Episode 3 of our new season of Science Chatter Hamburg podcast dives into the academic journey of Ana, a PhD student in particle physics at DESY. She talks about how she started loving physics by chance, her fascination for CERN and her eventual decision to work on one of the largest upgrades to the CMS experiment for her PhD project at DESY. She discusses the highs and lows of being a doctoral researcher, touching on her mental health journey and is hopeful for a future with more support for doctoral researchers. She hopes that by talking about her experiences, she can help people feel less alone, especially since the problems faced by doctoral researchers are often common to many.

For our Spanish speakers, stay tuned for a bonus episode with Ana and our host Michael in Spanish!

Science Chatter Hamburg is a platform on which Hamburg-based scientists can share their stories, via podcast, blogposts or video. Science Chatter Hamburg is organised and run by PIER. For more info on the podcast training with Michael Büker see here.

The platform might not be as polished and shiny as what is created in most research institutions’ PR departments. Instead, and most importantly, it is young scientists themselves communicating to the public. The platform can be used by all researchers from the PIER research fields to get their messages out there, without the need to set up their own blog or website.

If you wouldlike to contribute to Science Chatter Hamburg with your own podcast, blog post or You Tube video, just reach out to pragya.chopra@pier-hamburg.de and get started. Let’s keep it up!

Stay tuned for all episodes on Science Chatter Hamburg.

Photograph: Pragya Chopra