My Journey from Glasgow to Prague
As part of my MEng in Chemical Engineering, I am required to carry out an independent research project in Semester 2 which can also be done abroad as part of Erasmus+. Even though there were numerous destinations we could go to, Prague was immediately my first choice. As my home university, the University of Strathclyde has an agreement in place with the University of Chemistry and Technlogy Prague (UTCT) the only other thing was to find a project I would be interested in and be able to learn new things as part of!
While looking through the list of departments and their areas of research I was immediately drawn to the GreenCats Research group as the research seemed applicable, relevant and quite frankly really interesting. After doing some more research I had realised another Strath student had done their Master’s thesis with the Research team a few years back and has thoroughly enjoyed his experience. This prompted me to reach out to David and see if there was any chance of me doing something similar and joining the team for a few months to complete my thesis. Luckily for me, we hit it off straight away and the rest is history. I am currently looking into the kinetics associated with the hydrogenolysis of dimethyl adipate using CuZn catalysts. This is an area I knew very little about, which has presented challenges at first but I am now really enjoying the complexity of it and hopefully, the outcome will be a positive one with a finished thesis, some new friends and a breadth of knowledge and experience gained through carrying out the project here in Prague.
Now writing this after spending a month here at UCT, I can confidently say I am utterly in love with Prague, its culture and its energy. I expect to be back very soon after finishing, maybe even living here full time at some point. Big thanks to the team for making me feel very much at home within their space. I look forward to whatever the next few months bring (alongside the sunny weather I hope!).
Laura Karacic, trainee.