Question: What was it like getting your PhD in Biology?

Juan Ortiz answered on 17 Jun 2016:

It was very difficult because, when I finished my Bachelor’s Degree, I didn’t have any experience in the lab and it took me some time to get used to the new work dynamics. Experiments require great technical accuracy, otherwise they don’t work well and the results don’t allow you to make any conclusion. In addition, it is necessary to be very organised in order to keep track of the results and make conclusions out of them. I struggled with this at the beginning, but at some point midway of my PhD, I learnt how to make things work, then the real fun started. The experiments went on for 3 years and a half to 4 years until it was the moment to start writing my thesis. In the thesis it is required to write an introduction about your work, to explain why you are researching about that. This chapter must be followed by “Material and Methods” were it is explained how to do the experiments you did. Then you have to explain your results in another chapter and finally you have to discuss your results in the last chapter. When the thesis was ready and corrected by my supervisor it is sent to an independent committee. In my case, this committee was formed by 5 people. The day of my thesis dissertation I made a 40-minute presentation about my work and then for two hours they asked me a lot of questions about my work and answered them. At the end of the process they decided that I was ready and I became a Doctor in Biology!! :).

In summary, it was very hard process but it was worth it because it opened a lot of new opportunities for me and built up new skills that now are very useful for me.