The Earth Science course at Oxford, like most of the STEM subjects here, is a 4-year integrated masters course. If you chose to stay for the 4th year, as I hopefully am, you undertake a taught masters and graduate with an MEarthSci degree. This differs to other subjects such as Materials Science (which is the only other one I really know about because that's what my boyfriend studies) as it is taught. In Earth Science we have to take seminars and sit exams on content at the end of the year alongside our masters research project. In Materials, the research project makes up the whole of the 4th year. In some ways having a taught course is good. I feel there is so much more to learn and it takes some pressure off the project, but not having any seminars would give me a lot more time to focus on the project so there is pros and cons of each. Not that I really have any choice.
The first step in masters project was applying to research projects. One Friday last term, a list of about 50 projects was released. These had all been submitted by professors/researchers in the department who will be the supervising the projects. Our task then was to read through all of the proposals, have a chat with potential supervisors, and apply to the ones we wanted to do.
The list had projects from all areas of the course. From projects based on 6 weeks of fieldwork in Kazakhstan and using code to model the movement of ocean currents, to microscope analysis of minerals and determining the sensitivity of a trilobite eye, there was something for everyone. This being said, when I first looked at the list there was nothing that really stood out to be as what I really wanted to do. There was also the option of creating your own project alongside a supervisor. However, there was nothing I could think of devising a project on so I decided I would play it safe and stick to the list.
Before the list came out, I was hoping for a project based around paleoclimate proxies, things like using the CaCo3 content of shells to see what the climate was like in the past. Unfortunately, the researcher who has previously run paleoclimate projects is leaving the department next year. So, I had to rethink my plans.
My next step from there was to read through the briefing of projects, see what sounded all right and send an email to the professors running them so I could meet up and talk a bit more about it. I narrowed the list down easily by the fact that under no circumstances do I want to find myself writing code or having to use any of my limited physics knowledge. Ultimately, this ruled out most of the 'hard rock geology' options. I then ended up speaking with 4 different supervisors about 6 different projects. They were all of a similar vibe, being based around sedimentary geology and biology/paleontology which takes me away from the maths (thank goodness)!
There was a period of about 4 weeks when we were all talking to professors before we had to submit out ranked top 4 projects. This was an odd period, because although there was 49 projects, only 35 of us, and the knowledge that at least 2 people are designing their own project, competition was still very much at play. Some of the more popular projects, which in my year happened to be the ones based around earthquakes and active tectonics, had up to 5 or 6 people all going for them. Although we were assured the assignment process of projects is done as fairly as possible, everyone was wary that the more people apply to your first choice, the less likely you are to get it. Lucky for me, there was much fewer people applying to the projects I was interested in which relieved some of the stress.
Then the last week of term came around and it was time to apply. After about an hour on the phone to my mum (thank you!) discussing each project and making a handy pro-co spreadsheet I came to my final top 4 and sent them off. Then it was time to wait it out over the vac until we heard back which project I got.
In terms of what I applied for, my top four (which may make very little sense if you don't study Earth Science sorry) were as follows:
Looking at the role of exopolysaccaridhes in diatoms in carbonate precipitation
Looking at the orbital forcing of sedimentary mercury deposits
Looking at microbial processing of organic carbon in rocks
Looking at the reactivity of river carbon in thawing permafrost
Over the vac, I became quite attached tot he idea of doing the first project. The supervisor was the professor who had taken on the advisory role for my extended essay and I really enjoyed working with her. I had also decided that the project was super cool as the scope to develop it on to looking if these photosynthetic microbes could produce concrete (aka making concrete taking carbon dioxide in rather than releasing it) was super cool!
However, when the first week of term rolled around and we got emails assigning our projects I got told I had got my second choice and I'll be spending next year looking at the orbital forcing of sedimentary mercury deposits focusing on the Blue Lias formation in Dorset. If I'm being honest, I was a little disappointed not to get my first choice. But, after chatting to everyone else and hearing them get excited about their projects I have decided this one will be good fun. The basic idea behind it is to see how the Milankovitch cycles (a familiar word to anyone who took GCSE Geography) affect the deposition of sedimentary mercury in the Blue Lias, which is a rock formation known for having it's deposit affected by orbital cycles. Establishing this baseline of mercury deposition will then help when looking at mercury as a proxy for volcanism in the formation. So it has a clear goal and end product which is nice. The supervisors are great and there is four of them. Two professors, both of which are really helpful, and two PhD students, which will be good because people in the year above me have said that having a PhD student supervisor is ideal because they tend to have more time tot help with any silly questions or issues you have. So overall, not my first choice but it's exicitng to know what I'll be doing next year.
A photo of the Blue Lias formation I took during our field trip to Dorset in my second year.
Now it's time top focus on exam revision (only 20 days left at the time of writing this and I am no where near as prepared as I wanted to be at this point oops).
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