Hi, I’m Ashleigh. I’m a neuroscience PhD candidate from Scotland, and it has taken all of my willpower not to begin this post with ‘hello, world!’.
Hello, world! Who am I?
I’m currently in the final year of my PhD, where I’ve spent 4 years researching the molecular and cellular mechanisms which underlie psychiatric disorders, such as schizophrenia. I spend a lot of my time investigating the developmental regulation of a particular subset of neurons in relation to various genetic and environmental disruption (inhibitory GABAergic interneurons, for all my neuro people).
This type of research means I spend a whole lot of time tucked away in a lab wearing a very unflattering lab-coat. I love conducting experiments, but there’s only so much pipetting of tiny volumes of clear liquid into another clear liquid that a girl can sanely tolerate! Over the course of my PhD, I found a love for something I’ve always feared: writing.
I’m not entirely sure why, but scientists garnered something of a reputation for disliking writing. Writing is often sold as an entirely creative process, while science is touted as strictly logical. Of course, this type of black-and-white, binary classification is completely ill-fitting… but that didn’t stop me from conforming to this meme for the majority of my academic life.
After finishing my first scientific manuscript for journal submission, I had a startling revelation: I actually enjoy writing.
The manuscript still remains in peer-review, in case you wondered…
How did I end up here?
As I approached the final year of my PhD, I hatched a plan to make a little extra cash… Goodness knows, graduate students need it. I set myself up a Fiverr account and started writing original content for blogs, editing book chapters, articles and all sorts. I’ve been privileged to hear and learn a lot about the interesting ideas of my customers through this work. However, whenever I’m due to fall asleep, my head spins with my own ideas which I’d like to explore with my own writing. Writing is a creative craft that requires a lot of practice – something which I haven’t had much of yet.
And that’s how I ended up here.
I decided to set up this blog as a sort of repository for all of my personal writing. Ultimately, I’d like to foster a practice of daily writing. I’d also like to explore my own thoughts and ideas through this practice, from neuroscience and beyond. I’ll aim to discuss concepts from my own research and the wider neuroscience community. I also plan to unpack ideas from further field – from science to philosophy. If the occasion arises, I might also share some of my own experiences.
The best advice I could find from science was to announce and commit to this habit publicly. Seriously, there’s science behind this.
How did you end up here?
There is a lot about our digitally hyperconnected, ‘smart’ world that terrifies me. However, I will concede that this technological age has enabled some quite incredible things. So, if you’re already here, I’d encourage you to come with me on this journey. I’d love to hear your ideas, your thoughts and your experiences. Perhaps we can even delve into the ‘meta’; you can let me know your ideas, thoughts and experiences about my ideas, thoughts and experiences.
In essence, it would be wonderful to share this project with others. It’s possible my small corner of the internet could be useful to a couple of other humans.
If you’re interested, please follow along and reach out.
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