Stig’s perspective
A couple of years back, I was in the lucky situation to hire Frederik André Hansen as a very strong PhD-student. Frederik was highly talented and committed to the research, and he completed his PhD after three years by defending a very strong thesis. I was even more lucky when I got the opportunity to hire him in a tenure track position (innstegsstilling). This is the first time we hire a candidate in such a position at our department. In Frederik’s contract with the department, one of the criteria for permanent employment is to show independency of me as former PhD supervisor. From a general point of view, I understand this criterion. The only thing is that he is still highly committed to our common research on electromembrane extraction (EME) and liquid-phase microextraction (LPME), and we are collaborating very well. He has the expertise I am missing, and this has definitely brought our common research up to the next level in terms of quality and relevance. I think both of us enjoy the collaboration and benefit from it.
EME and LPME were born in our laboratory as conceptual propositions, and our group have worked with both for many years. We are well known for this, and currently our scientific publications on EME and LPME have more than 13000 citations. The techniques have been commercialized by a Norwegian company, and a lot of research is in progress, both in our group and in laboratories worldwide, by young people as part of their scientific training. Both techniques have broad potential. Hopefully they will establish as significant tools in analytical chemistry, and be used in hospital laboratories, pharmaceutical industry, food industry, chemical industry, environmental laboratories, and in biomedical research and development. It has been a very nice journey working with EME and LPME, because they are our own conceptual propositions, they have “Oslo fingerprint”, and they have been accepted by the international scientific community. We have developed our research strategy solely with focus on EME and LPME.
EME and LPME were invented by professor Knut Einar Rasmussen and myself in very close collaboration. We had a lot of discussions and ideas, we tested them in our laboratory, and together in a junior-senior collaboration we were successful. I was extremely lucky to work with Knut right after my PhD. I learned a lot from him, and he gave me a lot of space. At an early stage, he motivated me to take “captains’ seat”. We worked together for sixteen years, and he retired in 2012. In all years thereafter, he has been a very important and nice mentor for me.
Although we still have a lot to do on EME and LPME, it is now my privilege (and duty) trying to help Frederik into the cockpit; in “captains’ seat” with a new conceptual proposition in his hands. Therefore, we have made the following agreement; every Monday from 8-12 am, we work together in the lab testing totally new ideas (Blue Sky Experiments), most of them with no relation to EME or LPME. We start with a cup of coffee, and I ask him what are the plans for today. The idea is to gradually develop the next conceptual proposition, and anchor this to Frederik. He is the boss and takes “captains’ seat”. My role as “co-pilot” is to assist him in the creative process, and to give him space. At the point we are successful, my role is to stay behind the curtain and give “thumb up”. I have ten years left to retirement. I am quite sure we will nail a new conceptual proposition in ten years, if we do four hours Blue Sky Experiments every Monday morning, 40 times per year, during ten years. This is 1.600 hours with creative laboratory experiments.
I understand that independency from supervisors may be important, but my experience is that collaboration, creative focus, and time are much more important in the process of bringing up new conceptual propositions in science. The process takes time and needs an enthusiastic person in “captains’ seat” with the strongest commitment and energy, and this person should be young. The old professors should stand behind the curtain and support, when it is needed. This I learned from Knut, and hopefully it can be established as a tradition.
Frederik’s perspective
Even before finishing my master’s degree, I knew I wanted to continue to do research. I imagine that most people who have not themselves been part of a research project are not aware of how the everyday of a researcher working the university lab is. How much time is spent troubleshooting faulty equipment or experiments, how 90% or more of your ideas fail, or how daunting the task of improving the current state-of-the-art in the world may be. On the other hand, there is the joy of creating something new, being methods or knowledge, that you are the first in the world to have done based on your knowledge and innovation. The euphoric feeling of seeing data on a PC screen confirming your hypothesis or showing your idea worked… Dancing in the lab may have occurred…
Starting a PhD journey, the candidate almost always has to rely on the supervisor’s ideas, expertise, and experience to conceptualize and make progress in the project. However, as time progresses, some (including myself) will experience that they get to a high enough level of theoretical understanding and practical experience to have discussions with the supervisor on equal footing. For two researchers with the same interests and desire to drive a concept forward this is a fantastic point to reach, allowing one to improve the idea of the other, offer constructive criticism, and together reach new theoretical understandings. The best research is usually made by collaborating with others. Therefore, I have continued with electromembrane extraction as my main focus of research during my tenure-track postdoc position. However, a big aspect of qualifying for a permanent academic position is to demonstrate independence as a researcher. This may for example be accomplished by publishing without former supervisor as a co-author, even if the subject is strongly associated with the supervisor. I however also believe that if you work and publish for long enough with something, your name will also become attached to this concept. Still, it is fun to play with different ideas in the lab, and who knows, maybe some new clever concept will arise from testing crazy ideas. Playing in the lab is unfortunately often down-prioritized in a busy schedule with meetings, supervision, teaching, etc. Therefore, we have put 4 hours of playing in the lab (with “blue skies”) in the calendar every week. What will come of it, if anything, remains to be seen, but I am quite sure we will find something interesting.