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Asked by Ross0123 to Arthur, Clare, Daniel, David, Tora on 11 Nov 2014.
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Clare Harding answered on 11 Nov 2014:
When you start out you work in a lab for a professor. They generally are interested in one area of science and so you work on an aspect of this. But all of my bosses (so far) have let me choose the exact thing that I work on and have let me decide how I should research it.
Recently, I wrote an application for money to do research that was all of my own idea so now I get to work on whatever I want!
There are always some limits, for instance the time or the equipment and some things are just not really possible but generally in science you have a lot of freedom!
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Arthur Dyer answered on 11 Nov 2014:
I agree with Clare’s answer.
You start off in University studying Biology or Chemistry or Physics etc and that’s a huge area then you get the chance to work in a lab in something that you found interesting for a few weeks.
Normally people do another course after this and you get to choose what sort of lab you work in (for me it was a virus lab) and that’s very specific depending on what the boss of the lab is interested in.
Eventually you get to understand this area a little more and you can come up with your own ideas and experiments and do what you want but you can only really do that once you understand what you’re doing!
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Daniel Parsons answered on 11 Nov 2014:
Hi there,
It is a bit of both as Clare and Arthur say.
You do have a lot of freedom as a scientist, but there are some areas of science where you can get more funding to do research. Lots of funding for science comes from the government via their research councils. These bodies decide what themed areas of science should get funding as priorities different topics. I think it works quite well. But this does mean that in some senses your topic areas are “picked” for you at a funding level.
That been said – if you have a novel and interesting idea – you can usually find some funding to do the work – and that is part of the fun of it all!
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David Wilson answered on 11 Nov 2014:
Kind of both- I always wanted to do astronomy, but which particular bit of astronomy was up to what positions were on offer when I started my Phd. I actually ended up doing what I’m doing now almost by accident- they couldn’t give me the topic I applied for, but offered me different one instead. It looked interesting, so here I am!
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Tora Smulders-Srinivasan answered on 12 Nov 2014:
I’ve mostly worked for other people, as the others have said — but now I’ve gotten a bit of money & a post where I can do my own research & I’m loving it! 🙂
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