The beginning of our story

My intent with this blog is to document my pursuit of a doctoral degree in soil ecology. In part I suppose it's a bit hubristic to assume anyone would want to read this sort of thing, but on the other hand it's also a document for myself. As I look back at my life, and consider where I was and what my goals were upon completing my bachelor's degree in 2004, and look at where I am now and what my goals are, I find that the image I get isn't necessarily flattering, however I suppose looking at one's past rarely is.

I would define my masters study as "the right thing for the wrong reasons". That is to say, I'm terribly glad I did it, I had an awful lot of fun in the process, and I met a great number of exceptional people. It has helped shape me into who I am today. But I was naive in my reasons for getting the degree, and in a way it pains me to think that it really may have boiled down primarily to "I don't want to go into the 'real world' because it's a scary place". I loved the research aspect of it early on, to be sure, and I've long wanted to be a scientist, but I can't help but wonder how things would have turned out had I gotten a job for a year or two prior to returning to academia.

So this blog will be for me to recount how my PhD progresses; the ups and downs, my relationship with my advisor, committee members and peers in graduate study. I also hope to use it to put down some of my thoughts on matters scientific, social and especially on ecology. I suspect that while I may have some claim to expertise on the latter (and by some association, of course, the former), the middle one there will be where I'm most vulnerable to criticism. Such is life.

As I mentioned, I am a soil ecologist. Of a sort. My masters thesis examined the community ecology of oribatid mites, tiny arachnids that inhabit the soil and leaf litter of nearly every ecosystem on earth. They help promote nutrient cycling and play an active role in decomposer communities, although to what extent that role is remains unclear. I have looked at how tree-species identity in aboveground systems influences the species richness, abundance and composition of these little creatures, and how these aspects of their communities are affected by the depth of the litter layer that makes up their habitat.

For my PhD work, I am hoping to investigate what role the biodiversity of oribatids has in regulating or contributing to nutrient cycling processes, and if biodiversity does matter, whether it is due to species identities (i.e. what species are present) or merely to species number (i.e. how many are present). I'm also hoping to add in a component involving nematodes, which are omnipresent within all soils, and fortunately my advisor specializes in this field. If I'm really lucky, I may even get to do some work on such "controversial" subjects as global climate change.

So in short, for anyone reading this, I thank you. I can't promise that every moment will be interesting, but hopefully if someone who is looking to follow a similar course as I stumbles upon this, it should prove useful.