PhD: An update

Time done: 30 months
Time left in lab: 9 months
Time to write up: 9 months
Mood: wildly bouncing from euphoria to depression

So I thought I would do a quick update on how my PhD is going since it’s been a while.

I am officially ok with my hypothesis!

Before Christmas was the hardest my whole PhD has been. I had spent a year analysing and testing my Illumina MethylationEPIC array (which looks at over 850,000 CpG sites across the genome - not that many considering how many there actually are). I found sites that had significant increases and decreases in methylation when I treat with my drug, spent months validating them using pyrosequencing and what did I find? Nothing. It didn’t validate. It was soul crushing.

Buuuut I bounced back. Had a massive rethink with James (my supervisor). We thought about what my drug theoretically does and how that could affect epigenetics and I came up with a new, testable hypothesis. We were assuming my drug does a very specific thing that can be reproduced over and over (eg it always causes the same change in DNA methylation in the same place regardless of what cell line I use or how many times I test it). But maybe it’s not so specific but a bit more random, which is totally fine!

This new direction also means my Illumina MethylationEPIC array analysis wasn’t a waste of time. Celebrations all around!

And it seems to be going well so far. Well except that I have been troubleshooting the same western blot for nearly three months (and beating my head against a wall. Chairs may have nearly been flung through windows). There has been some tears not gonna lie. It’s hard to do the same 2-4 day experiment over and over to prove the result you got in the first place (in bloody January) was correct all along. Science - when you know you’re right but you have to show all the wrong ways to do it to prove you’re right!

So what’s the plan now?
Well I am going to the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Conference 2018 Chicago in April (there will be many vlogs, blogs etc) to present what I’ve found so far! Absolutely terrifying since I’ve only started to believe in my results like....last week.

I have about 9 months left of work in the lab before I need to write it all as a thesis. That will consist of learning a few new techniques (RNA-seq, ChIP-PCR) and to get a bit more of an idea of what’s going on and how I can sum this all up in a pretty bow.

I’m also getting another masters student to supervise (YAY) which I’m very excited about because I really like the project I wrote and the results regardless of what comes out are gonna be very interesting. She’s starting at the start of May and finishing up in September.

I need to write some papers! I apparently have to publish my data (who knew) so the next six months will be writing up what I've done so far in a paper, getting it peer reviewed by people in my group so I can find any holes and plug them before December. I can then sent the actual papers off for real peer review and (hopefully) publication. 

And that's it. Sounds simple enough but it's taken 7.30am starts working 5-7 days a week to sum up everything I've done since August in a few paragraphs. I've even started drinking coffee in work. I shake violently when I drink coffee. It's not a good idea.

I have one last thing to say to anyone thinking of doing a PhD, to people currently doing PhDs or anyone living with a person doing a PhD: 

To the person thinking of doing a PhD: be prepared. I want to scream at you "DON'T DO IT, IT'LL RUIN YOUR LIFE" but I won't. We need more researchers so we need more PhDs. But I will say be prepared. It is not all rainbows and unicorns. It's hard and it will drain the soul out of you. But then you'll get a result and feel like the smartest person in the world. You will love and hate the 3-4 years of your life doing a PhD. But really...be prepared to hate it a lot more of that time than you think. 

To the person currently doing their PhD: you are a god damn hero. Keep going. You may feel like you're drowning or that "maybe a masters for this isn't so bad, I should give up". DON'T. You have given your blood, sweat and tears to this thing. You are going to finish. Even if I have to carry you. But seriously. You have got this. You are smarter than you know, you are incredibly dedicated and you will finish. No one knows what doing a PhD feels like until they have done one. No ones knows the soul crushing pain. I know. And I know you have got this. 

To the person living with a PhD: please be patient. I know you don't understand what they're doing. I know you don't get why a little comma could cause a massive mental breakdown, the consumption of ALL of the ice cream and you getting shouted at but trust me there's a reason. It's hours, weeks, months or years worth of work that your loved one has just watched go down the drain (this specific example is for programmers but is applicable to all types of PhD). Just keep supporting and loving and caring for the lunatic PhD because they need it. And thank you for being there. Your presence means more than you will ever know. 

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PS: I know I haven't been posting a lot. I do apologise but every second of my waking life is going into completing my AACR poster so bear with me. 

PPS: Apparently I have a very neat desk in my office and all other desks should aspire to look like mine......Weird email sent around the office!? So.....don't get too jealous everyone...

Cute animal photos keeping me sane are courtesy of the wonderful Fota Wildlife Park Ranger (Liam) supporting this lunatic PhD (me).