PhD Talk

In today's episode we talk about teaching. We start from the practical aspect of teaching loads and the various contracts PhD candidates tend to have (and the role of teaching in these contracts), as well as the various teaching assignments that faculty members can get.

We learn about Sarah's experience and expectations with regard to teaching during her PhD and Eva's various teaching loads over the years.

Eva also shares the main lessons she has learned over the years: to balance teaching and active learning activities, to provide the same idea in different formats, and to understand that every group is different and what works one semester or in one country may not work in a different time or place.

We round off by looking at what we learned from teaching online and what we will take into the classroom.

References

• Ep. 24 - Online teaching
• PhD Talk for AcademicTransfer: 10 Ways for more Efficient Teaching
• The first semester of teaching, and my current struggles (Eva's blog post from 2014)

In today's episode of the podcast, we interview Raghavi Viswanath. She is a PhD researcher at the European University Institute (EUI) in Florence and also works as a senior research associate at the Public International Law and Policy Group in Amsterdam, a consultant for cultural rights collectives in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, and a lecturer in human rights law at the University of East London, as well as a careers coach at the St. Anne's college in Oxford and  a moot court mentor.

We learn about Raghavi's career path and PhD research, as well as what the PhD is like at her university and how far along the journey she currently is. Since she is also our first guest doing a PhD in law, we learn a bit more about the different doctoral degrees in law, and in particular the difference between the JD and PhD in law. We also look at the future prospects of those who select this doctoral journey, and what Raghavi has learned so far on her doctoral journey.

We round off the episode learning about a day in the life of Raghavi, the impact of COVID-19 on her PhD and daily tasks, her best advice, and how she sets boundaries around work

References

• EUI 
• University of East London
• On the northbound gaze, see Mogobe Ramose, ‘“African Renaissance”: A Northbound Gaze’ (2000) 19:3 Politeia 47, at 47-61.
• On breaking form/genre/language conventions, see Gloria Anzaldua, Borderlands/La Frontera (2nd ed., Aunt Lute Books, 1999). 
• See also Mackda Ghebremariam Tesfau and Marie Moise's Italian translation of Grada Kilombo's Plantation Memories for disrupting language conventions.  
• On the Irulars, the semi-nomadic community, see Thanaraj, ‘Jai Bhim Portrays The Injustices Faced By The Irular Tribe Of Tamil Nadu, But Who Are They?’, Adivasi Lives Matter, 19 November 2021
• On the need to visibly center collaborative praxis in academia, see this thread by Rohini Sen.  
• Some scholars are compiling a resource on caring as a research ethic/method
• On challenging Eurocentric epistemologies, see this interactive Walking Together guide put together to incorporate First Nations, Metis, and Inuit perspectives into the University of Alberta curriculum
• On Global North scholars ceding space, see Dr. Ibram X Kendi's How to Be an Antiracist (One World, 2019). See also Dr. Tara Van Ho's scathing twitter thread  
• Scholars whose work on working against Eurocentric epistemologies, decolonizing curricula and academia which have really inspired me: Lotika Sarkar, Gayatri Spivak, Foluke Adebisi, and Clelia Rodriguez, amongst others.
• Devon Price  - Laziness does not exist

In today's episode, we do a Q&A session. Before diving into the questions, we give a general update on what we are working on currently, what is going well, and what we are struggling with.

Then, we answer a number of questions from our listeners. The first question deals with how to select a research problem. The second set of questions deals with writing the review of a paper - how to write a good review, what to include in the review, and how much time we spend on reviewing papers. The third set of questions deals with motivation: if we should have a lot of energy to do a PhD, and how to find motivation for the PhD during the summer time.

We round off today's episode with what we are currently "loving".

References

• How to select a thesis topic
• How to review a paper

In today's episode, we look at how we prepare for an upcoming semester. Eva explains which tasks she usually carried out before each semester, in terms of getting all material ready for teaching and in terms of planning.

We dive further into the topic of reflection on progress, and how often we (would like to) do so. A monthly review may be over a time frame that is too short for the nature of research. But when we don't teach, we also don't really feel the structure of the semesters.

Finally, we also discuss how each semester is different, and how the semester itself has its ebb and flow.

References

• Planning a pandemic semester
• Eva's weekly template from Spring 2022
• Eva's semester prep task list

In today's episode, we talk about holidays, taking time off, and boundaries around work. 

First, we look at the regulations different universities have around taking time off for their PhD candidates and faculty. 

Then, we discuss how we take time off and how we disconnect from work. 

Finally, we discuss how we set boundaries around work, some "rules" we have for ourselves with regard to boundaries, and how our boundaries may have changed over time.

