Industrial Placement Student Review

My role is primarily lab-based. The aim of my project is to develop a method for bispecific antibody purification, therefore I work mostly with proteins. I spend about half of my time in the lab purifying antibodies in different ways to test different methods, then preparing purified samples for analysis. In addition, I work in the office or from home, where I analyse the data generated from these experiments and make decisions about which of the methods are likely to work best.

I developed a huge variety of skills from working in the lab. Namely, I learned to work with mammalian cell cultures, DNA scale-up, a variety of protein purification techniques, SDS-PAGE, analytical size exclusion chromatography, mass spectrometry. I also learned to analyse data generated by these techniques, visualise data using Spotfire, and developed my scientific writing skills by writing up experiments. Aside from the lab, I became better at giving presentations, networking and asking for help, and working independently.

After the initial few weeks, I started working in the lab independently. I started planning my own time and deciding which days I needed to come into the lab and which days I would be working from home. For the first months, all experiments I did were designed by my supervisor. Halfway through, I started designing them myself. In addition, part of my project was to automate the purification method, i.e. to make a robot carry out all the purification steps. While doing this, I was entirely independent from my supervisor and worked with an entirely different team of people, representing my team in meetings, analysing the data and presenting the findings on my own.

My supervisor was very closely involved with the work that I was doing, and was always available when I needed to ask questions. Aside from direct lab work, she and other people in my team gave me lots of advice on career progression. We had several meetings in the year to talk specifically about my personal development, where I reflected on the soft skills that I've been developing, what my strengths and weaknesses were, and what I would like to develop next.

Due to Covid-19, social events were very limited during my placement year. Despite this, we had several activities going. For example, we had scheduled coffee breaks, which were just meetings to have a general chat with my team. In addition, we had several department-wide online social events. Unfortunately, very few events took place in real life, at least not officially organised by the company. Although everyone was friendly and kind in general, I did feel a division between placement students and permanent staff, and I do not think I actually became friends with anyone who was not an another placement student.

I enjoyed my placement immensely, I did interesting work that was useful to the team and the company and learned a tremendous amount of new skills. I feel much better prepared for the rest of my time at university and for the rest of my career. It was a really good opportunity to see the kinds of roles that are available in the field, which helped me realise that although I would return to the company, I would join a different department that I think is better aligned with my research interests.

Yes

Really research what the department you're applying to is doing. Don't just rely on the name, as it can sometimes be misleading - departments are large and there is a huge variety of roles available, so you might find something you like in an unexpected place. This will also help you in the assessment centre. Once you're here, don't be afraid to ask for help, especially during your first days, weeks and months - your supervisors won't get annoyed if you ask too much, they'll get worried if you don't!