The Life of a Scientist
When you think of jobs in the sciences, what comes to mind? Many of us may think of doctors or veterinarians who are trained in the sciences but may not directly conduct scientific research. You may have a vague idea of what scientists do but before I started on my journey, I had no idea.
So, what does a biologist do, anyway?
Biology is a very diverse field of study and thus, being a biologist means different things to different people. We are united by our passion for the natural world. Many scientists spend their day pursuing ideas and answer biological questions that fascinate them. Each day can offer new challenges, new tasks, and new ideas.
One of my favorite things about my job as a budding biologist is that
no two days are ever the same. My first foray into research was in a
neuroscience lab as an undergraduate student. Researchers in the
neurosciences may run behavioral assays or quantify the concentration of
an important brain molecule in the lab. After being exposed to this setting,
I no longer could picture myself in a typical 9-to-5 desk job.
We collect data from a broad range of organisms in diverse locations using many different skills.
Currently, animals used for most of my research experiments are housed in enclosures that mimic a barn, so that the mice are in a setting similar to their natural home in the wild. Maintaining our "Mouse House" requires skills that go beyond biology - working with power tools to maintain the building, coming up with creative fixes for problems, and coordinating a team that helps with data collection. I love that I am able to flex my creative muscles in this way while still investigating topics I am so passionate about.
We share our data and knowledge with others.
Our work as scientists is also communicated to non-scientists For those of us who are affiliated with universities, we often teach classes or mentor students. Some opportunities allow us to communicate our research with high school students, such as yourselves, or other members of our community. I personally find this type of communication to be the most rewarding, since I know how much it impacted me and shaped my aspirations.
- Chloe Josefson, Graduate Student in Biology at Auburn University, June 2018
Many of my days are spent reading about the research of other scientists' so that I gain a more detailed understanding of the subject that I am interested in. This helps me to come up with new ideas and interpret my data. Writing and communicating is at the heart of the sciences, and takes up great deal of what we do. Once I've collected samples and completed my lab work, data must be analyzed and written up so that other scientists can see my work. Scientists also communicate and share their work at conferences, where they can give presentations and meet others working on similar topics.
Just as no two days of work are the same, different types of biologists often spend their days doing very different things. I fell in love with the field of physiology during my second research experience, when I realized that biology can be done using more than laboratory animals. I began working with wild-caught birds to understand their stress and immune responses. A typical day of research would include waking up before the sun so that I could catch House Sparrows; after all, the early bird may get the worm, but the earlier researcher gets the bird. After spending the morning catching birds, I would return to the lab and process some of the samples that I had collected. Other days, I would work on completing new analyses on the same samples. Many of these assays resemble those featured on this website. Although waking up before dawn and setting up cumbersome field equipment may sound awful, I was instantly hooked. I was able to study a topic that fascinated me in an organism that I see every day.
Some biologists go to exotic places to conduct their research.
For example, my mentor, Dr. Wendy Hood, spent time in
Antarctica, studying lactation and reproduction in Weddell
Seals, at the right! Although it may not seem like these seals
could relate to the work included on this site, they are excellent
animals for understanding energy use during reproduction
because they have some of the richest milk in the animal
kingdom. Compared to cow milk, which is about 3-5% fat, these
seals produce milk that is approximately 55-60% fat!
