5 years, 7 months and 25 days (Tenure)

You may think it's a bit silly, but I do have a thing for a well-made watch. I have a tradition of picking up a new one for major milestones at work (if you can call something you've done twice a tradition!). At right is the Seiko Premier Moonphase from my hiring as an Assistant Prof in 2012, the 62MAS Prospex Diver at left is the latest addition, doubling the size of the "collection." There's something about the simplicity and clarity of the latter that I appreciate now, much as I did the clockwork complexity of the former six years ago.

On the 26th of July this year, I finally got the good news from my President - I have been granted tenure! For those fans of this classic post that makes it 5 years, 7 months and 25 days since I began work at York University as an Assistant Professor. It's significantly longer than I spent as a postdoc and just a shade over the time spent in graduate school (5 years, 4 months and 7 days). I would have posted earlier, but I've been processing this news. In fact, I'm still processing. But, as is typical for this space, I'm feeling the itch to write and so I'm sharing my half-formed thoughts with you now.

But first; not all of you might be familiar with the concept of tenure. Why does it exist? What does it mean? Why do I/we care? And, what is it for? Perhaps a little background is called for. At most Universities, (but notably not all) most starting appointments, what would be in Canada and the United States called an "Assistant Professorship," is in fact a limited-term contract. The deal is that you will teach, research, serve the community/university and mentor graduate students for a period of time (typically 5 years). At at the end of that time, your fellow professors (Associate and Full) will weigh in and determine whether or not you meet the standards of your profession and merit being awarded a continuing position. Deans and other Senior Administrators also get a vote on this, however, at least at York it tends to be the lower-level committees that present the largest hurdles.

3 years 11 months and 11 days

"Like a Tree With the Passage of Time" 

That's the motto of my undergrad alma mater. That's where it all began. 

I now find myself back in that same city ready for a new start. 

I can now reveal to you that my stated purpose when I began this blog has now been achieved. As of December 1st, 2012, I will be an Assistant Professor, tenure track, at York University. Thus my time in postdoc purgatory will come in just shy of four years. Somehow it feels like it was much longer. Certainly, the period was a not a great one for my mental state. However, if you deal well with uncertainty you probably would manage better than I did.

In particular, I had the issue of not really knowing where I fit in an academic department. What is a planetary scientist? Is that an astronomer who stays close to home? A geologist who travels far? Or maybe an engineer who gets their inspiration by looking beyond their machines? Really it's all of these things and yet none of them exclusively. That's a problem for many traditional departments. But now the market has spoken and its answer in my case is loud and clear - I'm a Renaissance Space Engineer. I couldn't be more excited to join the talented group that will help create the Lassonde School - how often, as an academic, do you get to contribute to build something novel at the organizational level?

I'll have more to say about Lassonde later, but given that some of you may actually be reading this record to figure out how you yourself can proceed from PhD to something permanent, I'll distill (as best I can) my advice on what worked for me below, under the cut. As always your mileage may vary and in a very real sense, given the balkanization of science and engineering, my case may not be applicable to yours.

State of the Blog (2010-2011)

It's been another year since I began this experiment and one year since the last "State of the Blog" post. This writing business seems to be turning into a bit of a habit. It's been quite a year and there's lots to review. Some things I feel I have been doing forever, and it is a surprise to notice that many are only fairly recent developments.

Bob Richards' PSERF, March 25, 2011

Bob Richards, a "Space Dragon" who wants to expand the reach of the human race... 

and make a profit doing so!

In his talk last Friday, Bob Richards, a silicon valley space entrepreneur referred to the folks that blog about him. By virtue of this entry in my PSERF handbook, I suppose that now includes me. I cannot admit that I know the man well*, but he is an interesting fellow and his heart seems to be in the right place. For this special speaker, we met in a special location; not in the Biological and Geological Sciences Building, but over in the Ivey school of business. This was an appropriate choice, as Bob's expertise is in the area of space business. His primary goal these days? Expanding the economic sphere of the Earth from Geosynchronous orbit out by a factor of ten to encompass the Moon.

The presentation was free-flowing and Bob stayed afterwards to chat with several of us at the University's Graduate Club. While he spoke without slides, his talk was not unusual fare for PSERF which has attracted interesting speakers of all types, from experts on Space Weaponry through discussions of early cartography and the "inside baseball" story of science-driven space missions. Largely, I'm getting the impression that PSERF exists mainly to expand our concept of what we can do with these planetary science degrees of ours. In that vein, Bob had a great deal to offer us by describing in detail his experience with the emerging field of private space exploration.

A Year at York

I've just completed my first three days at Western, and it seems like a good time to reflect back on the year of working at York. I should mention first that I will not be disappearing entirely from York. Since I will be continuing to live in Toronto, and will be periodically travelling back and forth to London, the good folks at York have been kind enough to offer me a place to hang my hat while I am in Toronto. As such, my activities with the York University Observatory will continue, though they will be scaled back compared to what they were before my move.

And now a word from our sponsors

Opportunities to do planetary science may be somewhat limited in Canada, so it behooves us to spread them as widely as possible when they arise. I'll be starting work with this program on December 1st as part of the 2010 round of fellowships (Post by me on this to follow in a few weeks, I hope!). The good news is that the program will also be selecting fellows next year (2011) as well. The advert is pasted below. Interested? Feel free to contact the folks listed below below, or myself, or make a comment below and I will get back to you!

