Tag: #PhDJourney

Work-Life Balance as a final year PhD student

Hi everyone,

If you haven’t met me before, my name is Ciara. I’m a final year PhD student in the Cancer Bio-engineering group. My research focuses on using a 3D model of neuroblastoma to uncover pathways that cause cancer cells to invade other parts of the body, in a process we term ‘metastatic spread’. As a whole, I really enjoy my research and have a keen interest in the topic, making it easy to stay motivated and driven. However, as a final-year student, my lab days can be long and labour-intensive; unfortunately, experiments can sometimes span the weekends. This makes work-life balance hard to achieve. I have come up with three effective strategies that help me manage my workload and still enjoy my PhD work while taking the necessary time to recuperate. I would love to share them with you.

  1. Make a fun recipe – After a stressful day at work, plan a yummy dinner meal. While science experiments can fail, recipes only ever end with a delicious reward of a belly hug after a long day. Making a home-cooked meal helps me take my mind off the day’s stresses and fill myself with nutrients that keep my immune system strong. Check out some of the delicious recipes I’ve made so far.

2. Attend conferences. Conferences are a great way to meet researchers on the same journey as you. They can help keep you motivated and trigger new ideas for your own research. My most recent conference was in Athlone. While I enjoyed presenting my research and listening to talks, I also took some time to make new friends from other universities and explore the history of county Westmeath – for example, having a Guinness in the oldest bar in Ireland (they have a Guinness world record to prove it).

IACR Meeting 2023, Athlone

3. Plan a holiday to work towards – There is no better motivation to complete your work than jet-setting off to explore a new country. I aim to take a short science break every 4-6 months. My most recent one was to the snowy Italian mountains for a week of skiing. I came back with lots of fun memories and laughs, feeling ready to launch into another few months of hard work.

Ski hols 2023

Written by Ciara Gallagher

One Day of the Life as a Researcher: PhD student

You may wonder whether I re-submit the same. the third time? Actually, our team has 3 ongoing PhD students and one starting from October. So, here we are. Three identical titles so far but different journeys. Today, it is Tom’s turn to tell his story.

Three years I ago I decided to try my hand at some cancer research and quit my job as a medical scientist in a diagnostic lab. I am now in my third year of a PhD and I am certain I made the right choice. It was a challenging transition from working in an environment with a lot of automation and standard operating procedures to one where you have to figure out everything for yourself! However, I think that that learning experience has allowed me to adjust quite well to all of the COVID-19 related upheaval. 

Pre-pandemic you could saunter between your office and the lab as often as you pleased, you had a choice of at least four different places to go for coffee on campus and you could squeeze into a packed lift to avoid the stairs to the lab. Now a day in the lab is quite different. We have to book lab space online, social distance from our colleagues, frequent hand washing and wear a mask at all times.

Tom Frawley

These days I plan all my lab work and book lab bench space the week before. On a typical day I split my time between the lab and working from home. I am quite fortunate that my commute is only a 6 minute walk through Stephens Green, which is only 5 minutes longer than the walk from the lab to my old office. 

Working through a pandemic is certainly challenging however I do appreciate my time in the lab much more now and I feel like I am much more productive when access to the lab is limited. 

Thomas Frawley, the IRC-NCRC funded PhD student.