As Princeton students in 2024, we’ve all heard other students throwing around the terms “connections” and “networking.” Although I myself was eager to take advantage of Princeton’s vast resources, I didn’t quite know where to start, or how to start. To those of you who are facing a similar dilemma, let me introduce you to an incredible, vastly underutilized resource: our alumni network.
Continue reading The Alumni Advantage: Tapping into Princeton’s Network
In a world where instant responses to messages are possible, it can be especially frustrating when, after several days, you’re still waiting for a response on a time-sensitive issue. Many of us have experienced this before: asking an adviser a question, checking with a teammate if they’ve completed their tasks, and so on. Yet even with conventional wisdom on how to receive a response (crafting a compelling subject line, personalizing a message, or keeping an email short and sweet), responses can be elusive.
The truth is, the people we work with as students, researchers, or employees often have busy schedules. They may have several responsibilities vying for their attention, and sometimes an email just falls lower on their list of priorities. We want to resolve our questions and continue making progress as quickly as possible, yet help does not always come that quickly. In this article, I share key tips I’ve learned through discussions with my managers, colleagues, and advisers over the course of my time as a student and working in industry.
Continue reading The Art of Chasing: Securing a Response to Your Emails
When I first walked into the lab this summer, I thought research was all about running experiments and gathering data. What I didn’t expect was how much the people around me—the mentorship and the shared triumphs and failures—would shape so much of my learning and how I view scientific research.
Starting a research position at a bioengineering lab over the summer was really intimidating for me, especially as an undergraduate. At the start, I felt like the most inexperienced person in a room full of graduate students, postdocs, and faculty who seem to have it all figured out. Although I’ve learned or at least seen a lot of the quantitative and qualitative components in my Chemical and Biological Engineering course, I did not have much hands-on experience and critical thinking that comes with actually doing experiments. That’s when I realized how big of a role a mentor plays.
Continue reading Mentorship Matters: A Summer of Research and Growth
Princeton moves fast. The semester is short, the classes are dense, and before you know it, you’re taking midterms and turning in papers for your writing sem. At least, that was my experience as a first year. Even now as a sophomore, it can feel hard trying to keep up with the pace of the orange bubble. Balancing the demands of coursework alongside the demands of work for research teams and professional clubs can limit how productive I feel at any given moment. Those moments, when I feel I’ve done all the readings I can do and written everything I can think about, are so challenging because it feels like I’ve hit an academic wall. That’s when I find ways to shake things up with a study break. For me, that looks like taking a walk. I know it sounds cliche, but taking a walk can be one of the best solutions because it’s so simple.
Continue reading My Go To Study Break
Following the seasonal series theme of “Niche vs. Expansive Research Topics”, I interviewed Dr. Bjarke Frost Nielsen on his journey going from a Physics PhD to working in our EEB department and all of the different topics he’s worked on along the way.
Dr. Nielsen shares, “In general, I have a very broad notion of what physics is. I don’t think for something to qualify as physics it has to, you know, involve Newton’s 2nd Law, be describable in terms of the Schrödinger Equation, or something like that. I think that physics is essentially the science that tries to mathematically tackle the aspects of our physical world that can be attacked mathematically. That’s more or less what physics is, right? It’s choosing the areas where you think that a mathematical description can really capture the problem. … It’s a very broad science in that way.”
Read on to learn more about Dr. Nielsen’s reflections on his research background in Physics and current work in EEB.
Continue reading Seasonal Series: Interview with Bjarke Nielsen, EEB/HMEI
Jake Snell is a DataX postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Computer Science at Princeton University, where he develops novel deep learning algorithms by drawing insights from probabilistic models. He is currently serving as a lecturer for SML 310: Research Projects in Data Science.
As I dive deeper into my computer science coursework, I’ve found myself engaging increasingly with statistics and machine learning (hereafter abbreviated as SML). Opportunities to conduct SML research are abound at Princeton: senior theses, junior independent work, research-based courses such as SML 310: Research Projects in Data Science, joining research labs, and much more. There is such a wide variety of research opportunities, and so many nuanced pathways that students can take while exploring SML research. So, for this seasonal series, I wanted to speak with professors and researchers who are more advanced in their research journeys to share their insight and advice to undergraduate students.
Continue reading Journeying through Statistics & Machine Learning Research: An Interview with Jake Snell
In the spirit of upcoming senior thesis deadlines, I wanted to interview a senior currently working on their thesis. As an underclassman that doesn’t have to worry about any form of independent work yet and a COS BSE major, one of the only majors exempt from the senior thesis requirement, I’ve always been curious about the thesis writing process and what a BSE senior thesis entails. As a part of our Seasonal Series, I am excited to present my interview with Eric, as he shares his ORFE senior thesis, his interest in finance, and his advice for rising seniors.
Continue reading Seasonal Series: An Interview with Eric AhnWhether writing a paper or providing a presentation, you will often find yourself relying on the completed work of others to synthesize information about a subject. An essential part of using these outside sources is to give their owners rightful credit in your references! Read some tips below on making citations easier.
Last semester, I interviewed Albert Lee ‘24 to get a glimpse of what conducting qualitative research for sociology Junior Papers can look like at Princeton. (If you’re interested in reading that piece, click here!). Discussing qualitative research with Albert was exciting because his words of advice were quite applicable to the qualitative Computer Science research I was conducting in COS 436: Human-Computer Interaction (HCI).
An example user prompt and ChatGPT response.
Prior to taking COS 436, I had little idea of what qualitative research looked like in Computer Science, particularly because many of the CS courses I had taken were quantitative, involving systems, mathematical models, or theory. Taking the course opened my eyes to a whole side of research: interview-based qualitative research. For my semester-long research project, my team and I aimed to dive deeper into educators’ opinions on the use of ChatGPT in CS education.
Continue reading Tips for Recruiting Interviewees: My Qualitative Research on ChatGPT Use in CS Education
As a student surrounded by peers working on their junior papers or senior theses, as well as constantly hearing about groundbreaking faculty research, I came to seek a way to better engage with the research around me, and to synthesize current research and processes to bring insights to others. I decided to create a series of research insights, interviewing faculty and students, to learn more about their research topics, their personal research process and interests, as well as the potential implications from their findings.
In this article, I’m excited to have had the opportunity to interview Professor Claire Gmachl, who has also previously taught me in EGR 151: Foundations of Engineering: Mechanics, Energy, and Waves, the first physics course in the Engineering Sequence. In our interview, Professor Gmachl graciously shared insights into her research journey, shedding light on the multifaceted landscape of mid-infrared photonics and semiconductor devices.
Continue reading Research Insights Series: An Interview with Claire F. Gmachl
