Happy New Year and All the Best in 2012!

It's 00:30 on the 1st January in 2012 in South Korea.
I wish you all happy new year and all the best in 2012.
There have been so many good news in 2011, and I sincerely appreciate for them.
In 2012, I will do strive for my PhD study in Oxford, and will appreciate for everything I undergo.
I promise this blog will be more activated and more frequently updated.
Any resolution in 2012??
Coming Up~

Lee Sun-Hee

Lee Sun-Hee

Think of the 1980's of South Korea and what comes to mind may be the settlement of democracy and 88 Seoul Olympics. For me, one specific figure comes to mind, and today for the first time in the history of my blog, I'm gonna introduce a Korean celebrity. Lee Sun-Hee (이선희) has been known one of the best female pop singers in South Korea. She made her debut in 1984 with one of the most well-known songs, 'To J'. Since then, she has recorded a number of extremely popular songs throughout the pop music history in South Korea. She has continued her musical works as a singer-songwriter until now.

There is no room for doubt that her singing ability is the best in South Korea. Needless to say that she's got a powerful voice, so her voice quite well fits into rock songs. Apart from her powerful voice, well demonstrated in the song '아름다운 강산', she has been loved by people for her sweet voice. It's extremely difficult to satisfy these two qualities, but she is capable of two extremely different types of songs with her unique color, and this is why she has been so successful. '나 항상 그대를' is my favorite song, and a number of singers have tried remake this song adding in various versions, but none of them is better than her version. 

She is particularly special to people in my age because most of her best songs came out in the 1980's when South Korea was going through a 'change'. In the 1980's, Seoul held two international sports events: Seoul Asian game in 1986 and Seoul Olympics in 1988. I'm not definitely in the position where I can say that these two sports events have contributed to the development of South Korea in terms of economics, politics and overall quality of human life. But what I can definitely say is that old generation strongly believe Seoul Olympics was the turning point in the economic development of the country, and it also presented South Koreans with a great confidence in global market. Right after the Korean War (1953), all the industries as well as residential areas were devastated. And after 35 years, the country successfuly managed to hold the biggest sports event in the world. Since the Olympics, South Korea has held World Cup in 2002 and will hold Winter Olympics in 2018. But now people's interest for those events is way less compared to 88 Seoul Olympics and now it's the government or big corporations that are extremely passionate about those events. The way to make the Olympics more valuable and meaningful is providing an opportunity to a developing country to hold the event because Olympics is a great opportunity for a country to get united and promote themselves in international market. 

For these reasons, I love South Korea in the 1980's. Many people claim that now South Korea is better than ever before, and I agree. Several economic indices such as GDP show that Korea would overtake America in a few years' time. There were a couple of economic crises as European countries are undergoing now, but those were easily overcome by Korean people by working harder and sacrificing themselves. Nevertheless, my favorite view of South Korea is still the 1980's since I understand the dream and hope for the future which the people in my parent's age had at that time.

Her best songs also include 'Run Hani' and 'Fate'. 'Run Hani (달려라 하니)' is an animated cartoon which was on the air in 1988, and Lee Sun-Hee sang the theme song of the cartoon. When I was young (at around 6 - 10), I had watched this over and over again, so there is no particular reason why I like this song. I just like it and so do most of people in my age. She also sang the theme song of the film, a Korea blockbuster, 'Fate (인연)'. Her best was in the 1980's, but she has been continuing her musical work to date. This movie was released when we almost forgot the presence of Lee Sun-Hee. And when the movie became a blockbuster in South Korea, the theme song also got significant attention. Since the movie 'Fate', I think she came back on TV shows, and now it's not difficult to see her on TV.

What's in your mind?

It's been fifty days since I started DPhil. For now I find it's not too difficult to fit my lifestyle into DPhil course. A couple of elements of my characteristic tend to drive me to work hard with enthusiasm, and I often enjoy some achievements usually coming from experiments and literature review. Apparently, I'm quite busy with ongoing experiemental works, and it seems this project will get bigger and bigger as I make it successful. My little concern is that, from time to time, I wish I could have more time to read journal articles to be more balanced between physical and brain work.

So, what's in my mind other than work, work and work?