CANADIAN ASTROBIOLOGY TRAINING PROGRAM
NSERC Collaborative Research and Training Experience Program
MSc, PhD, Post Doctoral Fellow positions available 2011

Astrobiology is broadly defined as the scientific study of the origin, evolution, distribution, conditions and destiny of life in the universe. This new, transdisciplinary science is based on two scientific revolutions - the recent realization that microbial life is extremely hardy and can thrive in very harsh environments previously thought uninhabitable on Earth and the explosion of space technologies that are driving the robotic exploration of Mars and other planets in the search for life in our solar system. The Canadian Astrobiology Training Program (CATP) is the first Canadian cross-disciplinary, multi-institutional undergraduate, graduate and postdoctoral training program in Astrobiology and is a NSERC–funded Collaborative Research and Training Experience Program (CREATE) (2009-2015) located at McGill University, McMaster University, University of Western Ontario, University of Toronto, and the University of Winnipeg. CATP by its very nature will be accomplished through collaborative and integrative research approaches containing elements of geology, chemistry, physics, astronomy, microbiology, and robotics. CATP trainees (~70 graduate & undergraduate students, PDFs over the next 5 years) will be exposed to innovative research and training approaches, combining fieldwork at unique Canadian analogue sites, including those in the high Arctic, with laboratory work at cutting edge analytical facilities at participating university, government, and industry partners. Shared expertise within and among institutions will be provided by means of course and seminar videoconferencing, and interdisciplinary supervision. Professional training will be enhanced by training rotations with our collaborators at CSA, MDA Space Missions, and our international partners, including NASA Ames. CATP HQP trained in various aspects of astrobiology will be at the forefront of the search for life beyond the Earth. Indeed, CATP will address the recognized lack of HQP in space science and lead to new scientific opportunities and promote Canadian participation in future missions to Mars. The skills acquired through this program will be directly transferable to various other disciplines, such as Earth and environmental sciences, robotics, medicine, and astronomy.

We are presently seeking applicants for Graduate Student Fellowship (MSc and PhD) and Post Doctoral Fellow (PDF) positions available in 2011.

Successful applicants will have a strong interest in astrobiology and have an excellent background in microbiology/ molecular biology, geology, chemistry, physics, astronomy, and/or robotics or other related disciplines.


Applications will be received until January 14, 2011.


For detailed information on the CATP and how to apply, please visit the CATP website (http://create-astrobiology.mcgill.ca/) or please directly contact:

Mr. Robert Oxley
NSERC CREATE CATP Project Coordinator
McGill University
Telephone: (514) 398 7901 Email: robert.oxley@mcgill.ca

Banting Fellowships: Growing Pains

The requirements for the much-ballyhooed Banting postdocs have finally been posted. These are the funding awards announced by the Canadian Government earlier this year which look like very fancy versions of the Australian Super Science Fellowship program. They appear designed to attempt to keep Canadian talent in Canada and are set to become the most prestigious fellowships in the Nation offered to young researchers. Yet, the first year of disbursements will likely feature a very shallow pool which could lead to mixed results for the program a few years down the road. As well a structural issue with eligibility threatens to keep the best candidates from the program.

Quickly, this year's Banting Fellowships would pay $70,000 a year (taxable) to those who graduated with a PhD between Nov 2007 and Dec 2010, i.e. 0-3 years post PhD. Departments would be permitted to supplement this extremely generous salary and would be encouraged to provide substantial research/travel funding to allow the chosen candidates to carry out an ambitious program. Since a significant commitment is required from individual universities and departments, they would be required to nominate only fellows they would be willing to support. Thus the position is somewhere between a traditional postdoc and a starting faculty position.

So far, this all sounds good, however, there is one clause which looks innocuous on the surface, but which has a significant impact on who would be eligible to apply in the first year of the program. (Complete eligibility requirements can be found here, as provided by UBC) Specifically, the eligibility requirements prohibit anyone who currently holds an NSERC, SSHRC or CIHR postdoctoral award which runs out after March 31, 2011 from applying. Since these awards may be cancelled by the applicant at any time, could you announce your intent to terminate the award on March 31st and still apply? The rules say no. Thus those of us who currently hold the most prestigious awards in the country are barred from applying.

You must be thinking that this is no big deal. After all, why would you want to provide awards to people who are already awarded? Better to spread the wealth around. Well, the danger here is in the timing. Since academic jobs and grants are scarce, PhDs often start looking for a job long before they need one. In fact, if your funding runs out less than a year from now, you are in hot water whose temperature will be slowly rising as you approach that cut off date. Making things worse, is the timing of the award to exclude next year's may graduates in contrast to NSERC's usual application cycle.

Here is what I mean by that last paragraph. According to the rules and regulations, only the following people would be permitted to apply:

(1) PhDs who have not yet graduated, but will do so before Dec 31 of this year, and were losers in the spring NSERC competition, or have not begun looking for a job.
(2) Postdocs that are less than 3 years out (mostly 2 years out, due to typical graduation in May) but have been unable to secure funding beyond next March.
(3) Canadians doing postdocs abroad who wish to return home.

There are issues with all these groups. For (1) and (2) either NSERC or their advisors have shown a lack of faith in their abilities, or they have been unlucky (due to the economy, for instance). But the situation is worst for (3). This is the group you would most like to attract, however, they would need to be well-known to a Canadian department in order to merit being nominated above that department's own. Experience has shown that a star of that magnitude is more interested in a faculty position 2 years out than a second postdoc, though there may be some who see this as a bridging position that would make them more attractive to a particular university. However, there is a reason that they left for greener pastures in the first place, and that reason is not likely to have been money.

This suggests that the pool of applicants for the fellowships will be exceptionally shallow this year, and the recipients may not be the top Canadian early career researchers due to the eligibility restrictions. This should be better beginning next year, however, there is one change I would make: extend the eligibility of graduation out to the middle of the next year from the end of March. This would align the fellowships with the NSERC cycle and allow applicants to apply to both simultaneously.

As awareness of the Banting fellowships grows, the program will improve. But it looks a bit rushed this year, almost as if the politicians who made the announcement are desperate to have recipients in front of the camera ASAP.

