This week’s PhDetails is with Ewan Stephenson. Ewan did his undergraduate at the University of Hull where he did straight Biology but mainly specialised in human and disease biology. His Undergraduate final year project was on the cancer microenvironment and lymphangiogenesis which started his love of cell biology and interest in cancer. After his undergrad, Ewan moved to the University of Warwick and joined the ARAP (A*STAR Research Attachment Programme) and started a project in circadian rhythms of cancer cells in the lab of Dr Robert Dallmann. You can find Ewan on twitter @ewan_stephenson!
Well let’s start off talking about completely unscientific stuff: What is your favourite band pre 1980?
Ooh, these questions don’t start easy. Probably Queen though they were only two albums deep by 1980… failing that Fleetwood Mac.
Favourite band artist post 1980?
Oasis overall I think, though I am deep in a Panic! At the Disco and Logic heavy rotation at the moment.
Favourite movie?
The Grand Budapest Hotel!
Do you listen to podcasts? What are some of your favourites?
I do, I am very into The Weekly Planet who talk about films and comics and stuff but I have recently been put on to Sawbones by a friend, that talks a lot of medical history so that is really interesting.
Where do you study and who are your supervisors?
My PhD has years one and four at Warwick University and then years two and three in a research institute in Singapore. In the UK my supervisor is Robert Dallmann, out here in Singapore my supervisors are David Virshup and Vinay Tergaonkar.
Singapore isn’t a bad place to do a PhD to be honest
What year of your PhD are you in?
Year two.
Who’s giving you the money – and for how long?
A*STAR, they are a research institute in Singapore, I get four years of funding.
Do you have any publications?
Sadly not, I’m working on it, I promise.
Do you do labwork? what are the best and worst bits about it?
The best bit about labwork is when you get back data that kinda makes sense but kinda doesn’t and you have to really use your brain to figure it out, I really like that. The worst bit is pipetting colourless liquids into colourless liquids and then you get a negative result and have no idea what step in your 18 step process could have gone wrong.
How many PhDs did you apply for – what were you looking for?
I believe I applied to three or four, I can’t remember. I was just looking for a project I found interesting and in an interesting place. Moving somewhere cool was a big draw for me.
What is the most bodged piece of equipment you have had to use during labwork – did it work?
Gosh, most bodging just involves trying to fit wrong sized Erlenmeyer flasks in shaking incubators. I am currently designing a VERY bodged piece of kit at the moment. Without giving too much away, I am trying to replace an extremely expensive bit of kit with a piece of PVC tubing, some high tech cameras, and a lot of coding. I hope it will work.
What essential tool hardware/software could you not do your PhD without?
Lumicycles! Thanks Actimetrics.
What one piece of advice would you give to a masters student applying to PhDs now?
DON’T DO IT. Nah, I am joking of course. Just make sure that your PhD is something you are really interested in. I mean really interested. You can pick your undergraduate research project or masters project in something you have a passing interest in, but if you are going to study it for three to four years you’ve gotta be very interested.
How often do you meet with your supervisors?
In the UK I would meet with Robert once a week probably, normally quite informally. Here in Singapore I have a meeting with David every couple of weeks.
What supervisor traits are important to you?
Obviously you want a good scientist but I don’t always think a great scientist equals a great mentor. You want someone who is kind and wants to mentor you, not just use you as a cheaper version of a post-doc.
A great supervisor will create a great lab! (and my lab are the best)
What do you think are the worst supervisor traits?
I think the thing I hear most often from people who have bad supervisors is just that they don’t get it. PhDs are really hard and you are doing something cutting edge which, at best, a handful of people have done before ever. It is easy to make mistakes or just for things not to work and I think some supervisors don’t understand that and just want results ASAP.
In one sentence what is your PhD about?
Every cell in your body has a molecular circadian clock, cancer tends to get rid of that clock and I want to know why, if we know anything about cancer it probably isn’t for altruistic reasons.
Cancer cells are pretty when they aren’t trying to kill you
What has been your academic highlight of the last year?
This is an easy one. The SCNi Circadian Summer School at the University of Oxford was amazing. It was great to meet all of the important movers and shakers in the field and get a good base knowledge about the history and basis of our field. I think the best part was meeting my peers though, everyone was really engaged and interested in each other, I am a great proponent of the greatest scientific ideas happening down at the pub when you are throwing ideas around.
