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Keeping
Up the Communication in Science
Marc West
I work at the Defence Science and Technology Organisation,
and on April
12th I found myself up at 4.50am so I could get to work by
5.30 for a video teleconference with the UK, USA, NZ and Canada.
Being in Australia, and day light savings having just ended,
we drew the short straw with regards to the timing. This was
somewhat exciting, it always feels meaningful to be going
out of your way to be at work at strange hours to talk to
the rest of the world.
Having this international collaboration is
one of the most interesting parts of my job
as it has allowed me to travel to the US last year and work
with interesting
people.
So by 3 in the afternoon I was stuffed. I must admit though
that this was not the highlight of my scientific day - in
fact the highlight has nothing to do with what I'm paid to
do.
I do a radio show over the phone in China
- the "Mr Science" show where each week we talk
for 5 minutes or so about a topic in popular science (certainly
nothing about defence). This week we did a show on the new
species of hominids found in Indonesia recently and on the
strange animals that exist on the island of Flores in general.
It is quite fun doing the show, as science communication
is my main passion. So researching the story,
blogging it at www.misterscience.blogspot.com and telling
it to the Chinese listening audience, all whilst half alseep,
whilst if not exciting, was memorable!
The work I do with DSTO is essentially problem solving,
and the VTC allowed me to work in a collaborative environment
from which you learn new techniques, interesting information
and simply unique perspectives. This is the type of work I
am interested in - working in these group environments and
communicating science in different fora.
This is also what I love about the Mr Science show - having
the chance to once a week research an entirely new topic,
write it up, put it on the web and present it over the radio
is exactly the type of work I want to do. Its a pity it doesn't
pay all that much, unless you're Dr Karl, so I keep my day
job and work at these other endeavours freelance (well, for
free actually).
I have always been interested in science and imagine I always
will be. I like the idea of finding a problem to solve, assessing
it and going through the process of solving it, and then communicating
it. Often the communication is the most interesting
part. I did chemistry, maths and physics at school, and once
uni came around, I found that chemistry looked after me and
interested me the most. So I did honours in physical/theoretical
chemistry.
I also completed half a law degree, but found that it didn't
hold my attention as well as science. Following this, I completed
a graduate diploma in science communication and did science
shows to school kids around the country in order to pursue
my science communication dreams.
Now, I have a stable job and harbour ideas to continue with
the science communication work, as well as the problem solving
work, into the future. I couldn't say exactly what the future
holds, hopefully more trips overseas!
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