The next step

So, I can now officially announce that I have accepted a new job starting at the end of my current 12-month contract with York University. It's an NSERC Fellowship, under the Canadian Astrobiology Training Program and I'll be working at the University of Western Ontario with Dr. Gordon "Oz" Osinski. Oz and I knew each other, briefly, when I was a PhD student at Arizona and he was there working as a postdoc under Jay Melosh (now at Purdue). It's a 2-year fellowship and I'm really looking forward to starting! But before that happens, there is still much work to be done here at York. Hopefully that will include some publications and perhaps even a first conference since I started this blog, 13 months ago.

This fellowship caps off a successful couple of months for me, as I also recently took home a prize from the Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society (CMOS) for my publication "Atmospheric Dynamics at the Phoenix Landing site, as seen by the Surface Stereo Imager."



I've never won anything like this before and it was a happy moment. A long-time friend and colleague on the Phoenix Mission told me that my smile said it all. (The complete list of winners at that banquet can be found here ).
The award I received is named after Roger Daly. It's an interesting coincidence that the biography highlights some of his early work in Newfoundland and Labrador, my home province. But beyond that, his is an interesting story and a testament to the twisting, turning path that led many of his era into careers in Science. I have to wonder whether this kind of a career path would be possible today.

So while the near future looks bright, I also have to begin looking past this upcoming fellowship. And there lie dragons...

_____

As a footnote, a great little website operated by musician John Boswell (www.symphonyofscience.com) has just recently put out a piece on my favourite planet, Mars which samples heavily from Robert Zubrin. While Zubrin has been criticized in the past, he is a tireless advocate for a rapid, near-term crewed mission to Mars. Two of his books, "The Case for Mars" and very especially "Entering Space" were significant influences on me as I first entered this field as an Aerospace Engineer and later as a Planetary Scientist.

Annual State of the Blog

To my great surprise, I've kept this blogging thing up now for just over a year. That means that now is as good a time as any to take stock of the year just past and look forward to the year ahead.

In the past year, I've posted 27 times (this is #28), which is an average of a little better then once every two weeks. So based on the every-other-week frequency I was aiming for at the beginning, I'm pretty much on target. However, things have slowed markedly in the last six months with only half as many posts in 2010 as there were in 2009. As such, I'm going to try and step it up a bit, especially over the summer!

In that time, I've held a pair of jobs, one at Environment Canada, and another at York University. I've also had interviews for postdoctoral positions, research scientist positions and space agency positions. All told, 29 applications were made (I'd like to take this opportunity to thank all of my extremely supportive and patient reference letter writers!) of which two remain outstanding and three were successful at least in part. None of these were faculty positions or short-lists for faculty positions, so I must conclude that I need more postdoctoral seasoning at this time.

Content-wise, it's been a bit of a mixed bag for the blog. Initially, I had planned to talk mainly about the trials and tribulations of a young academic trying to find work. Over time, however, things have morphed to include a bit of opinion and commentary on topics of scientific interest. From my initial post, this isn't an entirely unexpected development. Aside from that, I still have not posted topics for potential collaboration and have been reevaluating whether this blog is the right place for that material.

Part of that reason are the low numbers of page views (46 over the year, most of which I'm sure are my own, despite advertising topics on my twitter feed) and comments (only one, in response to this post - thanks Nikhil!). This blog wasn't intended to draw a large audience, and it doesn't particularly bother me that few, if any, people are reading. The initial purposes of being part public diary, part practice ground for me to develop my opinions and ideas and work on my persuasive writing, remain intact. And, of course, if my writing helps even a single other struggling young academic long after I've got a permanent job, it will have been worth it.

Looking forward, you may notice a redesign as of today. I've added a search bar at top on the right, and my twitter feed to the bottom of the sidebar. Additionally, a new background replaces the old flat colour. The mottled spheres floating in a reddish cloud is meant to be evocative. On one hand, the colour recalls the Martian surface and sky with swirling clouds of dust. On the other, the spheres recall planets floating in the ether of space at the same time as they resemble microorganisms. Since my interests will focus more strongly on Astrobiology going forward (More on that in a later post), this feels appropriate. As required by blogger, the image is stock, and can be found, somewhat surprisingly, under the "health and beauty" tab.

In any case, it's been a good first year, and I look forward to another one that's even better!

The two-body problem

Let's face it, becoming a scientist is an oft-times thankless job. Once you decide to go for it, you'll have a long road ahead of you. You start with a four-year undergraduate degree, and by the time you finally have a PhD, you're often in your late twenties or early thirties. Next comes postdocing, which typically lasts about four years in Planetary Science. Then, if you are very lucky, you might make assistant professor and get tenure by the time you are 40 or 45.

Neglecting the long hours, many PhD programs expect you to have moved from your Undergraduate institution. Likewise, tradition has it that at least one of your two 2-year postdocs should be in a different place. I've been told here that the wider you travel the better. Ideally, you want to have experience in both the US and in Europe, and dabble a bit in Asia if you have the time. Finally, when that professorship comes beckoning, you may not have the luxury of choosing where you work, and may need to move again in order to get that coveted tenure.

But what happens if you meet someone? What if you want to start a family. Well, to put it mildly, you've got a challenge on your hands. Each time the end of a position comes up, you'll have a choice to make: who controls the move? And worse, do you even stay together? This in a nutshell is what is typically called the two-body problem. The resolution of the problem can be a sticky one. But, from what I've seen there are few different solutions which can work.

The simplest resolution is to eliminate from consideration as a wife or husband anyone who does not have a transferable job. Fields like medicine, law, information technology, grade school teaching, and artistic crafts, as examples, are in demand in almost any location where you are likely to find a university. Thus, the academic spouse controls the moves and the spouse with the transferable job follows along. This is the method followed by, perhaps, a little over 50% of couples I know. It works especially well in more traditional families, typically if the academic is male. It also works well when the non-academic spouse is an interested lay-person or enthusiast on the subject that the academic spouse pursues.

