Julia Silge discusses how she got into astronomy, her first non-data science positions after leaving academia, and how she then started blogging about data science and going to conferences, which opened up the door to new opportunities, including open source contributions, writing books, and data science positions. She shares advice for those who are considering making the transition from astronomy to data science. She also talks about the experience of speaking at SciPy 2024 about scientific computing across languages. 

Links:

Julia’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/juliasilge/ 

Julia’s blog: https://juliasilge.com/blog/ 

ROpenSci: https://ropensci.org/ 

Her first O’Reilly book: https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/text-mining-with/9781491981641/ 

SciPy Conference: https://conference.scipy.org/ 

Her Talk at SciPy 2024: https://youtu.be/MVuxbtERZMI?si=1pSajS3Y1I5CjjBx 

Credits

Intro Music: Tonight At Eight by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com (no relation)

Outro Music: Savour The Moment by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com (no relation)

Co-Hosts: Jeffrey Silverman and Joseph A’Hearn

Recording: Jeffrey Silverman

Editing: Joseph A’Hearn

ATDS Podcast Logo: Joseph A’Hearn

Thumbnail Headshot Image: Julia Silge

Thumbnail Design: Joseph A'Hearn

We thank the American Astronomical Society for being an official sponsor of the podcast.

Timecodes

0:00 - Intro

1:37 - Astronomy Background

7:45 - Careers After Leaving Astronomy

8:49 - Emergence of Data Science

10:36 - UT Austin Astronomy Conducive to Data Science

12:45 - Getting into Data Science

19:13 - First Data Science Job

21:36 - Consulting Roles

25:44 - Writing Books

28:16 - Current Role at Posit PBC

35:51 - Switch from Individual Contributor to Manager

42:50 - Advice for Astronomers Becoming Data Scientists

48:29 - Scientific Computing Across Languages

56:13 - Outro

#Astronomy #DataScience #Transitions #Podcast #ATDS #Astro2Data