Molecular Analytical Science [MAS], 2016-2017

Why did you choose Warwick?

There was some scholarship from, it's called a Chevening Scholarship, which is an international scholarship offered by your government across the world. And they required that I had to look into masters programs, one-year programs that will show me, teach me what I wanted. And it was very limited to find something that specifically dealt with analytical chemistry, which is the area where I wanted to go and more on mass spectrometry. The [Molecular Analytical Science course] at Warwick was the one that was the most relevant. To be honest I had never heard from the University until this point!

What were your first impressions of Warwick?

So, I was quite impressed by how accommodating they were to a last-minute request to go to the university, which was really positive for me. I managed to go to the UK prior to the programme start and at that moment I was just training with a friend and then I emailed a week before “Look I'm going to be in the UK. I would like to see the campus or just see the installations” because it was important to make a decision and they really helped me a lot. They even got me a room to stay the night so I could go later, the day after to visit the university. That was a really really, I felt really good. I felt that welcomed, they were really helpful. And somehow, which [I] was not expecting, that informal conversation I had with them also turned out to be my kind of interview application for getting into the master’s program and I remember walking out of there finally getting to see a little bit of the campus of the university and I really liked it. Everything was, it is a really beautiful campus if I compare to other universities that I have seen, both on the aesthetics part and how much green [that’s] there. And I remember walking through one of the courts, through one of the dorms and saying like yeah I could see myself in here like living here for one year to study this program.

What were the standout facilities for you?

The university provides a lot of installations for you to find productive ways of dealing with stress. And one of the things that really helped me was the tennis courts that you have over there. A lot of my good memories come from just being there, being able to relax, like it will be 7 p.m., I will still have a lot of stuff to do, then I would just go for one hour and a half to play something and then I come back and keep working and I must say that kept me sane through the master’s program. All the sport installations work so close to the labs, to the offices and what not, it's a very complex campus.

What did you think of the course?

It has definitely been one of the most challenging years in my life. It was a very difficult program but at the same time it was very rewarding. Finalized and then finally getting that last grade and saying you passed and feeling that big weight out of you because it meant that you accomplished something that many times through the course, I thought it was [going to be] impossible.

What skills did you learn?

What have you been doing since graduating?

So my PhD in Mass spec.[spectrometry] proteomics of oxidative post-translational modifications for clinical applications. All of those require three of the skills that I mentioned, being able to have a basic understanding of statistics, being able to have advance understanding of mass spectrometry. You really want to understand what you're doing and get the best data possible; you have to learn programming because many of the tools that exist at the moment are ones that provide you the most flexibility. They don't come with this, like graphical user interfaces either, you're gonna have to be able to use programming languages like Python, R or Java as you're developing the tools.

Will you develop these skills?

I think I'm going to keep advancing it, even after the PhD. It has helped me a lot in being able to get my goals, to one of those results that I had to analyse, so I feel I have been very limited in that sense. It really carries on well into the PhD that I decided to take afterwards.

What would you tell a prospective student?

So, my opinion can only go when it comes to sciences. I know Warwick offers many other programs but it is definitely something I will recommend [to] other people, of course I will warn them of the amount of the workload that you have to expect from it but in the end, I think it will be worth it, taking into account that you'll be done in one year. And if you're trying to go into analytical sciences, I think it's a really good university to do it. A lot of the projects that you were working, or you could work on were industry related. And that is a very synergetic combination because once you're done with your master’s or you PhD then you ask yourself “So what I'm going to do now”. Very few people get the option of actually being introduced or getting connections with working in the industry, but through either if it’s a master’s program that I was doing or the PhD program in which many of the projects are actually working with collaborators from the industry, you get another window or door of what you could do afterwards. So, once you're done, it gives you a lot of options as to what to do.For me it was a good stepping ground to being able to secure the PhD afterwards. I will recommend it, without doubts, to anyone at least in the field that I was.