Tomorrow I’m doing something for the first time, ever. I got an email yesterday with the good news and while we don’t have all the equipment we need for the project, we can still get some good data and an early look at what the data will look like. I’m so excited I’m shaking, I barely slept last night, and my mind is swimming with the possibilities. This is what it’s like doing research on the edge.
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In science, ideally, when you make a large claim, you need a lot of evidence to support it. In theory anyway, in practice with the speed of the internet, claims often get taken as truth no matter how self correcting later. The claim that vaccines cause autism for example has been thoroughly debunked over and over, but the claim still persists despite the piles of evidence to the contrary. Global warming is another good example of how having a lot of evidence doesn’t mean acceptance.
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After yesterday’s post on the whole match situation, I figure it’s probably time to talk about burnout. Because truthfully when you work yourself past your limit and you get even a small rejection, much less a rejection of that magnitude, you’re setting yourself up for a bad time. As a society we are told to push ourselves, to work harder, to “grind” as much as we can because only then will the system acknowledge our worth and reward us for our efforts. It’s a lie and we all know it, but propaganda is a powerful thing.
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Well how could I forget to talk about match? Unlike previous years, I’ve got several friends who are anxiously waiting or at least were waiting, to find out if they got matched or not. The medical system is broken and match is part of the problem, but for those who aren’t in it, you may not understand what match even is or why it’s important. In fact, if you don’t follow medical students on twitter for example, you may never even realize match was happening.
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In my line of research we have fancy algorithms to remove outside contamination to the data we collect. The problem with collecting electrophysiological data (electrical recordings from a person) is there is so much damned noise everywhere. The problem is magnified when you collect data that have a low signal to noise ratio (meaning lots of noise, not a lot of signal). Signal in this case is the thing we’re interested in measuring and while we have dozens of algorithms to filter (remove) the noise, there’s still no substitute for data that was well collected.
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Ever look up an answer in the back of the book? The problem with research is there’s no back of the book, but typically when you do an experiment you can at least glance at research surrounding your work and make sure you’re not going completely off the rails. Because I like to make my life unbelievably difficult, and because I don’t like taking small steps forward, I’m going to (hopefully) be the first to do a few things this year. But it’s not as glamorous as it sounds.
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My brain works in mysterious ways, but did you know there’s a town that’s burning and will probably be burning for another (roughly) few hundred years? Not a town exactly, but it’s yet another case of truth being stranger than fiction. If you’re not familiar with the story, or just like learning more when you can, let me introduce you to the town of Centralia.
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Sometimes I get into a groove and since we’ve been talking about failure, I think it’s time I shared why failure isn’t the end of the story. Failure sucks, let’s be real for a second, it hurts, it’s not fun, and it feels like a very personal attack. Or at least that’s what it feels like to me. When someone rejects something I’ve written or proposed I feel like I’m being told I’m not good enough or that I don’t deserve to be a researcher, imposter syndrome is a bitch. But failure isn’t the end, it’s just somewhere in the middle.
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After a rough night of sleep I knew exactly what I wanted to talk about today. Failure. Because like I mentioned yesterday, in my journey to a PhD, there was plenty of it. Part of this was due to the fact that I had no idea what the hell was going on or how to prepare for my PhD, but a big part of this was due to the fact that I held a belief that wasn’t true. I thought, because it’s what we’re told, that when applying to grad school grades aren’t the only thing that matters. And I was lied to.
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It’s that time of the year again for anyone who’s applied to grad school. This is roughly the time people get acceptance letters, or if you’re like me a pile of rejection letters, but look at me now MIT! Can you tell I’m bitter? Any sort of life transition is hard, be it high school to college, college to work, or even sleep to awake (or is that just me?), transition can feel downright scary. Well the person I’m mentoring “Kay” is about to take that jump and I can’t lie, I’m super excited for her.
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Maybe it’s just me, but going to the doctor is exhausting. I think selfcare in general is exhausting and so I’ve basically automated my routine, or maybe created a standard routine it is the correct way to phrase that, to make my life as simple as possible. One thing I can’t do is that with is my health care. I can’t be the only one, so in the spirit of sharing, let’s talk about self care and health care.