My submission to the SCNi Summer School, the jury is out on if green works on a poster
Have you had an academic low-point of the last year – if so what happened?
I guess right now probably. I am wrestling with library prep cloning and the troubleshooting has been taking months and it still isn’t working well yet. Molecular biology can be finicky sometimes.
Which academic idol/scientist have you met?
I try not to have idols to the best of my ability because I think it can be a bit of a problem, I don’t always manage that though. I really enjoyed meeting all of the big circadian researchers at the aforementioned summer school. It is cool meeting everyone who’s name you have been reading in papers for a year or more.
Which academic idol/scientist would you most like to meet?
I think Emily Graslie. Science Communication is super important in the modern world, the sore lack of it in the past is a big threat to the world at the moment and I think Emily is a master at it. I would love to meet her one day!
Do you have a favourite paper?
Legit or a joke? I think bar one or two bits Circadian actin dynamics drive rhythmic fibroblast mobilization during wound healing by Hoyle et al. (2017) is an amazing paper which really showcases the importance of the circadian field with some very elegant experiments. As a joke (kinda) I really like A comprehensive overview of chemical-free consumer products by Goldberg and Chemjobber (2014).
What has been your favourite conference so far – why?
If I assume the Summer School I mentioned doesn’t count, I really enjoyed the Frontiers in Cancer Science conference in Singapore this year. It was nice to get back to some proper cancer biology because I have spent a year neglecting it. There were a few Nobel Prize winners knocking around there too.
What hours do you typically work?
9.30 until between 6 and 7 on a normal day I think. I try to minimise the number of days I am staying until 8pm+ but that is sometimes unavoidable.
How do you avoid procrastinating?
With great difficulty. Did you know it is possible to deactivate your Facebook account without getting rid of messanger? That has helped I must admit.
What motivates you in your day to day PhD life?
I’ve gotta know. Just in general in my life I need to get to the bottom of things or they really bother me. A PhD is just a drawn out version of that I think.
What do you do when you’re not working – how do you balance it with your PhD?
Most of my spare time I just hang out with friends. I am a massive D&D nerd though, I play that weekly with my housemates and spend fair amount of my spare time thinking about story elements for that.
If a genie could grant you one wish to help with your PhD what would you wish for?
The ability to know exactly what has failed in a molecular biology protocol.
What would be your dream job?
Emily Graslie’s job perhaps. I also fancy science policy sometimes. I am not sure really, it depends on the day you ask me.
Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
This is another one which is very in flux. I think, even if I do want to continue in academia in the future, I would like to have stepped out at least for some time in five years. Maybe industry or politics or communication, I think I would be a better academic if I had tried my hand at spinning different plates.
One word to sum up your future in academia: vacillating
What do you want to achieve outside of academia in the coming year?
I really would like to publish some content for my hobby (D&D) I have a lot of ideas and should get them in print eventually.
Who has been your academic role model/inspiration and why?
The members of my UK lab have really inspired me in my first year. If I can be even half as good a scientist as they all are then I will be very happy.
Where is somewhere you would like to work in the future?
I really want to live in New York, I’m a living and breathing cliché I know.
Do you have a favourite organism?
I really respect the ‘make love, not war’ philosophy of Bonobos and I think orangutans are beautiful animals but if I had to pick one it would be something in the corvidae family. They are super clever birds and I really enjoy watching them solve problems. Just watch a crow doing something in the wild, you can really see their intellect in action.
Are there any social interactions/meetings which have enhanced your PhD experience ?
Every time I meet with my peers in any social capacity I feel that I learn 100x more than I expected to.
If you could change one thing about your group/department structure what would it be?
I would strip back some bureaucracy when it comes to finance, ordering chemicals etc. is extremely hard and, I think, can lead to some silly practices. I understand the reasoning for tight health and safety regulations but I do think that, often, they are thought up by people who aren’t using the systems day to day.
What major question in your subject area is yet to be addressed – why is it important and why isn’t anyone addressing it?
Why do cells undergo type one phase resetting at all when type zero appears to be better? Why are there brakes on the circadian clock at all? I think someone is currently working on addressing it, not in my group though, but I will be very excited to see the data when it comes out.
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