Bijoy Das

From Clearing to PhD

Best friend, flatmate, bandmate. Met at Queen Mary.

I still remember the day I opened my UCAS page on results day and realised I had missed both my university choices - by just a couple of marks. Stressed and upset, I began to explore my other options and by sheer luck, I found Queen Mary’s Biomedical Engineering course still available through Clearing. I hastily got in touch, and within months was packing to begin my life in East London.

Starting the course after entering through Clearing was a little bit daunting. I felt lucky to have found my course of choice, but also felt like perhaps I wasn’t smart enough, or would be looked down on. People around me would talk about whether Queen Mary was their first or second choice and I would dread to bring up the fact I was rejected from both of mine.

Second year Bijoy

But within a few months, I began to realise just how lucky I was. The teaching at Queen Mary was at a challenging but workable pace, with support available whenever I needed it.

"I loved the atmosphere of the university, and the unparalleled cultural diversity of the students. It turned out that Queen Mary was exactly the place where I could thrive, and instead of always feeling not quite good enough, I could achieve as much as I set my mind to."

In my second year, I won the Principal's Prize for top biomedical engineer, and had the privilege of working under Prof. Martin Knight for my third-year dissertation. The project was based on finding a novel treatment for osteoarthritis and was a one-of-a-kind experience; imagine having severed cow's legs in a bag waiting for you every week to clean, cut open, extract cartilage cells from and then propagate and experiment on. By the end, I was well trained in handling live cell cultures and had my name and work included in a published research paper.

China trip with Queen Mary Summer School, University of Sichuan, Chengdu.

With increased confidence after winning awards and carrying out a successful project, I opted to stay at Queen Mary for an MEng to advance my skills; choosing an open-ended design and materials-based project on 'designing a futuristic concept bike', in partnership with Nanoforce. Working under Dr Emiliano Bilotti and Dr Han Zhang was a great learning experience and a huge pleasure, and little did I know what it would result in.

The project received industrial sponsorship from multiple leading companies, won Queen Mary's top prize for MEng projects and had potential to be carried further into a start-up initiative.

I also received another opportunity in this year – to visit China as part of the Sichuan Summer School. I stayed in China for the best part of a month and had an unforgettable experience. I even have a matching tattoo with some of the others from that trip, to remember it for the rest of my life.

PhD life

Graduation day!

My whole journey really all fell into place when I reconnected with my Master’s supervisor, Dr. Bilotti – who informed me he had an interesting, industry-funded PhD opening available. After graduating I had considered a PhD, but was initially too burnt out to continue learning and research. After two years of working, I was ready to jump back into STEM and was accepted for the PhD position.

Which brings us to now – beginning my second year of PhD research, and in the process of writing four different papers, with my lab research being manufactured into an industry product.

The takeaway from all of this for me is that it did not matter at all how I got to Queen Mary, nor what I had (or hadn’t) achieved before I got here.

This institution gave me the chance to excel academically, carry out important scientific research, secure a first-class degree, be employed immediately after graduating, go on the trip of my lifetime, and is now supporting me on my way to a doctorate. Not to mention the contacts, friends and even partner I found here along the way.

Your time at Queen Mary is what you make of it and you can truly achieve anything here.

Best of luck!

Bijoy Das