research

Harmonizing Research and A Cappella: How Music Fuels My Scientific Journey

Posted on November 18, 2024October 28, 2024 by Nathan Nguyen

Photo of the members of the Princeton Footnotes in the year 2024-2025, taken at Rocky courtyard — *Photo of the Footnotes, Princeton’s fresh low-voice a cappella group founded in 1959*

Imagine standing in front of a big audience, heart racing, ready to blend your voice with others and hit the notes of an intricate a cappella arrangement. Every beat, every breath, is crucial. Every time I stand on stage or under an arch with my a cappella group, the Princeton Footnotes, I think of how similar singing and music feels to what I do in the lab. You might be thinking that singing in an a cappella group and doing research are worlds apart. However, these two passions have formed a bond in ways that I never believed possible. In fact, the creativity, collaboration, and discipline I have channeled in being a part of the Footnotes have made me a better researcher—and vice versa.

The Art of Chasing: Securing a Response to Your Emails

Posted on October 21, 2024October 21, 2024 by Alexis Wu

Image taken from above of Firestone Library, with ten individuals studying or working on laptops. — *Students working in Firestone Library, perhaps sending an email to an adviser!*

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.

On-Campus this Summer? Read This.

Posted on May 10, 2023May 7, 2023 by Amaya Dressler

*Rockefeller College in the summer.* *Photo Credits: Daniel A. Day (2014)*

So you’ve been brave, reached out to that professor whose research you’ve always admired, and just confirmed a summer on campus doing the research of your dreams. Whether you’re a part of an on-campus research cohort (like ReMatch or HMEI) or starting up your own independent work, summer on-campus is a special, if not bewildering, experience. If you are anything like me, the first few weeks may be a little confusing as you figure out what is expected of you and what exactly you want for yourself. Even though you’re doing research full-time, you’ll likely find that you’re substantially less busy than you were during the school year. This raises some important questions about how you choose to spend your free time. Who are you outside of research? How do you navigate the campus when you’re no longer a full-time student? Beyond time-management, what else should you know about being on-campus in the summer? Below I’ve compiled a short list of advice I’ve found most helpful during my summers on campus.

Need Resources For Your Next Paper? Visit the Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library!

Posted on November 18, 2022November 14, 2022 by Alexis Wu

Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library

In this post, I share my experience of requesting resources from Princeton’s Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library for a research paper in ART102/ARC102: An Introduction to the History of Architecture. I took the Spring 2022 iteration of the course, taught by Professor Basile Baudez and Professor Samuel Holzman. The course provided an overview of architectural history from ancient Egypt to the modern-day through key monuments and architectural movements.

One of my favorite parts of ART102 was our semester-long research project. Students have the opportunity to delve deeper into the history of any building in the Princeton community. My peers covered a wide range of buildings, including Firestone Library, the Graduate College, and the University Chapel. Inspired by my involvement with the Princeton University Art Museum as a student tour guide, I chose to research Bainbridge House (now repurposed as Art@Bainbridge, one of the Museum’s gallery spaces on Nassau Street).

A Week in My Life Doing Materials Science Research

Posted on March 14, 2022March 14, 2022 by Bridget Denzer

This semester, I am doing junior independent work in the Arnold lab group at Princeton, which is based in the MAE department but also focuses on materials science, which is what I am interested in. My project investigates creating graphene aerogels from protein precursors, which basically means that I get to select different proteins of interest, freeze-dry them, pyrolyze them, and then see if they create graphene by examining them under a scanning electron microscope (SEM). These graphene aerogels are interesting materials because of their high porosity and conductivity, making them promising for applications to energy storage, which is why we are interested in researching them.

I thought it might be interesting to highlight a week in my life (well, actually two weeks) to give some insight on what lab-based independent work can look like during the school year. I want to note that this is only my experience as a CBE major, and independent work can look very different for other majors. If you’re an underclassman interested in doing junior independent work or just curious about what that could entail, I hope that this post can provide some insight.

photo taken by Bridget Denzer — *The inside of Bowen Hall, the hub of the Princeton Institute of Materials and where my research lab is*.