But what if your spouse is an academic also? After all, you will typically be working day in and day out with other academics, and there is a certain attraction to shared suffering. In this case, things become a bit more troublesome as academic postings don't come in pairs. Thus you have two ways you can go. First, you can try to negotiate a job offer for a spouse as a part of your academic offer. Almost always, in the rare case where this is possible, the spouse would be offered a position at a lower rank. For instance, one of you would be an Assistant Prof, the other on soft money as a Research Associate. As well, unless your research is "all that and a bag of crisps," you may have to go well down your preference list to find an institution willing to deal. Even if you can make it happen, this can lead to tension as to who is sacrificing for whom by accepting a lesser position. We academics are a competitive breed, after all.

Second, you can do the long-distance relationship, and each of you take your best individual offers. Take it from someone who has been there, that this is not a whole lot of fun. At best, you will need to put off any family aspirations. And at a minimum, you will need to work hard to keep the relationship from falling apart. Sacrifices will need to be made to stay together in terms of time, effort and airfare. Naturally, the closer together you are located the better, and the degree of difficulty goes up exponentially as the number of separating time zones increase. Still, this could be a good solution for those who travel frequently for work. As well, if you prove yourself to be a valuable asset to the hiring department, it might be possible to arrange a spousal hire and a happy ending for all. Even so, this method is clearly a gamble and fails more often then it works out.

So why bother gambling at all? Some chose to end relationships at the time of moving instead. This selection of career over family seems to be especially prevalent amongst more successful academics.

That begs the question: do you have to put your career first in order to be successful? Or can you have both a family life and a professional life? Luckily, more and more institutions are willing to help in trying to balance these two spheres. Flexible work schedules, telecomuting, and spousal job assistance are being offered. Since these institutions tend not to be the top institutions in their field, perhaps they spy that by offering a solution to the two-body problem, they can access a better pool of talent then would be available to them otherwise. I, for one, applaud their efforts, no matter the motivation. After all, a more well rounded and happier set of academics makes for a better learning and collaborative environment.

The Benefits of Health Care

As those of you who read this column regularly know, I'm not one given to posting my initial response to events. I prefer to let things percolate for a bit and try to flesh out all the implications. The recently passed health care legislation in the United States is no different. First of all, I would like to congratulate the US Congress for their work. They have made the health system much more fair, and took a stab at trying to slow the growth of costs, something that will benefit all in the long term. Universal health care is something we have enjoyed in Canada now for many decades. In recent years this has proved to be a boon for private industry; they do not need to spend as much out of pocket providing coverage for their employees located here as for those in the US.

Thus, this provides an excellent place to talk a little bit about the benefits that one might expect working as a postdoc or undertaking a PhD. In Canada, things are pretty simple: with few exceptions postdocs and PhD students are left to fend for themselves. In the US there is more variation. Typically, as university employees (RAs and TAs), PhD students and postdocs are entitled to some basic health care, subject to reasonable co-pays ($5-25 for a doctor's visit, $100+ for emergency rooms, in-network). In many ways this replicates the Canadian health care system, so long as you remain a student in good standing and continue to work a certain minimum number of hours per week. Rare indeed is the postdoc or PhD that covers regular preventative care, such as dental visits, or provides it to spouses and that goes for both countries.

While this all sounds good, make no mistake, as Robert Heinlein once said "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch." (TANSTAAFL) If you work in the US, the cost of providing benefits with a position is passed on to you in the form of lower salary then you might earn otherwise. In fact, I have heard of positions that have a "marriage penalty" of sorts in which a pay cut is the price of adding a spouse to a coverage plan. These losses can be significant, totaling thousands of dollars over the course of a year.

Still, the situation is more complicated. For cultural reasons, Postdocs and PhD students in the USA tend to make significantly more then their Canadian counterparts (for instance, US$25k is not an unusual 1/2-time Science RA/TA, whereas the most lucrative NSERC PGS-D pays only C$21k and does not come with a tuition waiver, like the US counterpart; likewise US postdocs typically start around $50k and go up from there, whereas C$40 is much more common here), even factoring in the higher cost of providing benefits. Thus any reductions in cost associated with the new legislation will only widen this gap and make US Positions more attractive.

Some Soul Searching

It has been a while since I last posted, so my apologies to any of you out there who might be reading this space on a semi-frequent basis. During these last two months, I've been busy doing a bit of soul searching about what it is that I am looking for with my job search. Those of us who set out on a PhD do so for different reasons, but for many we envision life after grad school as a professor. In fact, a former colleague of mine once confided that students who did not secure a research professorship at a university were a failure and a waste of valuable resources.

However, a quick check of the mathematics shows that it is impossible for every doctoral candidate to become a tenured research professor. If the field is neither declining nor expanding, then each research prof needs to train, on average, a total of one student over the course of their entire career.

Of course, this is an oversimplification. Just as the human replacement rate is in fact higher 2 children per woman, the replacement rate per professor is likely slightly higher then 1 student per career. Some profs, especially those at leading institutions, will have several students who go on to be other profs, while some will have none. However, we have all known a professor or two to be mentoring a group of up to ten or more graduate students at a time which implies a graduation rate of two students per year! It doesn't take a PhD to realize that not all of these students will become professors, no matter how good they are at what they do.

So what then are the alternatives to being a professor that still make use of the degree? In the analysis that follows, I am intentionally neglecting those who go on to work in other fields. For planetary science there are typically three alternate routes.

The first, and perhaps most popular route is to go independent and be a 'research scientist.' These are so-called soft money positions in which you only get paid if you are able to secure competitive grant money. Some of these positions are at Universities, but the high rate of overhead, (i.e. the portion of the money you earn that gets taken off the top by the university) and the extensive application process which may be nearly as stringent as for a professorship have led to the creation of new organizations.

Thus many research scientists find a home in in cooperative groups with many such researchers where the overhead costs are lower. The Planetary Science Institute, Southwest Research Institute and Space Science Institute are examples of these types of organizations. These organizations do cutting edge research and even direct missions, such as SwRI with New Horizons, arriving at Pluto in 2015.

