Three years ago I started my PhD studies on the subject of evolutionary biology. Three years in which I haven't stop learning new things and acquired new skills, mainly in the field of genomics and bioinformatics. Three years in which I have been able to attend to four international workshops and one big evolution conference, as well as many in-house seminars. Three years in which I have been able to visit six countries and I met a lot of interesting people. Three years in which I had mostly positive experiences. Three years that would have not been possible without the advices of my supervisor and many other collaborators. Three years that would have been impossible if I had listened to those who I did not listen. But most importantly, three years in which I did never give up. Above is a super harsh email that a Professor wrote to me when asking him/her for a recommendation letter in order to apply for my current PhD position. I replied kindly and rejected his/her recommendation letter. Three years later, I am self-confident enough to let everyone know how unfair this senior Professor was to me, which by that time I was just an inexperienced student - and as so, of course I needed some support. However, it still remains unclear to me if a "a lot of support and supervision" was referring to the only day that this person was present in the experiment room with me or maybe to the two revisions that he/she did to my manuscript. Anyway, three years.
5 Comments
No science today. Here just to let you know that after a long time as a "task" in my to-do list, I have now updated my Flickr page with the most amazing photos that I have taken during the last two years. Of course, I expect my gallery to keep growing as time / life moves on. But for the time being, here I share with you what I believe is my top 3 favorite photos:
#1: Porto, Portugal#2: Barcelona, Spain#3 Uppsala, Sweden
And that's all for today. I am sorry (to myself) for not posting more often. Anyway, I guess that is also kind of good because it means that I am quite busy recently. Note: If you are interested in seeing some more photos, just go to my www.flickr.com/people/santiago-montero-mendieta
I am happy to confirm that I am going back to Czech Republic at the end of this month to a new workshop ☺ This time I am enrolled in the 2018 Workshop on Population and Speciation Genomics.
This workshop takes place from 21 January - 3 February (❄ ❄ ❄) at the UNESCO World Heritage Site Český Krumlov and it is organized by some of the best faculty members in the field of population and speciation genomics, such as Walter Salzburger, Michael Matschiner (University of Basel), David Swofford (Duke University) or Chris Jiggins (University of Cambridge) among many others. Interestingly, I already met David Swofford in last year's Workshop on Phylogenomics; plus I also attended a keynote given by Chris Jiggins in the 2017 Congress of the European Society for Evolutionary Biology. By participating in this workshop I expect to become familiar with the use of genomic data to study the evolutionary history on the level of populations and closely related species. Even though during the two previous years of my PhD thesis I have definitely gained experienced in various sorts of genomics analyses, I think this workshop is a very good opportunity for me to understand demography inference approaches in detail, learning from some of the leading experts in the field. This two-week workshop will be the fifth one (and maybe the last one) in which I will participate during my PhD studies. Český Krumlov is a charming fairy tail town; the perfect place for a science workshop. The food is super-tasty (not expensive at all) and hotel facilities are clean and comfortable. I am so excited to go back. Here some photos that I took last year:
First of all, let me say start by saying: Happy New Year 2018! ☺
Interesting facts: Did you know that the number 2018 has only 4 divisors? These are the numbers 1, 2, 1009 and 2018. Interestingly, the sum of all these numbers gives us 3030. I can't really imagine how the world will look like by the year 3030, can you? In 2018 we also commemorate the centenary of the end of the First World War (1914-1918), in which the Allies (France, Britain, and Russia) defeat Germany and Austria-Hungary (the Central Powers). The year 2017 was an amazing time for learning new things, meeting new people and traveling to new places. In particular, during 2017 I established a new personal record, since I stayed in 4 different countries (Czech Republic, Sweden, The Netherlands and Spain). Scientifically speaking, 2017 was also a very fruitful year for me with 3 new publications, and 11 new citations. I attended a very interesting Workshop on Phylogenomics and also my first international conference (the 2017 Congress of the European Society for Evolutionary Biology) in which I obtained the Second Best Poster Award. Will the 2018 be a (even) better year? Time will reveal. Here is my 2018 new year resolution: to write a new entry into this blog at least once a month. |
Hi, I am Santi. This blog series was mainly created to include a summary of each of my publications. However, this blog is also a place where I will write about science and my life as researcher in the field of evolutionary biology.
Categories
All
Powered by
|