Your Friendly Physicist and other Nerds

Can scientists found a start-up?

Christian Kuttner did his PhD at the University of Bayreuth and continued as a postdoc and Marie Curie Fellow at the IPF Dresden and the University of San Sebastian, before he joined the Springer Nature Group and became an Editor at Nature Communications. 

In this episode, he shares with us the reasons why he switched from 'content creation to content curation', and what the actual role of academic journals is. We also discuss, why publishing in certain journals like Nature or Science costs money, what you as an author should do when you want to publish in Nature, and how the future of academic publishing will look like. 

The key messages you will find in this episode are:

📓 What is the purpose of journals and why does it cost (a lot of) money?

📓 What skills are helpful to become an editor? 

📓 How to write a Nature paper?

📓 What is a predatory journal and how to identify them?

📓 How will publishing look like in the future?

Tune in for a great overview of how the academic publishing system works and what it takes to become a scientific editor at a high rank journal. 

Valérie Andre studied Physics at the Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris, before she joined the big chemistry company BASF in Ludwigshafen, Germany. As a Senior Manager for Scouting and Strategy at BASF, she was responsible for the relationships of BASF with universities and research institutes. 

In this episode, Valerie shares some inspiring insights on how to bridge the gap between the industry and academic world, providing a unique perspective that's of great interest to anyone looking to make their mark in both academia and industry. 🎓💼

💡 How to find a common language? 

💡 How to set up a productive and supporting environment for PhD or master students in industry?

💡 Why is it essential to keep knowledge and expertise while parallelly gathering new and fresh ideas?

💡 Why is fundamental research (without any application in mind) so important for our society?

Whether you're a student, professional, or someone just curious about the crossroads of academia and industry, this episode is packed with gems to help you thrive in both domains.

Coral reefs are important ecosystems and biodiversity hotspots. Many species of fish, invertebrates, and other organisms depend on coral reefs for their survival. 🐠 🦑 🦀 🐚

Also, coral reefs help to stabilize the global climate: They absorb and store carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, thereby helping to mitigate the impacts of climate change. And they act as natural barriers that help protect coastlines from erosion and storm damage. 🌀 🌪

Sadly, more and more coral reefs die, due to warmer and more acidic oceans, overly destructive fishing methods, and plastic waste.

Matthias studied solid-state physics in Dortmund and did his PhD with a focus on optical spectroscopy of semiconductor nanostructures. Besides being a scientist, Matthias is also a great communicator. As a Physikant, he combines both, science and communication, and brings physics into the spotlight. And he thinks big! There is no fire tornado, imploding oil barrel, or thermodynamic water column that is too large for him and his shows!

What actually is a Physikant and what is he doing? What does it look like behind the scenes of a Physikanten show, and how do the experiments work? Tune in for an exciting story about how to demonstrate complex physical phenomena in an enthusiastic and approachable way! And spoiler alert: Matthias even brought an experiment, which he performed live on the show. He indeed is a great science showmaster!

Gilles studied physics in Heidelberg and did his master's studies on polymer batteries at the Technical University of Munich (TUM). For his PhD, he moved to Southampton to work on electrochemical processes for bottom-up electronics. After a year at the Soleil synchrotron in Paris, he is now at the neutron research reactor FRM II in Munich, where he aims to further improve batterie technology. As a battery expert, he is the perfect guest to talk about the current state and the future of batteries. 

What actually is a battery? How does it work and why are they important to our society? How can we make batteries more sustainable and what are the challenges to integrating them into a circular economy? 

Tune in for a fascinating journey through the wonderous land of batteries. Along the way, we will meet mono- and multivalent ions, intercalated graphene anodes, and intermetallic phases. But don't worry, Gilles is an excellent tour guide, so we won't get lost!

Academia often is a challenging, competitive, and energy-draining place. But there are plenty of tips, tricks, and advice that can change that. Since I got many questions and messages from you, about how to master the academic system, I want to do a little community service and share my personal experience with the academic system, and what things helped me the most during my PhD and now my postdoc.

A big THANK YOU goes to my colleagues, collaboration partner, and the Academic Twitter Bubble for a lot of input and feedback on this episode.