The second option is to teach. Typically, exclusive teaching positions are not available at large research-oriented Universities (though there are exceptions). Also, while research is still encouraged, the time available for this activity is reduced compared to a Professor or Research Scientist. However, for those who enjoy working with and mentoring people, seek a better work-life balance and wish to explore their chosen subject matter outside of their comfort zone in a more relaxed setting, this can be a good option.

Thirdly there are positions in government and industry. While the Obama budget request for the coming year may shake things up a bit, ultimately, space missions are still run by governments and by defense contractors. Thus there are opportunities here to be a government research scientist, or to work on hardware, or to be part of the political process that creates the opportunities for research. Making these positions more attractive is the relative job security, benefits packages and highly attractive salary. On the downside, you may not be able to select your research, and your ability to conduct it will, in many cases, be even more restricted then with teaching.

So those are the options. But many come out of university intent on a professorship and nothing less. Can you blame them? Most have been high achievers all their life. Many have never known failure. As such, many new PhDs work in the relative purgatory of postdoctoral work. Postdoc'ing is neither here nor there as you are no longer a student, but are not yet in a professional post. You are paid better then a student, but in many cases are not doing work much different from one.

Further complicating matters is the fact that you may not be able to choose what research you do for a postdoc, especially in a depressed economy like one that exists now. Today, specialists are the only ones who need apply to positions. The fact that you have studied the atmosphere of Mars is no longer necessarily sufficient for you to get a job studying the atmosphere of Saturn. Thus, it is easy to run the risk of being pigeonholed to the work that you did in your PhD.

Also, you start to become aware that you have a best-before date hanging over your head. To be considered a viable candidate for an entry-level professorship, some postdoctoral seasoning is almost a prerequisite. However, postdoc too much, and employers start to wonder why you have not advanced your career. Generally speaking, in Planetary Science, the best before date is about 4 to 5 years out. Thus, this is a vulnerable time for a young researcher.

These are the lessons I've learned in just over a year of hunting. For now, I'm continuing with the postdoc route, but soon I may have to pick a way and go for it.

Feb 25 Update: more information on non-academic options for PhDs appears here: http://www.universityaffairs.ca/give-us-the-dirt-on-jobs.aspx

Planetary Scientist, now at York University

So, I can now confirm that I have joined York University in the department of Earth and Space Science and Engineering. I have now been working for Jim Whiteway for almost two weeks on the water cycle of the Martian Arctic.

I've got to say, it feels good to be back working in Planetary Science. This topic in particular is of great interest to me, as my PhD dissertation subject was also the martian arctic, specifically, how the sun interacts with ice and dust there to provide places where organic molecules or even life could persist, and the larger problem of determining how much water is available. This is a big problem, as water is a key component for life as we know it.

However, the interactions of water vapor and the martian surface are strange from the perspective of the terrestrial climate scientist. Clouds forming close to the surface have many characteristics of cirrus clouds on the earth, as seen by Lidar analysis. But they look for all the world like convective cells:



Animate This Image to see martian clouds forming by condensing onto rising dust!

[Animation created by the author from images taken by the Surface Stereo Imager on sol 112 of the Phoenix Mision. Credit: JPL/NASA/Texas A&M University/University of Arizona. The image contains information from both the blue and red filters and has been enhanced, hence the stretched colour]

The regolith is also so dry that it sops up water like a sponge and inhibits the movement of vapor. This effectively cuts off the interaction between the atmospheric water vapor and the ice table, just a few centimeters below the surface.

Do all these inputs come together to form a habitable environment? And what do the results of the Phoenix mission have to say about the amount of water stored below the surface? This information is critical for any future mission to Mars, especially any manned mission.

I've got a year to find out, as my contract runs until December 2010. We're going to run some numeric simulations, do some lab experiments and maybe even visit a Mars Analogue site. With a little luck I'll have some interesting stuff to share with you all here and next year at DPS or AGU!

It's good to be back!

* Note, if you liked the animation above, drop by my website, http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/~jmoores/photos.htm for a look at all the animations of the atmosphere taken with the SSI over the course of the Phoenix Mission looking straight up (Zenith) or outwards, just above the horizon (SupraHorizon). You can see the falling snow, along with several different types of cloud, and interesting billows of dust. Happy hunting!

My Year (and a month) with Environment Canada

In a few days I’ll put a piece on here about my upcoming job, however, now is a good time to look back at the year that was and the position that inspired the “Arctic” part of this blog’s URL. Last summer, during the Phoenix Mission, I was in a bit of a bind: looking for a job on short notice while working 24hour 39 minute days. Since I had already defended my PhD, my time at the University of Arizona was drawing to a close. But with the job market upset, my options for postdoctoral work were few. Through contacts, I was introduced to Jan Bottenheim at Environment Canada.

[ Our fearless leader, Dr. Jan Bottenheim. Photo by Spencer Brown retrieved from spencerbrownphoto.com]

Jan explained to me that the Ocean-Atmosphere-Sea Ice-Snowpack (OASIS) section of the International Polar Year (IPY) team at EC was looking for some assistance with their planned expedition up to Barrow, Alaska that winter. It sounded exciting, and presented a chance to experience one of the most similar environments on Earth to the Mars Chamber in my lab. Since I had already been placed on the VF list by NSERC it was merely a formality to join up and I started work in November to prepare for the March Field Study.

[The Arctic Ocean, seen from the North Coast of Alaska, is not so different from the Martian vistas I am used to. The cloud in the distance is a constant feature of the open lead whose temperature, -1.8°C, is far warmer then the surroundings. Also, the bright star seen is Venus. Photo by the Author ]

Aside from myself and Jan, the team featured several experienced Arctic Scientists and Technicians. Stoyka Netcheva brought spectroscopic expertise working with MAX-DOAS systems and with Environment Canada’s heavily instrumented sled which would go Out-Over-The-Ice, named OOTI. Sandy Steffen, an expert in atmospheric mercury, would be in charge of a mercury speciation experiment and several Tekran monitors. Ralf Staebler would study data collected by sonic anemometers, a fast-ozone instrument, and atmospheric structure as revealed by a powerful sodar (audible day and night near the Barrow Arctic Science Consortium Facilities). Meanwhile Patrick Lee and Andrew Sheppard helped us strive to keep everything working smoothly. As broad as this suite of specialities is, we were a small part of a larger international effort at Barrow drawing on Arctic researchers the world over.

