• Question: Have u ever did an experiment on something that someone has already tried to do?

    Asked by 292enek48 to Stephen, Emma, Karla, Shane, Yang on 14 Nov 2017.
    • Photo: Karla Dussan

      Karla Dussan answered on 14 Nov 2017:

      Most of the time as scientists, researchers try to continue to build on the existing body of knowledge, in order to solve old and new problems, or make technologies less dangerous, cleaner, cheaper, … So in many occasions your work starts from something that has been tried before, but you go towards contributing a new aspect of it.

    • Photo: Emma Hanley

      Emma Hanley answered on 14 Nov 2017:

      In my work I use anintegrated energy system model. This means it represents the heat, transport and electricity sectors. I use this model to try discover different things and this model is used by other people in my research group.

    • Photo: Stephen Rhatigan

      Stephen Rhatigan answered on 14 Nov 2017:

      When you first study science, all the experiments you do have been tried already. You do these experiments to see how they work and to help you understand the things you learn in class.
      After a few years of studying science you start to do new experiments that people haven’t tried before. Maybe the technique that you use was developed by someone else but you use it to look at something new.
      If you want to be a doctor of science (get a PhD) you have to do original research. This can mean doing experiments to look at things which nobody has looked at before.

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