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DARPA and I go way back. Right after I got out of the military back to be exact. Not that more than one or two people even know my name (and probably only vaguely), but DARPA is the reason I’m where I am today, even if the people who helped me get here don’t remember me. As much as I love the DARPA origin story, that’s all it’s ever been, that is until today, when school-PI let me know that DARPA was paying attention.
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Well today has been eventful! After a bunch of emails, meetings, and miscellaneous things, I have a clear shot to my dissertation proposal! I don’t want to say it’s been smooth sailing or that things won’t be rough, but I’m feeling optimistic after all the news. Since there’s a lot, I figure we can cram it into a single post as I take the next few steps to the big proposal defense day.
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With great power comes great responsibilities. Well as a grad student, you don’t have a whole lot of power (see: none), but you do have responsibilities. You also have more freedom to do the things you want (need) to do the way you want. One of those responsibilities, and my favorite frankly, is mentoring. With all the stress of doing my PhD, being a mentor is something that helps keep me sane, so today I’m going to share some great news along with why I enjoy doing the mentor thing.
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Well we’ve finally arrived, for real this time, to my proposal timeframe. There are a lot of things that need to happen between now and when I defend my proposal, but thankfully most of those things are started or almost finished. The one thing that isn’t started… well that would be my actual proposal. Be not afraid! I’m going to have the draft done today, or at least that’s what I’m telling myself.
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Well I don’t want to get my hopes up, but I have some big news! As promised in the last, last paper update, I wasn’t going to talk about it until we had submitted the paper for review. Well as of today, last paper is FINALLY in review! Now this could be months before we get it actually published and maybe even longer if there is several rounds to the edits, but this is a big step.
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I formed my PhD committee! Then it fell apart… Then I fixed the problem!! But really I didn’t… A PhD committee is a big deal and you can spend a lot of time trying to find the right professors only to find out that they don’t have the time. In my case, I got lucky and formed my committee without too much headache. Then one person left and the whole thing fell apart. So what goes into a committee anyway and why do you need one?
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I can write small novels on the accomplishments of others and praise the work they do, because the work they do is worth praise. I think I come off overly flattering, but I mean every word of it because people deserve to be celebrated. Well sadly, I lack that ability for myself, but I’m pushing through the skin crawling feeling that I should delete this and write something else to celebrate a victory, or at least an acknowledgement of a win. So today we’re talking about my least favorite subject, me.
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I love a good horror story. Now, personally I prefer fiction, but sometimes truth really is stranger than fiction. As the title of the post suggests, we’re talking MK-Ultra since I love the absolute absurdity of the story and frankly it’s a great illustration of how little the common person knows about what the government does in the dark.
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Well in the history of humankind, it’s been a hot second since we didn’t have the impending threat of nuclear war. While I would like to believe that the possibility of a nuclear attack is so remote we shouldn’t even worry about it, the truth is I would rather be prepared than not. So let’s talk a little bit about the history of nuclear warfare and how it’s shaped our world even today. Things like, have you ever wondered why shampoo and conditioner were sold separately? Hint, it involves nuclear warfare.
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Well today I’ve had a major demolition project going on at home (see yesterday’s post for details), which has left precious little time for anything else, much less blogging. Sorry, but for the day this is it. As a reminder, no matter how big your goal, no matter how far you’ve come, it’s okay to take a break if you need it. My goal was 365 days of academic blogging and well sometimes you need time away. It doesn’t reset the clock, it just makes you human. So take a minute for yourself if you need it, I certainly do!
You know, if I wasn’t living it I wouldn’t believe it. I honestly question if my coworkers believe it. I have some crap luck. I get the sense that if it weren’t for the photographic evidence of my horrible luck no one would believe me and frankly I wouldn’t blame them. Even with photos, I’m wondering if people are questioning, because how many times can something go wrong with one person?
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The past week has been surprisingly difficult. There are a lot of things right now that are up in the air and without moving forward, nothing will be settled. Still, there are ways to prepare and things that can be done now to take the stress off. We already know how last week went, so let’s take a break from directly talking about my horrible mental health and take a look at the week ahead. Spoiler, this is another way I deal with my horrible mental health. You didn’t think it wasn’t related, right?
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Fair warning, today’s post is heavier than usual. There will be discussion about suicide, death, depression, mental health, etc. If you’re not in a good place, this probably isn’t for you. Never fear, there’s help (suicide prevention hotline for one), you’re not alone, despite what it feels like. For everyone else, welcome to my brain once again, but the content is probably not suitable for anyone, including myself.
