Back In The Lab

So it turns out that working in the lab (at least right now while I set up my first 'experiment' is a lot like my old job at the Washington Technology Center, minus the frustration of working for a bunch of clueless idiots. I wonder how long it'll take for me to decide that everyone here is a clueless semi-retard. *chuckle* Oh wait, too late . . .

For the next five weeks, I'm going to be measuring the absorption spectra of 3/5 semi-conductor nanoparticles dispersed in glass over a range of temperatures from -180 to +100 celsius. I fired up my apparatus for the first time yesterday and I'm already identifying problems that'll need to be fixed. The biggest problem so far is that the temperature measurement that the system is making doesn't seem to reflect the actual temperature of the sample. That's kind of a problem.

Anyhow, it's kind of nice to be doing this sort of work again.