[ My compadres in Barrow. Clockwise from Paul Shepson (Purdue University) in Green: Ralf Staebler, Stoyka Netcheva, Jan Bottenheim and Sandy Steffen. Photo by Spencer Brown retrieved from spencerbrownphoto.com]

As for myself, I would lend assistance where it was needed and use my experience with the GARDIS mercury instruments to analyze the data to be collected by the OOTI sled. However, in the months leading up to the expedition in March, I had also been working with Jan and Paul Shepson’s group at Purdue University to develop a mobile version of their Bromine Oxide (BrO) collection apparatus. In its benchtop form, this was a system that weighed several hundred kilograms, required more then a kilowatt of power and constant liquid nitrogen to run down. By trimming this down to the bare essentials, we hoped to be able to make measurements out on extremely thin ice in the midst of frost flowers.

[ Frost flower pan: the ice here, several miles from shore, is less then an inch thick and only a few hours old. The spindly structures are called frost flowers and are suspected to be active sites for Arctic atmospheric chemistry. A pressure ridge is visible in the distance. Photo by the Author. ]

Despite some shipping snafus, almost everything arrived in close to working order. After a bit of last-minute McGuyvering, (including the transformation of Teflon snow-scoop into a high-pressure gasket using a hunting knife, amongst other adventures) we were ready to go.

Barrow, Alaska is the most northerly land in the United States. The northernmost point, located at the border between the Beaufort and Chuckchi Seas, is at latitude of 71°21’N. This far enough north that mid-winter sees a single 80-day long night. By the time we landed in late Febuary, however, polar sunrise had already occurred and the days were lengthening by ten minutes each and every day – an appreciable amount. Much of the illumination was twilight rather then direct sunshine: by the time I left to return to Toronto in mid-March, it was light enough outside to see until just before midnight.

We had chosen Barrow for this field study due to the presence of an ocean current-driven perennial open lead which guaranteed access to exposed sea water (an area known as a polynya) as well as pans of fresh first-year sea ice (called a nilas) created almost daily. These areas are of specific interest to researchers since they are especially active in the chemistry of trace gasses, in particular Ozone and Mercury. These gasses in the near-surface atmosphere play an important role in deleterious biotic processes and may enter the food chain.

As the arctic warms, periodic and puzzling “depletion episodes” are being observed in which these gasses disappear from the atmosphere. These events are increasing in frequency. Thus, for the health of the arctic bio system, it is important to determine where these gasses are disappearing to and what forms they take. OOTI would sample these gasses directly and determine the vertical flux (rate of adsorption into the frozen surface, or out of it). As well, some clues as to what is happening, chemically are offered by BrO, hence the presence of my experiment on our study.

[ Science out on the Ice. I unload the BrO Equipment on a frost flower pan. Photo by Spencer Brown. ]

Even with a warming arctic, for now, it is still plenty cold in March. On several days, windchill values at the warmest part of the day exceeded -60°C and even the shortest trips out into the field required extensive preparation. The clothing required to sustain human life out on the Arctic Ocean may well be the closest I will come to wearing a space suit.

[ Dr. Stoyka Netcheva models our expedition gear on the Elson Lagoon near Barrow, AK. The Instrumented sled in the image is OOTI. Photo by the Author ]

Initially, we stayed close to our base of operations. But over time we gained confidence and took longer snowmachine treks with the OOTI sled, leaving it overnight on the relatively protected Elson Lagoon and eventually out on the frozen sea past a hundred-foot tall pressure ridge within spitting distance of open water. We were also able to collect a full suite of BrO samples on a nila less then 1-inch thick, several miles from shore on sea ice only a few hours old.

[ Our Inupiat guide and Polar Bear Guard, Carl Kippi, keeps watch with me on top of a pressure ridge out on the Arctic Ocean. Photo by the Author. ]

Later on, over the summer and into the fall, I worked to develop a process for analyzing the samples we had collected. While we didn’t get hard and fast values in the end, we did show that the process was viable and the experiment was a success. I spoke a little of this at AGU in late May. While the lab work was satisfying, I have found that my thoughts often return to the field study, through the toil of the rest of the year.

There is a certain harsh beauty to the arctic, especially the frozen artic ocean in winter. Many researchers even compared it to the “Magnificent Desolation” of the Moon. Of course, to the trained planetary scientist’s eye, the imprint left by the wind upon the landscape is more reminiscent of Martian structures, but this is a minor quibble. It is certainly a place where the elemental in nature is front and center. Contrasting with the monochromatic world of snow and ice and cold is the explosion of colour that is the Aurora Borealis. Never before have I seen such displays; titanic energies glowing, dancing and changing colour and form in the arctic night.

[ A Swirling Aurora near the Barrow Arctic Science Consortium (BASC), photo by the Author ]

There are also rudimentary signs and vignettes of life all around, if you look closely enough. Polar Bear paw prints out on the ocean (with frozen spittle and chewed intake lines on the OOTI!). Caribou out on the tundra breaking through the crust of snow to feed on previous summer’s grasses, preserved beneath. Innupiat peoples hunting seals in the open lead. Still the canvass of ice is not that different from the austere beauty of the rocky shores of Newfoundland where I grew up, or the deserts of Arizona where I studied. Each has a story to tell. All these landscapes are a part of me now, and as I move forward to new challenges, I thank Jan for allowing me to add one more to my experience.

