Profile

I live on the very edge of Bristol (I wake up to countryside views everyday) with my boyfriend. I am allergic to fur and so I have two fish tanks instead.  I love baking and trying out my new recipes on my work colleagues. I love having a go at floristry and go to classes each month. I will have a go at any craft and like how different arty activities are to my daily science job.

I carry out various tests on water samples each day to ensure they are clean and safe to drink. Most of my work involves filtering water samples and then reading these test results off the next day.

If we have any failures I have to let the scientists out on site know so that they can investigate and take more samples if needed.

I have to do a mixture of bench work and paperwork ensuring that any problems are recorded and dealt with appropriately, and all the tests we do are valid to standards set by the government.

We make all our own media and do some chemistry testing as well.

We do have to test how much bacteria is in sewage sludge and this is the most smelly part of my job.

I would come in and check the rota first to find out what area I am going to be working in that day. I leave it as a surprise each day even though the full week is up on the notice board.

I would start off by reading off the tests that were set up yesterday and hope there are no failures. If there are failures, you know the afternoon will be busy with extra samples.

I investigate any failures from the past couple of days; we need to find out what species of bacteria we have found so it can point the site scientists to where the problem might be and it can then be fixed quickly.

That takes me up to lunchtime. The day is split into two parts so you’re not always on the same job all day.

The afternoon’s work is to help set up and test the samples as they come in. All the tests have to be complete by 6.30 when we can all go home, so we work fast to get the 200 samples done and in the incubator in time.