Question: What persuaded you from being a marine biologist to working on materials for solar cells?

Bethan Charles answered on 30 Jan 2017:

In the third year of my degree I worked on a project describing the physics of dolphin’s echolocation. I enjoyed it so much I applied for a job with marine biologists who studied dolphins and was lucky enough to get it. It was my job to record the calls of the dolphins and analyse the frequencies of the calls they were using to communicate.

I loved this job and I actually applied for a similar project for my fourth year of my degree. But, obviously, this was a popular project and I didn’t get it!

But I was also good at materials science and I liked the idea of working towards bettering renewable technology. So I picked another project for my fourth year…solar cells. I miss the dolphins but I found a new passion for solar technology!