[ The Polar Desert. Photo by the Author. ]

Author's note: Images for this post have been obtained, in part, from Spencer Brown, a professional photographer who accompanied us out on the ice. His photography, not only of the Arctic, is spectacular and his portfolio www.spencerbrownphoto.com , is definately worth a visit. For more information on OASIS, please visit our website and blog at http://oasishome.net/blog/index.php?p=1.

What Matters in Academic Job Hunting

One of the most difficult things to deal with when looking for work is dealing with the uncertainty of not knowing where or when your next lead will come from. With rejection letters piling up, interviews few and far between and the clock counting down to the end of fixed-term employment, things can get a bit tense. Unless you have superhuman confidence, eventually you can't help but start to doubt yourself and your abilities.

The situation is doubly worse in the midst of the so-called "great recession." Funding is tight across the board. Many public institutions in the US have been hit with double-digit budget cuts, my Alma Mater, the University of Arizona included. U of A is dealing with a reduction of 13% this year compared to last and they are far from being the worst-off (look here for a full chart: http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2009/11/01/education/01data-edlife.html). When I left at the end of 2008, the University was in the midst of a massive re-organization to save funds. Whole departments were being shuffled, shuttered, disbanded and combined to focus on core strengths and save on administration costs.

In Canada, things don't seem much better. Last fall, York University canceled a search for a junior planetary scientist. Within days, a job board for academic appointments which typically sported 50-100 entries fell to single digits where it remains (Note: as this was posted, midway through the fall hiring "busy season," there was exactly 1 ad posted on the York U site - http://webapps.yorku.ca/academichiringviewer/listpositions.jsp?page=1 ; Also in the interests of full disclosure, I am an unpaid visiting scholar at York).

So what's a young scientist to do? My advice: stay connected to the field, seek out opportunities to grow your craft and remember your passion.

One of the most difficult things is to remain connected to the community. Without a travel budget or student status (for grants), you may not be able to go to conferences. If you have your own money to spend here - that's great. But for those of us without that luxury, you can still participate by reaching out to other professionals, keeping up with the trade news, and especially watching the twitter posts of role models. These people have the pulse of the industry and can help direct you. This blog is, for me, a part of this process of staying connected.

Secondly, if you live near a University take the opportunity to use your PhD to gain experience. Offer to help on a field study, or at an Observatory, or in a lab pro-bono. Your high level of experience and low cost can be major selling points. Give a guest lecture or two or three! If nothing else you can get more comfortable in front of a crowd and figure out if you want to teach.

Third, go back to your roots and remember why you got into this business in the first place. Few people complete a doctorate without passion. Rediscover it. For me, this was exploring my stop and start interest in astronomical observing. If you find that fountainhead it will help give you the strength to carry on. If you don't, then perhaps it's a signal that it's time to change course.

Lastly remember that these things are cyclic. The longer slow hiring goes on, the greater the backlog of positions in need of filling will become. It's just like with the auto industry, people may be currently buying cars at a replacement rate of one per 30 years, but it won't stay that way for long since the cars they currently own can't achieve that longevity. Eventually, funding will rebound, the retirement accounts will improve for the professors who want to retire and jobs will be offered again. We may even be approaching that time with LPL recently announcing a search for three positions, amongst others.

And how you stack up against your peers for the competition lying at the end of the wait will depend on what you were able to accomplish in the interim.

As for myself, I admit that I was pretty down in the dumps earlier in the summer, but as I went through the steps above, I was able to recenter myself and focus on what mattered. Today I sit here writing as I consider my first concrete offer in my field. It didn't come from the 22 applications I completed this year, but instead I learned of it through the actions I spoke of above. And while it's not a permanent position, it would give me an opportunity to do good work and that's what matters at this point in my career. I've not yet decided if I will accept, but I hope to be able to tell you all about it next week.

330 Minutes in Montreal

Another interview and another fleeting journey, this time staying within Canada! I do have to hand it to the timing gods, however, there was just enough time to get in on the first train of the morning (leaving on the first subway to get to Union) and head out on the last train of the evening back to Toronto. Even a few taxi hijinks on the 112 only reduced me to being on-time. I even had the chance to pick my wife up her favourite picante truffle from Premier Moisson.

I've now had four interviews, and I am definitely getting to see a complete spread in hiring practices. I've done all day long marathon interviews, and 45-minute panels. I've flown over oceans to extol my qualifications, and answered questions over Skype. I've been greeted with completely free-form questioning (i.e. "let's talk about a subject") and very structured formats. The behavioral ones are always a bit tricky, and I have to wonder how much of this other scientists have seen.

Still, I hope that I have acquitted myself well. I've received some good feedback and I'm grateful to all of those who have given it to me. I've also received a first offer to consider - but that's a topic for another post.

P.S. I've fallen off the wagon a bit recently in terms of updating, but I've been stockpiling some good ideas. Now that I have some more time to devote I hope to catch up, so look for some more essays in the coming days and weeks!

The End of Planetary Science?

A couple of months ago, an agency colleague of mine asserted to me that planetary science was a dying field and that I should branch out. This has been repeated to me several times since by others. This is not a comment I took lightly, sitting as I am here at the start of my career. We all want to be on the right side of history; it’s much better to be around for the start of a grand enterprise then to represent the last of a dying breed. Thus, I needed to think carefully on my response to this comment, and decide for myself which way to go.

A good start is to clearly lay out what Planetary Science is. A good definition might be the study of bodies not large enough to initiate nuclear fusion, typically located around a star. Thus it is an interdisciplinary field existing conceptually between Earth Science and Astronomy. Strictly speaking, the study of the Earth is a sub discipline, but in practice, it tends to be split off. But this distinction is somewhat fuzzy. As we learn more about different bodies, especially those that are more earth-like, the study of these bodies is taken up more and more by Earth Scientists. Thus while few would argue that the study of Jupiter and its satellites are the domain of Planetary Science, the study of Mars is to a increasing extent seen as within the realm of the Earth Sciences. This implies that Planetary Science inhabits an unstable border which moves along with our understanding of the solar system.

