All in a Day's Work: Peter McHugh, Department of Mechanical Engineering, NUI Galway
My walk to work can be stormy, so I often head off in rain gear and big boots. I turn on my computer, check my mail I'm straight into an online international scientific conference. I'm wearing two hats at NUI Galway - I'm a member of the academic department with teaching duties, and I also head a research group at the National Centre for Biomedical Engineering Science.
My teaching duties take up a good part of the morning as I lecture at the mechanical engineering department. I take science education outside the university too, as part of my role on NUIG's communication committee. In the late morning, I visit a girl's school in Claremorris to talk about studying science and engineering.
I think the students are intrigued when they hear how our work at the university impacts on people's everyday lives. I tell the girls of how we recently developed a cardiovascular catheter for minimally invasive surgery - basically a balloon inserted into a heart valve to open it up and avoid the need for a bypass. I've witnessed heart surgery using a device that was developed in Galway. It's good to know that something we made is being used to improve and save lives all over the world.
The line I always use in the classroom is "are you ready to change lives?". It seems to work - we've been able to increase enrolment figures for a number of courses this way. More than 50 per cent of our students in the mechanical engineering department are female.
A considerable part of my day is spent filling out forms, questionnaires and correcting student projects. It's onerous, but it has to be done. Research is getting a more prominent place in education and if that brings extra paperwork, then bring it on.
Another big part of the job is selling. Most active researchers cut their teeth begging the EU for research funding. You get pretty good at selling your projects.
Galway is not hard to sell. Among its many attributes, it's the European capital of the medical device industry. NUIG is a symbol of the West and plays a critical role in the development of the region. We take our responsibility to local industry very seriously.
In the afternoon I head across to the lab and hook up with the research team there. At the moment, we're working with a local orthopaedic surgeon designing a new screw for improved shin bone fixation.
Later, we will look at building complex computer simulations of the way the bone develops in reply to force applied. Virtual design prediction is empowering, amazing stuff. We can test to see whether a design works before it has been made.
I'm pretty hands on with the research projects going on the lab and spend as much time with my student research team as I can. Any time left at the end of the day will be taken up with writing research papers - they're our currency in this business. I may end up bringing the laptop home and finishing what I started after the kids go to bed.
I am not a nerdy scientist, but I do love my job. Today's students are so in-your-face - you have to be up to their questions and challenges.
In conversation with Louise Holden