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Aren’t there enough things trying to kill us? Between global warming, pollution, and the pandemic, I feel like something somewhere wants us gone. Then again, humans are stupid, I include myself in that statement. So here we are talking about something I wasn’t expecting to talk about and that my dear readers is combat.
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Well new year, new problems. I’m not super surprised I guess given… life. I’m incredibly tired, like mentally and physically exhausted, but we do what we need to in order to move forward. Like I said yesterday, the only way is through, so today is an example of how I try to cope with living. That’s right, time to plan and figure some things out.
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Well I’ve been on a talking about mental health kick lately and I guess that fits with today’s topic. Sometimes in life we find ourselves out numbered, outmaneuvered, outsmarted, and without any real power. It never feels good to find yourself in that kind of situation. I’m proud of how far I’ve come mentally, because if the situation I’m in now had occurred even just a few years ago, I would be checking myself into a hospital for my own safety again. When the weight of the world presses you down so hard you just want to scream, all you can do is push back.
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We’re all super busy… right? I don’t think it’s just me, we feel like there’s a mountain of things to do. Then you try to get through the list and when you look away just for a second, suddenly you have twice the work left. This is particularly troublesome for someone like me who has serious mental health issues (along with physical health issues). I want to do all the things, but my mind and body have other plans for me. Somehow I still manage my deadlines and since I was specifically asked to share, we’ll talk about how I do it.
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Sure, it’s a little early to think about graduation. Even if I finish on time, I still have a little over a year left before it’s my turn. If I don’t finish on time, then it’s anyone’s guess on when I could hope to graduate. Still, it’s something that’s been on my mind lately because I was actually looking forward to celebrating this time.
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With the weekend here, comes time for some school work. School and work is a tough combination, but I did this to myself. The payout is both in experience and security, but the risks are just as high, failure on either end would mean severe disruption to any plans I’ve made. Then there’s the third and fourth pillars to this equation, physical and mental health. Thus a complex balancing act where if one thing becomes too heavy, the whole thing topples over.
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The body is stronger than the mind. At least that was what the military drilled in me. Your mind will give up well before your body fails. Because being uncomfortable is, well uncomfortable. We don’t like discomfort and we don’t like pushing ourselves outside a limit we’re comfortable with. But constantly pushing yourself past your established limits… that isn’t good either.
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Move fast and break things. It’s the silicon valley motto. In an extremely “tech” world where the pace of computer progress has been and continues to be exponential, that motto works well and drives progress. But it isn’t without consequences. Second Sight is… or was, a tech company that promised to, at least partially, restore vision. Sadly, when the users are so entwined with the product, when a tech company hit’s the “break stuff” portion of the motto, things don’t always work out well for the user.
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What drives you? Who would you be if the world around you stripped away all the pretenses of how you should act and who you need to be and just let you be you? If it’s a bit too philosophical or overwhelming to think about, then maybe we should all take the time to ask ourselves if we are the people we want to be. Then again, I don’t have the answers, so maybe I’m just as lost as everyone else.
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“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood…” and that’s twice in almost a year exactly that I’ve started a post off with that line. The title of the poem isn’t the road less traveled, but I’ve decided that for today, that’s the name of the post. I have not had an easy life, some of that was because of birth, but a lot of it was based on the choices I’ve made. While the poem isn’t really about how hard life can be, when I thought of today’s post Frost’s poem popped into my head. Because the road less traveled, fucking hurts.
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Well we finally got approval to head back to the OR. We were having some issues with our sample size, as in we hit the max for our protocol, but after a little bit of work we’re going back! The good news is that this doesn’t just affect the project I’m working on, this means I can move forward with the other project I’ve been dying to start.
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Pick a number between one and ten. You picked the number seven. Was I right? Doesn’t matter, the point is there’s a slim chance you picked one or ten. The reason is simply because humans are bad at random number generating. Fear not! Computers are bad at it too, but that’s a problem for a world that revolves around cyber security. Randomness is so important to our daily lives, that we don’t even notice it… mostly.
Read the rest of this page »It’s been an exhausting week so, for the day at least, I’m calling it a mental health recovery day. Don’t worry though, 365 days of academia year three (wow, still at it!) will be back tomorrow. In the meantime I’m going to catch up on my sleeping and do absolutely nothing. So friendly reminder to all my readers, don’t be afraid to take care of yourself. You can’t take care of anyone if you can’t take care of yourself first.
