• Question: What is your favorite aspect of research?

    Asked by anon-199863 to Sylvia, Sumit, Aryanne on 5 Mar 2019. This question was also asked by anon-199699.
    • Photo: Sylvia Soldatou

      Sylvia Soldatou answered on 5 Mar 2019:


      I like being in the lab and working on my samples! Of course when I get good results, that’s always the best!
      But research is not only lab work, I also about interacting with students, other scientists and many different people in general! Is about communicating your science too!
      Also in what I do, I love the field trips when we go in the sea to collect samples!

    • Photo: Sumit Konar

      Sumit Konar answered on 11 Mar 2019:


      What you want to get, or what you expect to get—- if you get that, that is not a good research, your research is so simple and easy. This is boring.
      When you get unexpected result; and then able to explain what is the reason for this strange result— that is what is my favourite aspect of research.
      I give you one example. I wanted to make lithium carbide (Li2C2) and I always got some tiny impurities with my Li2C2. I was not happy; but I then chased to know what is this impurity and why it is formed. After couple of experiments I figured out that impurity is due to intercalation of Li into graphite. When I understood that I made lots of intercalated graphite; and the research became so interesting. Please find my paper below:
      https://pubs-acs-org.ezproxy.is.ed.ac.uk/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.chemmater.5b00235

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