First of all, I've made my decision 70% for skiing trip to Chamonix. I should've booked airplane and hotel during the last weekend, but my Saturday was messed up due to overdrinking at Wine & Cheese. I'm not going to disclose why I had to have beer after several glasses of wine due to his privacy, but talking about international politics was terrible idea. I must sort out booking by coming-up weekend. I believe it won't be too difficult to figure it out as I'm thinking of the same route and the same hotel, but it might be troublesome since Christmas is the busiest time of the year (probably). So, I better rush it!

Secondly, my laptop has never been the external threat to me while I'm living in the UK. Probably this is because I'm always prepared for any issue coming from softwares, and I don't much carry my laptop, so there shouldn't be a big mechanical issue. BUT, in the end, it seems to me that mechanical problem occured to my laptop. FAN ERROR. Still I don't really understand why this is happening to my laptop at this moment. The critical limit of life span of my previous laptop was a noisy fan. Given that nowadays nothing seems to be impossible when it comes to portable devices, it's quite nonsense that the first maintanance which PC requires is exchanging fan. Now I have to make quite difficult decision because this country hasn't earned much credit from me when it comes to service work, but at the same time, it's quite scary to keep using laptop having fan problem. I'll probably pop in PC shop in Oxford.

Thirdly, my first term is quite chaos. Now, it's week 7, so only about ten days left until Christmas vacation. Considering the fact that there is going to be almost no social activity organized by the college MCR during vacation, I might be better try more activities. Now I'm obliged to sign up for Christmas dinner because of my best college friend (?), and I'm also supposed to sign up for 2nd hall for day after tomorrow (Eventually!). Probably that's it. And we'll see I will be able to proceed research as much as I wish to do during off-term!

MCR dinner

On November 10th, it was my first MCR dinner in Oxford. On the day, late afternoon, since I was able to confirm that my current method of sample preparation won't work at around 6pm, I went to MCR a bit late at 7pm. My first impression of the dinner was that the people were relatively calm and peaceful probably because the people more energetic and keen for socializing were screened by the swap dinner with St John's College. Thanks to the swap dinner, I was able to meet non-fresher graduates in the college.

I hadn't been to the MCR, and my first impression for the MCR was small, cozy and mess like other ordinary MCRs. As a person who speaks English as the secondary language, it's not very enjoyable having a chat with someone who I don't know much about in a crowd. With said that, the idea of social connection through MCR is unique, and one of the best advantages of Oxford and Cambridge. Mixing up with people from different academic fields and backgrounds sometimes creates a distance in human relationship because they have less chance to professionally get connected. But, right before the dinner, and with a glass of wine, an engineer may find it quite interesting to know what a economist or a pianist is doing in Oxford.

In my college, MCR dinner does not take place at main hall, which is a bit disappointing in that the hall is quite beautiful and cool. Another surprising point was that there was no seat plan, which means you can sit anywhere. This could be good or bad, depending on individuals. As for me, it was not bad.

During the dinner, I met a fourth year Chinese DPhil studying physics. Actually, I cannot imagine how it would be like being a fourth year DPhil student. Needless to say that under massive pressure for thesis, and almost chaos due to job hunting or applying for postdocs. It's been just one-and-a-half month since my DPhil started, and still it's extremely difficult to judge the nature of DPhil. It seems to me that I am having more spare time, and enjoying what I am doing, but at the same time, it seems to be impossible to feel satisfaction and achievement from work. Sometimes, it seems like I am just working as an employee in Oxford ltd, but it requires academic depth. 

MCR dinner is definitely expansive, and I guess it's because of wine. Having a wine or not should be optional, and if the dinner price could be under 7 or 8 pounds, I would like to sign up for the dinner everytime.

Viva Voce

Looking back, viva voce was definitely defending myself from the attack.
And it'll be during my DPhil.

Could I finalize my mobile phone contract tomorrow?

When I was a college student, one of the lecturers has told us that mobile phone is depriving freedom from people. You are normally asked to give your mobile phone number when you try to join online networks. Then, what if you don't have one? The answer is that you are not allowed unless you get a new number.

Thesedays, mobile phone has become troublesome for those who are not particularly interested in other functions in it. As for me, there is little time to utilise a number of apps in smart phones, so I don't pay attention to the latest smart phone. Instead, the quality of phone camera is quite important because I want to memorise my daily life in Oxford. Even if I need to take pictures with no plan, I can't carry a camera all the time since it's heavy, bulky and probably more fragile.

I'm currently using one of the cheapest phone with no camera, so planning to purchase new one or contract a pay monthly. The criteria are now clear.

1. It has to be a major telecommunication company, so either O2 or Vodafone. For some reason, signal is extremely weak depending on regions, and Oxford is not a good place for this aspect. The first priority should be strong signal, and hence I prefer those companies.

2. It should definitely have a camera. As a result of the research on current mobile phones, 5 megapixel seems to be reasonable, so I would be happy with the camera with the resolution of over 5 MP. Paradoxically, some phones provide good cameras with no flash, so I'll have to double check if it has flash function.

3. Deciding mobile tariff is quite tricky and difficult. The best option seems to be either 18 months or 24 months, and I don't like either tariff. How could I possible know which phone is better unless I actually use it? Contract over 18 months with no experience is oppression by major companies and must be abolished. Having said that, 24 month contract offers £10.5 a month, and particularly Vodafone offers 100 minutes call and 500 texts.

I guess I should choose the cheapest one because most of my phone call is international call, and this is not included in the £10.5.

4. I don't need a smartphone for the time being. It might be neccessary to keep myself away from the internet at least on the street or in Tesco because I have to spend significant time with the internet for my work.

I've decided to let myself left behind the cutting-edge mobile phone for the next a couple of years. But, instead I need to pay attention to the progress of mobile phone technology as a PhD student working on MEMS.

Now it became more clear which tariff and which phone I should choose tomorrow. Be decisive and quick with no hesitation.

Managing your DPhil

Doctor of Philosophy =
physical work +
minimum brain power (99% human being has this) +
language +
what else??

Several days ago, I took 'Managing your DPhil course', by the lecturer, a PhD degree holder, from Imperial College. This course seemed to be mandatory to new DPhil students, so I went to the lecture room with no hesitation. Surprisingly, there was no one other than the lecturer in the lecture room. Recently, I often get surprised by my amazing punctuality. Being puntual at a meeting or whatever and waiting for others to arrive make me feel quite nice than you imagine.

This session was booked for the whole afternoon (1 to 5 o'clock). I knew it was going to be a waste of time and actually it was. Four hours is ridiculously long to learn how to manage my doctoral research. The content of the session was quite predictable, and indeed it covered stuff like time management, plagiarism, originality and etc.  

Since I came to the UK, I've taken quite many training courses such as presentation skill (particularly several times for this one) and various kinds of management skills. Fortunately(?), I've never got bored from those sessions, thanks to the language. It requires high concentration and good listening skill. To me, it's quite impressive to see how British people pay attention to this this kind of sessions.

Despite the fact that four hours of managing your DPhil was obviously over the top, I have to say that the course was quite fruitful. During the course, I had to think about 'Why?' for a couple of factors associated with DPhil course, and it was a good opportunity to clarify more specific goals. For example,

What a DPhil is?

'Demonstrate your ability to conduct research, understand your subject, demonstrate critical and independent thought, show originality, contribute to knowledge, develop a model, explain and defend a model and so on.'

These are most of factors and qualities which I should always bear in mind as a DPhil student.

Another interesting point in the session was 'The Pareto Principle'.

'The 80:20 Rule.

A minority of input produces the majority of results.'

This implies several good points and suggestions to DPhil students. First and foremost, it is very likely that you will waste your time by sticking to one particular experiment. Success or failure could be determined by your extra input and effort, but it is less likely to happen. Trying to be well oriented is much more important than just hard working. Secondly, do not focus on just your work during your DPhil. It might be wiser to try to drill your other skills with your main work so that I can efficiently utilise the 80% of my time.

So far I feel doing DPhil is not tough as much as doing MPhil, but you should always bear in mind where you are, where you are heading, how you are doing in longer term. Probably, doing DPhil is another step to become more professional.

Sporadic enjoyment

It's been approximately twenty days since I came to Oxford. It was quicker and easier to settle down in  Oxford since I've gone through the initial setting-up process a year ago in Cambridge. I've got a bike, bank account, mobile phone and etc, so was able to begin normal daily life from the second day in Oxford. Yet, my life is still nevertheless inefficient, inconvenient and uncomfortable. There are only several streets and roads I've become familar with so far, and just a couple of shops where I am going for shopping. I've not been inside any college other than my college, and haven't taken any photo yet.

To analyse this, I think, I'm not rushing it and there is no reason for rushing it. I will be here for three years (to say the least). Interestingly I've never lived in one city more than a year in the UK, so three years seem to be extremely long to me. Here is a good analogy. Jinju Castle is one of the best cultural heritages in South Korea, so tourists across the country travel to visit the castle. But, surprisingly, I've been to the castle just a couple of time though I've lived in Jinju over twenty years. Once you're aware of that it's always there whenever you reach your hands, you don't try hard to get to know it.

At the same time, I'm also afraid that I may get tired of this old town too soon. Since I haven't looked around the city, Balliol College, which I pass by everyday on my way to my college, looks like a classic castle, and Queens College, which I come across on my way to the pool, is mysterious and magnificant college for me. The easiest and quickest way to become familar with this city might be taking a city tour bus. It probably takes you around most of important and beautiful places in Oxford in one and half hours. But I want to leave it for a while.

For me, the best way to enjoy this town is letting Oxford sporadically and randomly get into my eyes, and the enjoyment will be maximised when I get tired of the routine work.

My baseball philosophy

Sports is addictive as much as internet. Nowadays, professional sports leagues have become a huge industry in a number of countries. In South Korea, football and baseball have been major sports for the last several decades. Despite the fact that Koreans tend to take international football matches seriously like other countries do, Korea professional football league (K-league) has never been a big success. First of all, it is hard to watch K-league on TV since it is not attractive sports from the viewpoint of broadcasting companies. Broadcasting companies seem to be relectant to put K-league games on the air because of the less economic benefit from commertials. They can utilise only 20 minute break between the first half and the second half in football, so this is definitely not a beneficial sports for broadcasting companies. By contrast, Korean professional baseball league has become a 'blockbuster'. Surprisingly, baseball has become a super hit in both professional league as well as international matches, and people love to watch baseball either in stadium or at home. Besides, broadcasting companies, in fact, way prefer baseball since they can insert 15 minute commercials  between every inning and whenever pitchers get changed. After Beijing Olympics and WBC, more people have visited stadiums to watch heros' plays, and once boom was created, more people started travelling to baseball stadium to enjoy the fever and atmosphere.

What I intend to argue today is not the present and the future of Korea sports or anything like that. Once you are addicted to something, it is quite difficult to just ignore it. I am a big fan of 'Kia Tigers', which is one of the teams in Korea Professional Baseball. Being currently in the UK, I've been consistently checking all the news associated with this team. Given that Korea Professional Baseball is around 30 years old, Kia Tigers has been the most successful team by winning the league for 10 years. The fans are not limited to the home city Gwangju, and this team has secured supporters across the country. Accordingly, the expectation from the large number of fans is enormous, and the manager is always under signifiant pressure and criticism. Because I understand that the position of the manager of Kia Tigers is difficult, I have been generous about his leadership and the result. But, today I intend to brutally criticize his baseball philosophy, and strongly believe that it is the time to change the manager.

First of all, his philosophy on baseball is doubtful, and the success highly relies on the performance of only several top players. He put a high value on the quality of pitchers rather than that of hitters. He believes that the performance of pitchers is more stable and consistent than that of hitters. As no hitter can achieve over 0.4 batting average, baseball has been known as the game of pitcher. With said that, having just several good pitchers is quite risky, particularly when there are not enough reliable bull pen in the team. In this year (2011), Kia Tigers had the excellent three pitchers, and the manager intended to take advantage of them. The earned run average of these  three players used to rank in top five during the first half of the season, which means that any one of three could be the ace of other teams. The manager's strategy was quite successful in that Kia Tigers was placed at the first in the league table at the end of the first half of the season. Since these pitchers were capable of dominating the game by the seventh or eighth inning, the hitters in the team got less pressure, and hence they were able to bring their the best. Even though the bull pen in the team was critical weakness, they used to be able to finish the game in the lead. In 2009, and the first half of 2011, I must say, his strategy did work.

In 2009, Kia Tigers was well known for the strongest five starting pitchers including two foreign players. Lopez has been playing in Kia Tigers for the last three years, significantly contributing to Kia Tigers (he should've been absolutely the MVP of Korean Series in 2009). Rick Guttormson has won 13 games in 2009, with earned run average of 3.24. (He had to leave the team immediately because his performance during Korean Series was not impressive compared to Lopez). In 2011, three starting pitchers (Yoon Suk-Min, Lopez and Travis) showed fantastic performance every single game until the summer break. In particular, Yoon Suk-Min and Lopez were ranked at the first and second place in several league tables such as earned run average.

However, the second half of the 2011 season showed the critical weakness of Kia Tigers, which was the injury of the key players. Because the team was relying on the ace pitchers, they had to be in charge of as many innings as they could, which in the end brough about injury. As soon as two foreign pitchers' condition fell down, the bull pen pitchers had to play longer innings, but bull pen also requires enough break time for recovery. Therefore, the ace pitchers' injury got the entire team to get trapped in a vicious circle.

Given that every team is allowed to have two foregin players, there have been just one Korean ace pitcher, Yoon Suk-Min, who differentiates Kia Tigers from the rest teams. This means that for the last several years, the coach has failed to upgrade bull pen and pitchers. In fact, bull pen is extremely important when it comes to professional baseball league. Having a group of good bull pen means that the team is less vulnerable to the injury of aces. Besides, it provides reliability to the team, so hitters can concentrate on games up to the last inning in games. As long as there is good bull pens, there is no collapse.

Secondly, a combination of one foreign hitter and pitcher might work better rather than two foreign pitchers. In 2011, Kia Tigers had four home run hitters (Kim Sang-Hyeon, Choi Hee-Seop, Na Ji-Wan and Lee Bum-Ho), but this fantastic line-up has never played its role properly since most of them had to suffer from injury. Nevertheless, it is worth noting that Kia Tigers was the top in the league table when three of them were able to play in their good shape. Having another good pitcher affects one game out of five or six games, but having another robust home run hitter contributes to the overall performance of the team. Travis who is one of the foreign pitchers in Kia Tigers ended up with one of the worst foreign players in 2011 due to both his injury and bad temper. It makes me think of 'what if Kia Tigers had another home run hitter rather than pitcher?'

The next year is the last season for Cho Bum-Hyun as a manager of Kia Tigers according to the current contract. His success is very likely to be entirely up to the performance of a couple of ace pitchers and hitters in 2012 again. As a fan of Kia Tigers, I do not want to see another victory highly dependent on luck. Even if Kia Tigers cannot be a winner in the next season, I wish the team could have more sustainable and consistent performance, and it's only possible with a stronger bull pens and more consistent home run hitters. This is why most of fans are speaking up for Sun as a new manager in Kia Tigers.

I took a Citi Tour Bus in Cambridge

Today (August 31st) was the last day in Cambridge. I've come up with several plans for the last day in Cambridge, and I decided to go with taking a Citi Tour Bus. I thought this is the best way to store all the memories in Cambridge for the last one year. Taking a tour bus is always exciting because you can feel all the energy from other tourists.

Surprisingly, there was 3 pound discount for students, so it costed me 9 pounds (ouch!). Deciding to take the tour, I was looking forward to discover new places which have historic significance. Unfortunately, however, the bus took me to the places where I've routinely passed by due to lectures and libraries. I honestly felt really nice in that my daily route was the heart of Cambridge!

I have to say that Cambridge is extrmely gorgeous, classic, beautiful and strong. I think I successfully sealed my memory pocket of Cambridge. FAREWELL!

August is not ideal season for open double-deck bus

St Catharine's College

I would like to proudly introduce my college St Catharine's College, one of the oldest colleges in Cambridge. Making an application for the MPhil course, I firstly considered the prestige and reputation of the college. St Catharine's was established in 1473, and has been continuously ranked in one of the top ten colleges in terms of undergrad's academic performance. Another critical benefit of this college is the location. It is probably 3 minute walking distance from the college to the Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy, so I was able to have breakfast, lunch or dinner whenever I needed to have. If I have to single out the most important things in the campus life, I would say accommodation itself and its location. Good accommodation includes nice housemates, quite environment, fast internet speed and so on, and having a good accommodation does maximise work efficiency. The dinning room in the college is particularly popular among the people in New Museum Site due to the location, reasonable price and tasty food.

Front view of the college

College view with snow lightly covered

St Catharine's College is probably only the college which you can see the entire view from outside. The pictures of front gate is usually taken by tourists on the way to King's College. I've realized that people have different thoughts regarding the front view of the college. Some say that no college other than Catz has spectacular and opened front view in Cambridge. Even though, in fact, this college is one of the smallest colleges, and most of college buildings can be seen through the front gate, the front view tends to raise confusion that there might be more spaces beyond the main court. By contrast, it seems like that others have an issue on the college buildings; they say the buildings are rather depressive. I agree with both opinions and my college looks different everyday. It is gloomy or elegant depending on my mood and the weather.

Being a student of University of Cambridge, I prefer old colleges rather than modern ones. Modern colleges obviously have merits to graduate students as they care of grads more than old colleges do (my personal opinion), and as they are modern, facilities are way better. However, after having a formal dinner in a dining room (I don't know the room name), which is officially for college fellows, I became absolutely fascinated by old colleges, and eventually got to understand why old colleges are valuable. College dinning rooms amazingly retain an medieval aura. Candles, framed portraits on the walls, tables, chairs and people... Every single of these elements create mysterious mood. If there is one thing you ought to experience while in Cambridge, it would be formal dinners in old colleges.

Easter term

The result of Part 1 was disclosed two weeks after the exam. Cambridge setting great store on tradition, the result was posted on the front door of the department. I have no intention to disclose the result here, but we went to a pub straightaway to celebrate the successful accomplishment. I believe it was significant achievement in my life.

Right after the exam, I finally had a real weekend for the first time in Cambridge. It hardly remember how I spent the whole weekend. On the following monday, I contact my supervisor Dr Oliver to begin my project. I was fascinated by her lectures and most of my coursemates agree on that she was the best lecturer in the master's programme. I thought she was the ideal supervisor for the one who has no past experience in dissertation, and I needed someone who is somewhat fastidious and spartacus style rather than generous in supervising my research project. Only the disadvantage of the project was that she was not able to supervise my literature review for some reason, and yet the fact of the matter, it was good news for me because I might have not had enough time to work until she satisfy with my literature review during Lent term.

Taking the exam in April has an advantage. Undergraduates and most of graduates have exams in May and June, and during this period, it is hard to see students in Campus except for libraries and examination halls. Instead, campus is crowded with tourists who visit Cambridge to taste medieval atmosphere in lovely spring weather.

Queen's College

King's College

Queen's College

Queen's College

King's College

During the period of Part 2, there are three official things we were supposed to carry out: to give a presentation in the department, to submit a master's degree thesis and viva voce. These works, I personally think, are not that difficult to just do. As a student in Cambridge, it is more about how you manage to successfully do it, and I would give 6 out of 10 point to myself for my work in these tasks.

There wasn't many opportunity to hang out with the coursemates until the end of course dinner. It had taken place in St John's College by the last year, but in this year, Janet had to book in Downing College for some reason. It was a fabulous night with nice food and people. The end of course dinner was on 30th June.

End of Course Dinner. The person (Dr Elliot) making a speech
was the internal examiner in my viva.

There were twenty days left until the deadline of dissertation submission, and those days were not pleasant time due to writing and editing the thesis. I've finished the first draft of my thesis, but nightmare began from the draft. Firstly, my supervisor was not happy with my lieterature review, and I totally agree with her. It was not a good literature review and there was significant disagreement between the main topic of my thesis and the research field of the literature review. Accordingly I had to just delete a significant part from the literature review and reorganize it since I was not fully understanding many literatures and the supervisor pointed out that the structure was not good and a lot of literatures were in a wrong order.

Lent term

It became a bit easier to manage my work during Lent term probably because the loathsome PhD application was completed and maybe I got used to the people and environment. Since the deadline for the literature review got put off from 14th January to 18th February, I got to have a few more days for the literature review. I have to admit that this coursework was the hardest one during the MPhil programme, and the time given was absolutely insufficient. I was aiming at referencing over 50 literatures in the technology and science field which I was not well up in. I personally think one of the best yardsticks to measure the ability of a person as a graduate student might be writing a good literature review. It requires an insight into the scientific field, organizing skill and good writing skill.
Other than literature review, we were supposed to work on MEMS course works and MoTI (Managment of Technology and Innovation) consultancy project.


I would like to give my thought on MEMS lecturers since this is the one which brought me into nano-world. MEMS stands for Microelectromechanical systems. MEMS exploits all the physical phenomena ultimately in order to sense something or actuate a tiny device. In this master's programme, two modules were included as core modules. The first module, Materials and Processes for MEMS, was scheduled for the first term, and this provides the general materials and fabrication processes for MEMS. The second module focuses on designing and controlling MEMS. To provide my personal feedback on these courses, it could've been more interesting and exciting lecturers though I understand a lack of time to cover diverse kinds of MEMS.

After the hectic period of two and a half months, we had four weeks of Easter vacation, but I am pretty sure my coursemates spent this whole vacation revising for the exam which was scheduled on 27th and 29th April. This was my first experience of taking three modules on the same day, and taking six modules for two days. Thanks to the massive pressure, I believe, my work efficiency and concentration were outstanding, and mental attitude was extremely stronger than ever before.

Christmas break and my sister's wedding

Technically, Christmas Vacation was obviously a vacation in that undergraduates  live off campus for a couple of weeks, and all the electrical power in the department is off for around 10 days. It is a bad idea to travel Cambridge during this period (roughly between 20th December and 5th January) since tourists are not allowed to get into the colleges. It seems like English never stop working throughout the year and have 10 days off at the end of each year (It doesn't mean they work harder than other countries, I'm afraid)

After 2 months of hectic work, we had 40 days of christmas vacation, but massive workload was greeting me. The paper on which a list of essays and courseworks is written is still posted to the wall  commemorating the Christmas vacation in 2010.

MEMS (4000 words) : 18th January 2011
Societal & Ethical dimensions (2000 words) : 14th December 2010
Literature Review (5000 words) : 18th February 2011
Science Communication in Business (four pages essay) : 24th January 2011
Science Communication in Media (write two news articles) : 24th January 2011
Science Communication in Research (one post) : 18th February 2011
Mock exam : 19th January 2011

On top of these courseworks, my sister's wedding ceremony was scheduled on 23rd January. I was quite uncomfortabel because there was nothing I was able to do for my sister's wedding, but at the same time, it was stressful as I had to finish most of the course works before flying back to Seoul to attend the ceremony. Luckily I was able to work in my room because a noisy and cocky american flatmate spent his Christmas vacation in Paris with his girl friend. For the people who are in the late 20s, internal elements are less likely to be big issues in carrying out tasks. Once you know your strength and weakness, managing yourself for a task is not extremely difficult. However, as for external threat (e.g. working environment), it is extremely difficult to deal with it, and hence luck is so important in human life.

I have been living in the UK for three years so far, and I have never seen snow this frequently ever before. As it was anticipated by BBC and newspapers, definitely it was freezing cold in December. Once the temperature goes down under zero degree, it is very likely to snow due to the 'typical British weather'. The amount of snow is normally not enough to make a snowman, but you can easily see the people playing a snowball fight. It is also interesting to watch the foreign students from south Asia or India because it is their first snow experience. For me, snow is one of those stuffs I should be grateful to. People are keen to travel to some exotic places to escape from their routine life spending a lot of money. On the contrary, if the environment gets changed by itself, you get the exotic feeling without spending money. Why wouldn't I thank snow?

I know snow is not common in the UK, so if it snows, I bring out my camera from the drawer and get out. As for me, winter is the best season in Cambridge in terms of mood and beauty. Seeing the people dressed up for formal dinners on the street makes me feel like I'm living in 15th century, and particularly in winter.

Peterhouse

Queen's College

King's College

King's College (I really like this photo :D)

Somewhere in Cambridge

My route in Cambridge

Home-Department-College

After a couple of weeks of cycling, I seriously realized that riding a bike is quite a dangerous transportation method even in Cambridge (needless to say other cities). But, moving around different departments in Cambridge is extremely time-consuming, and occasionally it takes almost 30 minutes by bicycle from home to Cavendish in West Cambridge. So, I've purchased a safety vest and safety halmet from Argos. The biggest improvement in my safety with respect to cycling, however, was not these safety accessories but finding the safest route from the house to the college St Catharine's through the department. As the map shows, this route is about 5 minute cycling distance from the house to the department and 8 minute distance to the college. A third of the path is along the park called Parker's Piece, so there is no question in safety. When the path alongside of the park terminates, I definitely have to stop due to a traffic light. The path from here until turning left is probably the most dangerous region since there is no bike lane, and people (including me) sporadically cross the road, so you've got to be careful. Once you turn left, you can cycle in the bike lane and the street is called Pembroke Street. In the middle of the street, the New Museum Site is on your right-hand side, and you can access there through the archway. In the New Museum Site, there are several departments including the Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy. This site is my favorite place due to Old Cavendish which is the most historic place in the University of Cambridge in terms of scientific discoveries. You can access to the department through either Old Cavendish or the archway which you just came through. St Catharine's College is adjacent to King's College, and my college and Corpus Christi College are the closest colleges from the New Museum Site, so the cafeterias in these colleges are always busy in lunch time.  

the bike lane in Pembroke Street

Archway in New Museum Site

Michaelmas

Most formal lectures take place during the University Terms: Michaelmas, Lent and Easter. Michaelmas is the first term ranging from 5th October 2010 to 3rd December 2010. This period is the busiest and hardest time for majority students in the University since this is the time they are getting used to new environments, new lecturers, new people and new subjects. I was getting through an endless dark tunnel, but at least I had enormous energy so that I could carry out all the tasks enjoying myself.

Characterisation techniques
Materials and Processes for MEMS
Nanomaterials
Physics at the Nanometre-Scale
Science Communication in Media, Business and Research
Societal & Ethical Dimensions of Nano- & Biotechnology
MOTI (Management of Technology and Innovation)
Practicals

This is the list of modules we took during Michaelmas term. Considering there are total 11 modules associated with technology and science in the programme, the four modules in the first term may sound like easy. However, three of them are compulsory (or core) for the exam, and the rest one does not have an exam but alternatively requires a 4000-word essay. Besides, the other business and social science subjects also involve course works, so if you carry out all the course works and make applications for PhD, the workload is actually rather dauting and overwhelming.

I have pretty negative memory associated this term; the memory and the associated feeling is sort of blue and gray. I was just working without any clear vision related to the future. I was extremely busy and finding a academic supervisor for my doctoral research was extrmely difficult. First of all, even though you email someone who is looking for a PhD student, you may not receive a reply. In particular, as far as one of the best Universities in the world such as Cambridge or Oxford, there is huge amount of email sent through the email addresses of the universities, and hence you are less likely receive a reply from the people. I personally advise that you send an email and make a call to the person who you email. Secondly, the information on the internet, probably on the department website, is not usually the latest version, and has been updated quite a long time ago. This means that even if you make a call to the supervisor, you might get to hear that the PhD place has been taken up already by other students in the last year. Definitely, making an application for PhD got my life in the first term much harder. The good news is my hard work got rewarded in that I was offered a PhD place by the supervisor who I made an application to during this term.
  

The cue for Maticulation photo

Maticulation dinner

Cook Experiment

Given that the beginning of my PhD will be rather tough, I've decided to conduct cook experiment for a month. I've got to say it's tough! It seems like I'm conducting chemical experiment on a living body. All the recipes are on the internet, and yet there are still plenty of things you should make your own decisions. For example, you'll never get the right ratio between meat and sauce until you learn from experience. I've made spaghetti with pesto sauce, and I guarantee it was my first and last experience on pesto sauce. Unfortunately this experiment must go on and I'll try other pasta sauces for this week. It's a pity to say that most of delicious and healthy Korean dishes include corned beef or pork, and I don't think I can manage both working and cooking this kind of dishes, so I've given up such delicious Korean foods without any hesitation.

A Small Step For A Blogger A Giant Leap For Myself

I wish to continue to update and upload everything about my life and myself during my PhD course, and hope to see a gradual development in my writing skill.