In today's episode, we interview Dr. Martijn Molenaar. Martijn obtained his bachelors in Chemistry/Life Science in the Netherlands in 2006. After that, he worked in industry for a while as a lab technician, after which he moved to Utrecht University for a position as research technician. He fell in love with science and transitioned from technician to PhD candidate at Utrecht University. Martijn tells us about his experience and his perhaps unconventional career path.

During his PhD, Martijn studied the role of lipids in liver health and disease. He studied how the fat-soluble vitamin A is stored in liver cells and also built a computational pipeline to analyze lipidomics data. Martijn tells us about his research, and how he followed his interest to go from bench-focused research to computational work.

To further his interest in computational biology, Martijn did his postdoc at EMBL in Heidelberg (Germany) between June 2020 and June 2022. By chance, we interviewed Martijn on the final day of his postdoc. In the interview, he reflects on his experience during the postdocs and his next step, back in the Netherlands, where he will start as a project leader in data science research at an applied university.

Martijn is also an academic parent. His son was born in summer 2019, so he navigated writing his PhD thesis and being a new parent. Moreover, he got the chance to work part-time (4 days a week) when his son was born. We talk about what it is like to work part-time to get an extra day a week to spend with your child, and how to manage the workload while being part-time.

Finally, we round of the interview with Martijn's best advice for PhD students, what a day in the life looks like, how to set boundaries, and the impact of COVID-19 on his work and daily tasks.

References

• Find Martijn on Twitter
• Martijn's publications
•  Retinyl esters form lipid droplets independently of triacylglycerol and seipin:  biochemistry/cell biology of vitamin A storage in liver
• LION/web: a web-based ontology enrichment tool for lipidomic data analysis: a web-tool that we built to perform lipidomics analysis
• Lipidontology website
• Utrecht university 
• EMBL Heidelberg
• Lipidomics
• Molecular dynamics

In today's episode, we talk about how we plan our days, and how our summers may be different from the rest of the years.

We discuss when we decide what needs to be done when, the various levels of planning we use, and what a typical day or week looks like for us.

• Find Marta on LinkedIn
• Find Marta on Twitter
• Max Planck Institute for Metabolism Research website
• Max Planck Institute for Metabolism Research on Twitter
• PhDNet on Twitter
• PhDNet on LinkedIn
• Max Planck PhD Net Career Development & Conference working group
• PhD Net website
• PostdocNet on Twitter 
• PostdocNet on LinkedIN
• PostdocNet website
• Learn more about Marta's research
• Family trees of scientists in neuroscience
• Novo Nordisk

In today's episode, we talk about supervision: both from the perspective of developing a good relationship as a PhD candidate with your supervisor, and from the perspective of being a good supervisor (as a PhD candidate) for master's students.

We talk about the importance of setting clear expectations, and getting to know the working style of your supervisor so that you can work together optimally.  We also look at realistic expectations for how and when to receive feedback, as well as strategies for effective communication with your supervisor and as a supervisor,  as well as methods for having fruitful supervision meetings that both touch upon the contents of the research and the overall progress.

Then, we look at the topic of feedback: how to give feedback, and how to receive feedback. Finally, we look at how conflicts result in supervision relationships, how such conflicts can be solved, and what to do when the conflict cannot be solved.

References

• Supervision issues - Ep. 18

In today's episode, we interview Dr. Chrysan Mohammed. Chrysan is a Postdoctoral Fellow in Global Medical Affairs and Scientific Evidence at Johnson and Johnson Vision Care in Jacksonville Fl. She obtained her PhD in Molecular Medicine from The University of Toledo, College of Medicine and Life Sciences.

We learn about Chrysan's career path before the PhD, how she applied and got into a PhD program, her experience during the PhD as well as what the PhD program is like at The University of Toledo, and how she then landed her post-doctoral fellowship in exactly her field of interest. She also gives us insights into doing a lab-based PhD, and how she found the lab she wanted to work in. Finally, we look at how the skills she learned during her PhD are essential to her current work.

At the end, we round off with the questions we ask all our interviewees: on the impact of COVID-19 on Chrysan's research and personal life, her best advice for PhD students, how she sets boundaries to work, and what a day in the life looked like for her during the PhD.

References

• University of Toledo
• A PON for All Seasons: Comparing Paraoxonase Enzyme Substrates, Activity and Action including the Role of PON3 in Health and Disease
• Targeted Disruption of Paraoxonase 3 in a Dahl Salt-Sensitive Rat Model of Chronic Kidney Disease Increases Renal Cortical Pro-Inflammatory Eicosanoids
• Paraoxonase-3 Regulation of Cardiotonic Steroids Mediates Renal Injury and Dysfunction in a Dahl Salt Sensitive Model of Chronic Kidney Disease
• Circulating lactonase activity but not protein level of PON-1 predicts adverse outcomes in subjects with chronic kidney disease