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WPeople: Will Dunn

By Emily Robinson, on 7 June 2018

Job title: Postdoctoral Research Fellow
UCL Department: Department of Physics and Astronomy

What does your job involve?

At the minute I am a researcher in Astrophysics and Planetary Science and I split my time between the Department of Physics and Astronomy UCL, the European Space Agency and Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

I use X-rays to look at other planets. I try to figure out why they are producing x-rays and what that says about the environment on them. I want to know more about what the energetic environments around the planets are like and what the atmosphere on the planet is like.

Most of my work has been centred on Jupiter. Currently we have a spacecraft called Juno which is doing orbits around Jupiter and going through some very dangerous environments to measure parts of Jupiter that we have never seen before.

“The zone in the middle where the planets are neither too hot nor too cold
is called the Goldilocks Zone. These are the planets that could potentially have life on them.”

 

We also took some x-ray images of Uranus and we recently did some work around extra-solar planets. They are planets which orbit around other stars. So far we know very little about those planets, mostly we just know how big they are and how close to their star they are. Planets which are really close to the star they are orbiting are very hot, whilst those that are far away are very cold. The zone in the middle where the planets are neither too hot nor too cold is called the Goldilocks Zone. These are the planets that could potentially have life on them.

I really believe that in the next 15 years we will know whether or not there is life on other planets, and if there is how common it is. We’re just at the point where we are starting to study the atmosphere on these planets to figure out what is there and whether they have all of the things that life needs to exist. I think that, definitely in our lifetimes we are going to know more about whether other life forms exist. UCL has a great new mission called Twinkle which we will launch in four years and an even bigger mission called ARIEL which we will launch in 10 years.

You said that you split your time between quite a few different locations, which one would you say is your favourite?

I would probably say the Mullard Space Science Laboratory, which is part of UCL but is based in the Surrey countryside. It’s this really weird old house that was built in the 1800s and has been owned by a lot of people, including the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Guinness family. UCL got it in the 1960s when they started to work in space science and they needed somewhere to launch from since central London is not very practical for launching things into space.

The people there are really great and everybody works together. I think I was expecting working in space to be quite isolated but it is not the case at all. I couldn’t do the work that I do day to day without standing around a whiteboard with three or four other people trying to work out why nature is doing this weird thing. It’s really quite a collaborative part of science, space really takes a global effort with lots of people from lots of different countries to solve these problems that we have never solved before.

Can you tell me a bit about how you got to where you are today?

When I finished school I was pretty sure I wanted to work in business but I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to study Economics or Physics. I knew that I would enjoy studying Physics but wasn’t sure it was right for me.

In the end, after taking a gap year, I decided I wanted to study Physics and I went on to study at UCL. Throughout my degree, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to keep studying Physics until I got to my final year and I had a really inspiring supervisor for my masters. They let me work on extra-solar planets and that changed everything and inspired me to carry on working in Physics.

After a few years working elsewhere, I decided to come back to UCL and do a PhD. It was during my PhD that I started to use X-Rays to study planets and after completing that I was fortunate enough to be offered the post-doctoral fellowship that I’m doing now.

What advice would you have for a student thinking about studying something similar?

If you really like Physics and are interested in studying it, I would definitely recommend sticking it out for three years at university. It doesn’t close any doors to you, in fact it leaves you with a whole host of opportunities. I have friends that I studied with who are working in politics and the Civil Service, some in business and banking, a couple are even in music. Honestly the options that Physics can give you are endless.

We have a big shortage of physicists in the UK, so the more people who decide to study it at university the better! For that reason, if you are stuck between Physics and something else, I would definitely go for Physics because it will give you a much rarer skill set.

There are some things that Physics teaches you that are particularly valuable, to the UK and to the rest of the world. One of them is creatively solving problems, as a physicist you are constantly solving problems and it becomes something of a habit. That kind of problem solving is a skill that will serve you for life, no matter what you decide to do outside of Physics.

What’s the best thing about working in Physics?

Studying the universe as a whole gives you a real sense of humbleness about who we are and about humanity’s place. All of the people I know who do astrophysics are very focussed on helping humanity. I think it comes with learning that we are this tiny speck in the universe and that we are really fragile. It’s really important to me and everyone else I know that we still get to exist and continue to make amazing art and music and literature.

“Studying the universe as a whole gives you a real sense of humbleness
about who we are and about humanity’s place.”

Why do you think it’s important to work in widening participation?

When I was young, I was very fortunate to go to a good school. I saw a lot of other people who grew up with a very similar background to me who didn’t get to have that same opportunity. I think it’s important to address the fact that some of these people have a lot of natural talent that they haven’t been able to make the most of it because of missed opportunities.

I’m also very sensitive to the fact that there are some really serious diversity issues in science. The scientific community does not accurately represent the wider community, and that is damaging for the scientific community and for society in general. Without people from every different background, it’s impossible to solve the problems that we are facing.

Can you tell me about one of the programmes you’re involved with?

Right now I’m working on a programme called Orbyts, which involves researchers working with GCSE and A level students to get them involved with the work we are doing here at UCL for the Twinkle space mission.

The motivation for the programme came from the fact that we have a big shortage of Physics teachers in the UK, and so a lot of students are taught by someone whose specialty might be Biology or Chemistry. Whilst these people are still great teachers, they might lack the extra knowledge of Physics that is needed to really spark their students’ interest. We designed the programme to try and help students get some specific knowledge about Physics and learn about what scientists really do.

We started last year with three schools, and from those three schools we got three papers published in science journals with about 20 pupils named as authors on those papers. This year we have had a lot more success in finding schools and we now have 15 who want to be involved next year too.

It’s a really great programme because it not only gives the students a chance to meet people who are working in science and taking part in research, it also gives the PhD students and the post-doctoral fellows the chance to try out teaching which is really important as their career will probably involve some lecturing.

We see that the students benefit hugely and their knowledge of the curriculum is better, and we also hope that teachers are able to learn a little from what the students are doing and can use that in their lessons.

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