Industrial placement student - lab based Review

There are usually a few meetings in a day, which I can either attend in person or online. that gives me a bit of flexibility if I have an experiment planned for the day. if I do have an experiment planned, I will have booked my equipment the days prior so that when I come into the office I can get going right away. if I have data to analyse I will often do that in the afternoon and then review it with my supervisor if I am unsure.

public speaking (presenting in meetings), ELISA, RT-qPCR, target review (creative thinking and submitting new target ideas), working with human tissue, assay development. getting trained on a variety of equipment to introduce automation into my lab work such as the use of the Hamilton, Kingfisher Flex systems, Quantstudio, ECHO, Tapestation

Responsibility started very low and progressively increased as my confidence increased. Helping with ongoing projects by the end meant that data i generated actually affected the course some drugs will take.

to start with, my confidence levels in the lab were not very high, my supervisor was very supportive and was there with me throughout all my experiments until i progressively became more confident. once i became confident and had practiced the protocols a few times i was then happy to run my experiments in my own time. i then slowly started learning to identify flaws in my protocol and alterations needed to optimise what i was doing. regular meetings and interactions with my supervisor were really helped me learn how to identify changes needed to be made and how to go about planning my following experiments. By the end I am running my own experiments in my own time, not needing assistance.

Everyone is very helpful from start to finish. people are happy to teach each other new skills or advise on how to make work more efficient. Sharing reagents is also very common so a real sense of comradery is definitely present with in the lab. a lot of events and groups like AZInspire which aim to create an atmosphere to make everyone feel welcome by hosting events during work days and outside of work too.

I really enjoyed my time and having settled in so well I really don't want to leave. people are lovely and the facilities for research are amazing. i have met some amazingly smart and genuinely lovely people and friends during my year and would 100% recommend it to anyone thinking about doing a placement

Yes

Don't be scared to apply if you think you don't have the skills or knowledge, as long as you are open to learning they will be happy to have you as there are plenty of opportunities to develop the skills needed and knowledge for your project. Creative thinking is encouraged and new ideas are always very welcome. Going into it have a good idea of what department or area of research you would like to go into however, be open minded as you may not receive the exact project you may have initially wanted. Skills learned are all transferable and there are always options to ask to shadow and learn from other students and projects.