Question: What does your job involve, so what do you do on a daily basis and is it hard work??

Ian Cade answered on 11 Nov 2014:

Most of what I do is air sensitive chemical synthesis. This involves mixing different starting materials in very clean glassware that has been heated under vacuum, to remove any moisture, and re-filled with argon. The starting materials react (hopefully in the way that is wanted) and the products are purified and analysed to see what they actually are.

So in addition to actually mixing chemicals, I also have to clean glassware (my day to clean everyone’s glassware is Tuesday morning), analyse spectra and write reports/papers (I’m supposed to be writing a new paper now, for publication before Christmas.

I’m also the group’s X-ray specialist so I also run a lot of X-ray experiments (about one every week or two which can take most of the day) and help train the other postdocs and PhDs how to use the diffractometers.

As for hard work… not especially, it rather depends what you are used to I would say! It can be complicated and require a lot of thought to work out what’s happening. Sometimes I’m here until 10pm or at the weekend because that is when a reaction needs my attention or a particular machine is available. Other times I can arrive late or leave early.