy comparison with others is improtant to stop you drifting.

Also, in my case anyway, a LOT of people suffer if I don't do my work, cos that means they can't do their work (it's a lot of interlinked research).

I think your feelings are completely normal. It has always taken me several months to really get into a rhythm in a new job, and the PhD is more like a job than a course. I think it is a good sign that you recognise that you have things still to learn.

And, take it from the master - don't worry about cocking up experiments. No-one's cocked up more than me and it's the best way to learn.

Every bloody day. My supervisor (well, one of them) thinks that holidays are bad for your work.

Try this link:

http://www.usal.es/~phytochem/netsymposium.html

It was in 2002, but it gives names of presenters and their institutions. Should give you an idea as to where ther active research is.

It's the Leicester School of Pharmacy. I think this is quite a popular area of research at the moment; Google "anticancer prodrugs", CYP-enzymes and so on.