Tuesday 4 December 2012

PhD week 39: Conferences

Not-so-gratuitous picture: Bats that walk—Humeri of Icarops aenae (A–E), Mystacina robusta (F–H), M. tuberculata (I–L). M–O are schematics showing the morphological features of interest.

A big part of the social aspect of scientific research are conferences. These provide opportunities for scientists to present their research, learn what their colleagues are up to and offer and accept (ideally) useful criticism of their research. They also provide the opportunity to discuss problems and ideas and form long-lasting collaborations and friendships.

Over the past week Lincoln University has hosted two conferences, the New Zealand Ecological Society Conference, and the New Zealand Molecular Ecology Conference. The scope of these conferences broadly overlap, but are very different in execution. The EcoSoc conference was a moderately large conference of around 300 people, with several sessions happening concurrently over three days, and talks by some of the big names in New Zealand ecology. The Molecular Ecology Conference was much smaller with around 40 attendees, had a strong student focus, and was held in the Wainui YMCA campground. Both were valuable conferences to attend, and I learned a lot the speakers at from formal and informal discussions.


Read:
   Borg MJ. 2001. Reading the Bible Again for the First Time. HarperOne, New York.

Watched:
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Season 6

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