What challenges do you face in your research?

Question: What challenges do you face in your research?
- Keywords:
  challenge,
  research
Asked by anon-350898 on 7 Mar 2023. This question was also asked by anon-353574.
- Jo Ellis answered on 7 Mar 2023:
  
  Determining exactly what the problem is with a product – has a formula degraded, do the customers what something changing, but often they don’t know so understanding the actual problem can be a challenge and needs agreement before getting into any research
- Alice Martin answered on 7 Mar 2023:
  
  The work I do is air-sensitive which means I have to work using only nitrogen, rather than the air surrounding us. This means sometimes a product makes something I don’t want it to make; normally with some oxygen involved.
  
  It sounds cliche but challenges in science can sometimes be a good thing. You learn a lot about what works and what doesn’t, but sometimes the most exciting discoveries are accidental when a reaction doesn’t work in the way you thought it would.
- Emmett McKenna answered on 7 Mar 2023:
  
  For me it starts with getting some to pay for it and agreeing on what “good enough” for the purpose actually is. I can always do better but often it would cost more than it’s worth.
  
  Then discovering the best way to efficiently get the information I need to have a successful end to a project.
  
  I start by getting what knowledge I can from others, then design experiments which often fail as I discover some of the initial information is wrong.
  
  Nearly every experiment I run fails in some aspect and it is important to understand why so I can do better. Sometimes, I do get lucky and it goes better than I thought possible. Then it’s really important to understand why to see if it can help in other projects as well
  
  Doing this means I can come up with the final successful experiment and move onto the next project.
- Graeme Barker answered on 8 Mar 2023:
  
  Usually finding money to do the research in the first place! Research is very expensive, and it can be hard to convince funders (usually the government) to finance you – to give a number, a fairly standard small-scale project for 3 years costs around half a million pounds!
- Graeme Dykes answered on 8 Mar 2023:
  
  For research, you are making things which have never existed before. That may mean that they are not easy to make. Fortunately, chemistry is always improving with new catalysts and methods. There is often more than one way to make particular molecule.
  We tend to gradually change each molecule so we see that the properties often change gradually too. Somethings are nice white solids and others a liquids. Some might dissolve well in water and others less so. However, sometimes these changes happen suddenly and you get a surprise!
  For drug discovery, there is a lot of competition to make a new drug.
  A lot of human biology is not nearly as well understood as Chemistry and Physics. There are always surprises. Maybe good ones!
- Rebecca Walker answered on 8 Mar 2023:
  
  Often practical chemistry is unpredictable – while all the theories tell you an experiment will definitely work, sometimes it just isn’t to be and you end up with mysterious side products you don’t want or an unusual unexpected reaction occurring! Sometimes this is exciting, since you’ve potential found a new way to make something, essentially by accident, but often it’s annoying since it’s not what you want and you have to start again!
- Nathalie Oguntona answered on 8 Mar 2023:
  
  Understanding the problem that arise and the real cause behind them alongside the financial side
- Martin McCoustra answered on 8 Mar 2023:
  
  The biggest challenge is finding the funding to keep the work going. Science costs money for equipment, chemicals, and we even have to pay for the research staff and students to do the work. Obtaining funds through the UK government (and through the EU when we could) is very competitive. You have to pitch your research proposal in a way that will win you the funding you need. But not every pitch is successful. You learn very quickly to take the wins and losses equally.
- Grace Roper answered on 9 Mar 2023:
  
  Experiments often don’t go as planned, so you have to think on your feet to work out what to do about the problems that crop up.
  It can also be hard to find the money/expertise to do new experiments sometimes.

Question: What challenges do you face in your research?

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