At first blush, Planetary Science seems to be doing fine. There is no shortage of quality research with planetary science discoveries being reported in prestigious journals like Nature and Science. Even trade journals, like Icarus, typically have over a hundred papers in press and hundreds more under review. There are certainly plenty of people in the field, as indicated by record turn-outs at conferences, like the signature LPSC (Lunar and Planetary Science Conference) which recently upgraded to a larger venue in part to accommodate the ever swelling ranks.

However, there is a bit of a darker side that belies the tenuousness of the field. This can be seen in geography. The vast majority of planetary scientists are found in the United States where many are supported by a single lifeline: NASA grants and missions. This can make life somewhat precarious. For instance, many of us know of someone who had a job offer cancelled or postponed a few years ago when NASA made the decision to halve the funding to a single program in Astrobiology. When the outer planets granting segment was threatened, there was an uproar.

Making matters worse is the glut of young planetary scientists which have come on the market in the last ten years or so. A string of mission successes in that time – pathfinder, Galileo, cassini, MER – got many people interested in the field. Many universities opened dedicated planetary science departments or tacked a ‘and planetary’ designator onto their earth sciences department to deal with the inflow. The result is a swelling of the ranks with 3000 scientists signing on to planning white papers for the recent decadal survey.

In most times this would be a good thing. Green shoots suggesting that the field is a growing one. However, with the economic crisis in full swing and NASA in full introspection mode, everyone’s funding is in question and many missions are being put off. MSL slipped 2 years, and the future of Mars science after it is hardly secure. The outer planets are in even worse shape, given the long timescales required for the transit of spacecraft. While Cassini looks forward to a successful campaign through 2018, and New Horizons will reach Pluto in 2015, future prospects are far from bright.

So what’s a young PhD to do? Two suggestions have been made to me. First, I could broaden my field, go into the earth sciences or astronomy formally so that I would be a part time planetary guy. This is a common solution; many of the Canadian “planetary scientists” I know are really atmospheric physicists or engineers or geologists who happen to take on a planetary project every now and then.

Or I could double down on my investment, do all that I can do to find a job and hold on with hopes for happier times ahead. But in the process, I would risk that if that job ends there won’t be another place within reach for me to jump to.

I won’t pretend that I’ve made a decision, but I know which way I’m leaning. Nothing in life is without risk and we can only make the best choice with the information we have at the time. I feel like I should make the best use of my skills while they are in demand, and keep on following my dreams as far as I can take them.

120 hours in the Netherlands and a Review

Since this is, at least in part, a chronicle of my job hunting efforts this seems a good time to provide an update and to reflect back upon the summer's job search efforts. This will be helpful in gearing up for the fall blitz, since that is when most permanent positions and postdocs are advertized.

The summer was largely a quiet time for applications compared to the spring months and the rate at which I applied to positions dropped off somewhat. As I mentioned this was not unexpected. Nevertheless, I recieved three invitations for interviews including one in Boulder, Colorado and another in the United Kingdom. To cap off the summer, I was invited over to the Netherlands for an interview at the end of August.

Each position was very different from the others; one was a permanent staff position working on a specific space mission with some postdoctoral aspects. Another was a more classic purely limited term postdoctoral position working with returned data. The last was a permanent agency position doing some science, but mainly facilitating future space missions and the efficient and effective acquisition of science.

Given my experience, all of these positions are of great interest to me. But all have subtly different styles for interviewing candidates. The staff position was the closest to a traditional academic interview entailing an 8-hour, day long interview which focused on my technical competency alone. Another interview took place via Skype. The agency position was a two stage process with a telephone interview followed by a 45 minute in-person discussion focusing on my technical, communication and leadership competencies. This last interview was my first experience with that Engineering stalwart, the behavioral interview and I think that I learned some good lessons which I intend to apply to my preparation for future interviews.

Each of these three interviews was also a deeply valuable experience for me since they gave me a picture of the different working cultures and academic experience across three countries. I am familiar with the fiercely independent American experience from my graduate days. But the Europeans have a different, perhaps more collegial style which may have grown out of the necessity of forging alliances amongst so many different states with different interests in Space. I can't help but feel that each one of these experiences provides a little piece of the puzzle for my future career. Each different, but interlocking and necessary for my success.

While I have yet to hear back from any of these positions, I look forward to the feedback I will receive. It will make me a better interviewee, and highlight for me where I need to work hard to close any gaps in my experience.

Looking forward to the fall, I can already see a few positions that are of interest. One of these is a teaching position at a small liberal arts college. I believe that this is something I would like as well, since I can impart the knowledge that I have gained over the last ten years to students just starting out on their personal Quests.

But for now, I'll leave you with one image from the Netherlands. My wife and I took this picture of a kite we brought along with us to fly on the beach, as I relaxed and gathered my thoughts on the day before the interview. Never before had we been able to let the string out to its full length, but here in Noordwijk assisted by the on-shore breeze, the kite flew higher and more steady then it ever had before. Let's hope that's a good portent.

40 hours in Boulder

I just returned tonight from one of the World's hotbeds of Planetary Science research: Boulder, Colorado. It's here that you can find Colorado University, the Southwest Research Institute and the Space Science Institute which probably give boulder the highest per capita concentration of planetary scientists anywhere. Since this blog nominally has something to do with my search for employment, I should mention that I was in town interviewing.

While there I also had the chance to catch up with some old friends. Most notably, Oleg Abramov really did his adopted town proud, I think. In some ways the walking tours of downtown and two separate hikes (one of which was a bit of an adventure; getting trapped on top of one of the flatirons during a thunder storm) were probably representative of the place. It's certainly not the place for people who prefer to remain indoors.

I was impressed with all I saw and I would be proud to call that city my home in the future, should I get the opportunity. Maybe next time I'll have more then 40 hours to look around the place!


The view from my hotel window!


Convective cloud as seen from the front range of the rockies.