It’s been two months since I started as a graduate student at NYU’s PhD program in Biology, and I am finally getting around to doing something I’ve been considering for a while: starting (and hopefully maintaining) a blog. Maybe a proper introduction is in order.
I am a twenty-eight-year-old Bangladeshi-American en route to becoming an evolutionary biologist. Or that’s the path I currently feel I am most likely to take.
I grew up in Bangladesh, and moved to the US with my entire family when I was eighteen. I completed Bachelor’s and Master’s programs in the biomedical sciences, and then to give myself time to think (among other reasons), moved back to Bangladesh to teach at a university.
Teaching was fascinating, and basically rewired me as a person to be more attentive and diligent. The material I taught helped me hone in on a novel interest in genomics and computational biology while bringing into central focus a perpetual but until then peripheral interest in evolution.
So now I am a PhD student. I want to blog for several reasons. On a general level, I would like to document my graduate school experience as much for myself as for others like my former students in Bangladesh who should benefit from a blueprint for a career in research. More specifically, here is the kind of content I am aiming to come out with, at least initially:
- Short posts on concepts or themes I come across in my classes, rotations, and eventually, thesis project
- More personal accounts of grad school experiences and milestones
- Updates on a couple of projects in science communication I am leading with collaborators in Bangladesh
- Short science communication pieces on research I find exciting in the fields of genomics, population genetics, immunology, microbiology, and evolutionary biology
- Historical takes on specific sub-fields or discoveries
I see the last two, and to a broader extent, this whole project, as a kind of dress rehearsal for future forays into science journalism. Hope you find this blog fun and useful.
Ornob
The Genome Inquirer 