• Question: What inspired you to study physics?

    Asked by 08khanumk to Natalia, Hayley, Andrew on 22 Nov 2011. This question was also asked by yazy.
    • Photo: Natalia Parzyk

      Natalia Parzyk answered on 18 Nov 2011:

      I’ve done my undergraduates at Material Engineering which was basically having some classes exactly like Physicist and some like Chemists (it was joined between two department). After high school (I’ve done it in my country, Poland, so sth like your A-level probably) I’ve been quite sure how much I like .. chemistry (perhaps I don’t have good physics teachers before) but when I start Uni, I’ve met quite a few scientist – physicist, who’ve been giving a lectures with such a passion and it was so obvious how much they like it and tI decided to try to get to know more about a physics and that was the start..After, I was going deeper and deeper..I’ve done my masters from physics and now I’m doing Ph.D. And hoping to do more research, that’s great fun:)

    • Photo: Hayley Smith

      Hayley Smith answered on 22 Nov 2011:

      Oooh, what inspired me to study physics?

      Well, I guess I was always kind of interested… I remember asking my Mum one evening when I was younger “what’s electricity?” and being told “be quiet, go to sleep”, so I guess I’ve always been interested, from somewhere…

      But I think the main thing that did it for me was on a once in a lifetime holiday to Disney World when I was 12… We took a day trip (or early morning, 4am, trip) to the Kennedy Space Centre and there was a shuttle launch that day (hence the early morning start). We stopped 12 miles away from the launch pad and we saw the lift off…. it was insane. The noise, the sight, the ground even shook a bit, and we were 12 miles away! I think at that point in time I realised how amazing science and engineering was, that they could work out how to get these things to work… from then onwards I wanted to be an astronaut.

      For me that was definitely the moment when I realised what you could do with science 🙂 and I guess, physics, more specifically 🙂

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