Amid all the chaos that the lab visitor we had yesterday caused I wouldn’t blame the causal reader if you thought that the robot project was my only focus. Hospital-PI summed it up best when he said we’re all working on roughly four projects at any given time and I responded with, “you guys are only working on four?” Don’t get me wrong, I like it this way.
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Today was the day! Luckily I somehow managed to get the robot assembled and working properly… mostly. I’ll get to that. We got to showcase some of the stuff we did in the lab, I got to explain “big idea” to yet another person who may be interested in helping fund the project (since technically I’m running on a budget of funding scraps), and overall I think it was well received.
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Sixty or so hours later and I somehow finished the robot assembly. It’s been a week and a half of 12 or more hour days to get it done and I’m exhausted. Still nothing feels better than when you finish, flip the switch and everything goes exactly how you hoped. Unfortunately I’m not quite at that stage… maybe?
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There’s nothing wrong with a little competition. In the field of research you’re either the first or your a footnote, so we rush to be the first when we know that other labs are on the other labs are not far behind. Our lab knew it was coming, there was already rumblings of something big coming from another lab, but when it finally came, we were both surprised, but not exactly shocked. It’s a pretty impressive paper.
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Okay that isn’t really what happened, it was more measure once, realize the piece is directional, measure a second time, realize that the direction doesn’t matter, and after about three times finally making the cut. Then freaking out because you’ve now marked the piece three different times, but you cut the right mark… right?
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In the middle of the week we’re expecting some visitors that could lead to funding for our lab! Not that we need more projects, we already have over a dozen different projects we’re trying to power through and only three of us (including hospital-PI) to get them all done. Since we have so many projects, we’ve split them in half, literally. I’m taking all the lower limb projects and my labmate is taking upper limb. What does this have to do with the visit? It turns out, a lot.
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With all the excitement around here with the progress made towards making “big idea” a reality, you may think that I’ve forgotten about other projects and things I’m working on. That isn’t the case and I have other exciting updates regarding something I’ve been calling my “super secret technique” not the most descriptive name, but that’s sort of the point. It’s not “big idea,” but is sure isn’t a tiny idea either.
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Today was the day we pitched a proposal to two of the doctors that can help make my “big idea” a reality. It did not go anything like I planned, some of what happened was funny, some of it was horrific, but mostly it went how it needed to go. Things never go as you plan them, but this was just completely off the rails.
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Well I’m excited, tired but excited. It’s been a long week and that is partly because I have a meeting tomorrow to discuss a project that will be a big help in my PhD, but also a really cool project in general. We also have a second big meeting next week with some guests coming to see the research side of the hospital, so yeah busy!
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Well this seems to be coming up a lot lately. One of the things about working in a hospital is you get to see a lot of different opinions and cases from doctors from all areas of expertise. It gives everyone a well rounded education and frankly no matter where you are in your career it’s always good to keep up with the state of the art in your field and adjacent fields. I’m in the neurosurgery department so we get to talk a lot about the brain and spinal cord, which means pain is a frequent topic.
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Well things are moving fast. So fast I haven’t had a break. Since I have a free moment, and I really do mean moment, we might as well go for the low hanging fruit and update on the “last” paper. This paper has been in the works for years (literally years) now and we’re finally coming to a close in the chapter. At least that’s how it appears. There’s still some rough sailing ahead, but I think we’ve finally made it…. maybe.
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We ask a lot of kids, I say kids, but I guess more accurately I mean teenagers. The pipeline (here in the US anyway) is high school then, if you’re lucky enough, college. The pipeline assumes you have a clear idea at 18 what you want to be doing until retirement, which in the US is ~65 again, if you’re lucky. While in college you get a short four years, on average, to figure it out and do the work to get the degree you desire. Then you’re forced into another choice, work or more education? I don’t know about the former, but I do know about the latter choice.
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Since I have a policy of brutal honesty around here, I’m not going to lie, it’s been a minute since I seriously did any solid modeling work. I think the last time I tried in earnest to do any sort of solid modeling was for the class I taught… two years ago? So yeah, today will be fun, right we’re using the term fun. I’m okay with lying to myself.
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Lunatic Laboratories 