A Look into the Publishing Process for Academic Journals

Posted on December 2, 2021December 2, 2021 by Bridget Denzer

An important part of research is writing and publishing papers in peer-reviewed academic journals. Through a Princeton-alumni sponsored internship last summer, I was fortunate enough to co-author and publish two materials science review papers, one in a journal called Gels and the other in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences, both a part of the Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute, or MDPI. Since the publishing process was entirely new to me, I thought it would be helpful to give some insight into what publishing looks like, which is helpful especially if you are interested in pursuing research in graduate school. I will note that although having published papers is helpful for admission to graduate school, it is by no means required.

NCBI: An Invaluable Tool for Life Sciences Classes and Research!

Posted on November 3, 2021 by Sandeep Mangat

Have you ever come across something in class that you wish you could get a better Have you ever been wondering more about how proteins are made in the body? Or have you ever been looking for a specific type of lab experiment protocol for your independent work? If yes, then look no further than the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) website! It contains dozens of resources, some of which I have found to be very handy in my own research and school experiences. The site is tailored for students in the life-sciences field, but there is a lot of breadth in the resources available—you’ll be able to find useful tools regardless of whether you’re a MOL or CHM major, or if you’re interests lie in researching chemically synthesis mental health, or neurodegenerative diseases.

Screenshot by Sandeep M. — *The NCBI Logo, as it appears on the website*

A very useful tool on the NCBI website is Bookshelf. There is a search bar at the top of the website where you can input some topic, book title, or field name, and the program will return a variety of different reference materials relating to the query, including full scientific textbooks, book chapters, studies. On the side, there are often figures and graphs that may relate to your search.

Screenshot by Sandeep Mangat — *Some sample search results within Bookshelf if I look up “synaptic plasticity”*

Census Records, Wills, and Obituaries: Exploring the Ancestry Library

Posted on November 1, 2021 by Austin Davis

Have you ever wondered about your family history?

Besides the DNA kits offered by Ancestry and 23andMe, there are more concrete ways of piecing together the different tales that aunts and uncles spin at family reunions. Thankfully, as Princeton students, we are given access to a powerful database to locate, explore, and utilize different genealogical records to the benefit of both our personal and academic research: the Ancestry library. I had earlier discovered this resource through the class HIS 388: Unrest and Renewal in Urban America, whose instructor is Alison Isenberg, who was just featured in PCUR!

You might be asking: What kind of records does Ancestry keep? The records are multitudinous. From census records to wills to obituaries to yearbook photos, Ancestry keeps records from many different places, different times, and different people. The bulk of these records are government documents, often created, collected, and stored by bureaucrats for the purpose of institutional record-keeping and tracking individuals. According to Ancestry, these records are collected from different archives of information across the world, where they are then digitized, made machine-readable, and uploaded to their public database.

So, what does this all mean? What can we do with these documents? Let me show you.

Writing a Literature Review? Some Tips Before You Start

Posted on October 11, 2021 by Agnes Robang

Writing the literature review section for a scientific research article can be a daunting task. This blog post is a summary of what I have personally found to best help when writing about scientific research. I hope some of these tips can help make the process an easier and more fulfilling experience!

Worried About a Lack of In-Person Research Experience? Don’t Be. Here’s Why.

Posted on May 14, 2021 by Bridget Denzer

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, a lot of in-person internships and research positions for students have been transitioned to remote opportunities. Last summer after my first year of college, I opted to take online classes over the summer because in-person opportunities were not a possibility. For this upcoming summer, I was hoping to gain laboratory experience in person, but my internship was also transitioned online. With only one summer left before I apply to graduate school, this left me with a looming question: will I have enough in-person research experience before I apply to graduate school?

Although this question bothered me for a while, I realized that I was approaching this issue from the wrong perspective. I feel as though many students are probably dealing with similar issues now that many summer opportunities have been canceled or moved online due to the pandemic. In this article, I am going to walk through the reasoning behind why you should not worry too much about lacking in-person research experience and also include some additional opportunities you should be on the lookout for.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: