Profile

Photo:

Eileen Diskin

Thanks to everyone who voted - I'm super excited to have won, and can't wait to kick off my project with the prize money!!!

My CV

  • Education:

    I grew up in the USA, but moved to Ireland for college and the PhD – right now, I’m at Trinity College Dublin

  • Qualifications:

    Loving science!

  • Work History:

    Since I grew up in the United States, most of my work history is from there. I worked at a wildness lodge in Alaska, a state park in Missouri, the Pittsburgh Zoo, the National Aviary (thats like a zoo, but just for birds)…all of these jobs were in environmental education…and I was an archaeologist for 6 months in Indiana!

  • Current Job:

    I’m a PhD student

  • My Typical Day

    I walk into my office around 9, wake up with some coffee, and then the science fun can start! I make graphs, write about my results, read about other research – but I make sure to save some time so I can take a break to work on (fun!) outside projects in the afternoon. Then its time for tennis, swimming, running, or meeting up with friends – and then home in the evening.

  • My Interview

    • How would you describe yourself in 3 words?

      Creative, funny, caring. I was having a hard time picking for myself, so I asked one of the other students in my office and this is what she said! Well, she said I’m ‘sometimes funny’ ;)

      What did you want to be after you left school?

      I wanted to be a marine biologist for a long time…I guess I’m close, since I’m researching flamingos (and they live in water!)

      Were you ever in trouble at school?

      You can’t get in trouble if you don’t get caught! ;)

      Who is your favourite singer or band?

      Oh! That’s a really hard question…I like so many different kinds of music! Right now, some of my favourites are Lady Gaga, Nicki Minaj, MGMT, Rihanna, fun., Kanye West, Of Monsters and Men…I could go on and on!

      What is the most fun thing you've done?

      I once rode on a camel through the desert in Morocco – that was pretty cool

      If you had 3 wishes for yourself what would they be? - be honest!

      1. A better voice (I’m the worst singer EVER!), and I’d especially like to be good at rapping. 2. To have a magical power where I can know the solution to ANY problem in science – so I can cure all of the diseases, cancers…everything! (And then I can tell the solutions to other scientists, like the ones in this group!) 3. To give 3 wishes to everyone in the world!

      Tell us a joke.

      (I made this joke up by myself, so maybe its not the best joke EVER, but I’m proud of it!) What is a dogs favourite part of a tree? The BARK.

  • Work photos:

    Here I am on fieldwork in Spain (I’m the one in the middle with the bag). In this photo, we are just about ready to start capturing flamingos – it is SO fun, even though we had to wake up VERY early (4am) to do it!

     

    These are a bunch of flamingos that we caught. The big, pink ones are adults – and the littler grey ones are the baby flamingos. (You can ask me why the babies aren’t pink yet if you want)

     

    This is me taking a sample from one of the flamingos (and if you want to know the details…from its bum – where there are lots of interesting bacteria). Don’t worry – it doesn’t hurt the flamingos at all, and we release them back into their habitats when we are done!

     

    See!? I told you we released the flamingos! This little guy is headed back into the water to join his friends in the ‘creche’ (thats what they call it where all the baby flamingos are looked after by the adult flamingos). You can see some of them behind him headed back as well.

     

    This is me talking at a conference in Berlin, last year. Sometimes I bring along this inflatable flamingo – he gets lots of attention from people in the audience. (I even got a prize for this talk, but I think the flamingo deserves most of the credit!)

     

     

Questions answered by Eileen

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