• Question: when did you decide you wanted to be a scientist, and what was the influence?

    Asked by mezza to Meeks, Stephen, Tom, Pete, Steve on 15 Jun 2010 in Categories: . This question was also asked by lily, barefootdoctor1856, jejones, paaigefirmy, wlea, kayleigh96, dependingontheweather, salvatore, nataliamay, giuola.
    • Photo: Steve Roser

      Steve Roser answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      If you look at my profile, you’ll see that I am a bit of a saddo because I wanted to be a boffin when I was ten…My Dad bought me a really cool chemistry set which had lots of old fashioned bits like retorts, and odd glassware. In those days you could buy all sorts of hideously dangerous chemicals at Boots, and so I equipped myself with a lab in the garage, that I shudder to think of nowadays. Bangs, smells and other effluvia came out of there, and I never really looked back. In terms of deciding careers and Unis and all that I had some really inspirational teachers, and I’ve found that that seems to be teh key for a lot of other folk, but I was already on the way….

    • Photo: Tom Hartley

      Tom Hartley answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      I was interested in a science and being a scientist from a very young age. I’ve always wanted to know how things work. I used to watch TV programmes (by e.g., David Attenborough, David Bellamy, James Burke, Jonathan Miller and Carl Sagan) which made me think science and nature were fascinating. I think Dr Who was also an influence in that he made it clear that scientists could be quirky and fun, heroic even. My first secondary school science teacher Mr Hugall was very good at making science interesting – I think he was an influence. I was so interested, it seemed easy. I didn’t really decide that I wanted to be a scientist until I was doing my degree and I got the chance to design and run my own experiment. It was creative and fun, and that’s what got me really hooked.

    • Photo: Stephen Curry

      Stephen Curry answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      Hi Mezza – hmm I think I was quite a late developer. At the end of my physics degree I was still unsure but gave it a go anyway and signed up to do a PhD. I really enjoyed that – studied how general anaesthetics work. Though I had a little wobble at the end of my PhD project (I went into the NHS for a year), in the end I decided to take a chance on a career in science.

      It’s been rather varied so far which is one of the great things about doing science. After anaesthetics, I started working on viruses and on protein structures. Twenty years later I’m still spending most of my time trying to figure out the structures of virus proteins and hope that our work will some day be useful in fighting viral diseases.

    • Photo: Pete Edwards

      Pete Edwards answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      My dad says that ever since I could talk I was always asking him questions about things around me – Why is grass green? How big is the Earth, What’s the Sun made of? Things like that. I realised at school that science was about trying to answer a lot of the questions that most interested me so I studied as much science as I could. I took biology, chemistry and physics as single sciences to GCSE. When I started my A levels I wasn’t sure if I was going to study marine biology or physics at uni and I only decided I was going to do physics at the end of my AS year.
      I guess my main influence was my A level physics teacher. He was new at my school and was very enthusiastic and had a great way of bringing physics alive. Thanks Dr Roscoe if you’re out there!

    • Photo: Marieke Navin

      Marieke Navin answered on 15 Jun 2010:

      I knew from a really young age that I was going to be a scientist. I loved science from when we did a project on the planets in infant school. I wasn’t influence by anyone in particular but i was really encouraged by my teachers and my parents which helped a lot.

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