In article <v01520d01af90dcb863c7@[192.73.4.201]>, Paul Schlosser
<schlosser at ciit.org> writes
>....
>suggested that I might also become involved with the air-flow project:
>a project in which computational fluid dynamics and mass-transport
>analyses are being used to predict uptake of gases and vapors in the
>upper respiratory tract (nose). [Formaldehyde causes nasal tumors in
>rats, but morticians, pathologists, and industry-exposed workers do
>not get them. Why?] I said that I didn't have much of a background
>in mass transport, so wasn't sure what I could contribute. I must
>have also showed some of the reluctance/lack of interest I was feeling.
>>The president then went to the dry-erase board and drew a learning
>curve--steep and the beginning then leveling off. He said that as you
>keep working in an area, you will get to that leveling off. You're
>still making progress, but it's much slower. He then drew another
>learning curve above the first, starting just into the leveling off
>section of the 1st. He said that for my career I should then move onto
>a new learning curve. (The y-axis was 'success' or 'recognition.')
>And then he drew another curve on top of that one, and then another.
But what's the point, if at the end of your 'career' you still haven't
done the science you actually wanted to do?
>>I have just had a paper accepted in the International Journal of Heat
>and Mass Transfer (a major journal in the field).
So does this means you've done great science, you can now keep your job
for a little longer or both? Is it what you want to do or have to do? Do
you just do what you're told or advised or do you go where your
scientific curiousity takes you? It's a difficult decision to take
because it you take the later and as you imply, you're out of a job.
>>Moving to a new curve does not mean that you completely drop the old
>one (unless you move onto 3 or 4 new curves at once, as I did.) But
>my suggestion for all members of the group is that you look out for
>opportunities to branch out, if you haven't done so already. (Sounds
>like Doug K. has.) You should certainly take 'natural' branches that
HOLD ON HERE. Can I ask why most of us in this group do science? Surely
it's not because you can get a job with it!? Don't sell your soul!
I only do it for one reason and that is because I like it, it's
certainly *not* because I can get a job with it (which is why I havn't
got one in it), or a better job, or lots of money, or just money, or for
fame or status, or to please family members with status, or to have an
easy life, or because it's a career, or a stepping stone to some great
adminisrative job, or to travel to conferences held at nice places, or
to re-engineer society, or to cure diseases, or to invent gadgets, and
so on... Has it become so old-fashioned and out of step with the times
to claim that one does science because of pure and simple curiosity?
>draw a lot from your existing expertise, but remember "if you're a
>hammer, all the world looks like a nail." Don't look for MCA-like
>problems, look for important problems that you can solve. If you can
See below but MCA is *not* the end of the story in quantitative
metabolic biochemistry, it's just a scratch on the surface. The reason
why MCA is talked about so much is not because people are blinded by it
but because it's the first of what could be a real renaissance in
quantitative biochem, and I think you'll agree that it has cleared up a
fair bit of confusion in metabolic biochem. MCA also supplies many
testable predictions and novel experimental approaches which I am sure
that if done correctly would uncover many new details of metabolism.
>use the tools of MCA in the process, great, but if the problem forces
>you to develop totally new mathematical tools, I'd say that's even
>better.
As for MCA, it is itself only a stepping stone, it it *certainly not*
the end of the story. When I started in this area there was virtually
nothing available to quantitatively describe metabolic systems,
metabolism was a black box, sure we had modelling but in my hands at
least it just turned into another black box, it was only in conjuction
with MCA that modelling really became useful to me.
Sure stable steady states are pretty boring, but it's a start. MCA/BST
is after all the first decent formal description of complete metabolic
systems, have you anything better in mind? Once steady state MCA has
been sorted out (the framework is finished, many consequences still to
be worked out) it's time to move on, and you're the people with the
resources and money to do it, most of you in this group do after all get
a guaranteed salary to do this sort of work.
>>-Paul
>>Herbert
--
Herbert M Sauro
email: HSauro at fssc.demon.co.uk
Telephone: 01974 282428
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"He who cannot draw on 3000 years is living from hand to mouth" Goethe
"Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for?"
R Browning.