Gian studied physics and did a PhD in theoretical condensed matter physics afterward. His research focuses on holography, which is a mixture of quantum mechanics and general relativity. Right now, he is a postdoc at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). Besides, Gian is very talented in explaining complicated things in a simple way. That makes him just perfect for this episode, which is all about the basics of general relativity!

What happens when you are near a black hole? Why do we need a 4-dimensional space-time? And where are the everyday examples of special and general relativity? 🚀🌍⏱️

Tune in for a fascinating journey to the wonders of relativity. Along the way, we will meet strange creatures like gravitational time-dilation, Einstein-Rosen bridges, and equivalence principles. Don't worry, Gian is an excellent guide, so you won't get lost!

Dr. Maria Kramer did her Bachelor of Science and her Master of Education at the University of Hamburg, where she studied the growth conditions of radiated tortoises and developed educational trails in the nature around Hamburg. After her studies, Maria moved to Munich for her PhD at the Ludwig Maximilian University (LMU). There she investigated how to support the diagnostic competencies of biology teachers. Today, Maria works as a nature mental training coach, where she uses nature as an environment to help people develop new visions and learn strategies to face their next challenges. 🐢🌲🐌🍁🌍

In this episode, Maria explains how her techniques can help academics to establish sustainable boundaries, develop inner resilience, and generally improve their situation in an increasingly demanding and energy-draining academic environment. 🏞️🌄

Tune in for a fascinating journey with Maria into nature, mental training, and the underlying scientific principles. 

Lennart Reb did his masters in physics with a focus on astrophysics at the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich, before joining the Chair of Functional Materials at the Technical University of Munich as a PhD student. His research is about a special type of solar cells called perovskite. These solar cells are incredibly thin and lightweight while having an astonishing high efficiency. 

Thin, light, robust, and efficient: that makes them perfect for space applications! And this is exactly what Lennart is doing. He prepares these perovskite solar cells, mounts them on a rocket, and shoots them into space 🚀🛰️⚡️

How are these solar cells performing in space? How are different types of solar cells shaping the future of our society? And what can we learn from space technologies to solve problems down on Earth?

Tune in for a nerd talk about solar cells, rocket flights, and space technologies! 🤓🚀⚡️

Mélanie Clozel is a scientist at the Institute of Material Physics in Space at the German Aerospace Center in Cologne. Her research is about the development of a 3D printer that is able to print metallic tools in space. This way, future astronauts are able to print their own tools and spare parts, either onboard space stations and spaceships, or potentially on the moon or other planets. In this episode, Mélanie and I are talking about how to realize experiments in space, what it is like to shoot rockets with scientific equipment and experiments into space, and why you always keep an eye on the locations of the reindeer herds in northern Sweden.

Tune in, for a fascinating journey with Mélanie and her 3D printer to space 🚀

Gian studied physics and did a PhD in theoretical condensed matter physics afterward. His research focuses on holography, which is a mixture of quantum mechanics and general relativity. Right now, he is a postdoc at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). Besides, Gian is very talented in explaining complicated things in a simple way. That makes him just perfect for this episode, which is all about the basics of quantum mechanics.

Quantum objects, particle-wave duality, superposition, entanglement, and Schrödinger's cat 🐈📦☠️

Tune in, if you want to understand what's behind these terms, why they are connected to quantum mechanics, and how they are shaping our modern way of life. Quantum mechanics? Yes, to-go, please!

Christian did his PhD in the Wood Materials Science group at ETH Zürich, where he used wood as sustainable bioreactors. Also after his PhD sustainability plays a major role in his life: since April 2022 he took on a new mission, which is all about the circular economy. As head of reserach and development at the cleantech start-up KUORI, based in Switzerland, he develops innovative materials that are produced from food side streams e.g., banana peels or nut shells. In this episode, Christian tells us what it is like to work in a start-up, how food waste might contribute to an improved circular economy, and why the first application of his materials is in shoe soles. 

Shambhavi (her friends call her Sana) did her PhD at the Chair of Functional Materials at the Technical University of Munich and decided afterward to leave academia for a new adventure in industry. In this episode, Sana tells us about the challenges she faced, the questions she asked herself, the pros and cons of academia and industry, and where to find help and support. We both hope, her experiences and insights might be of help to some of you out there, who are asking should I stay or should I go?