Final Stages

Work isn't winding down, but the process is. I can see where I may be realistically with my research by next Friday when I leave, and I will spend the next week trying to statistically analyze the data I have been processing for the past few weeks. I am in some bittersweet place between frantically trying to do as much as I can on my research, report, and presentation, and letting myself take a breath before my next semester starts up full force.

So, what will the next week look like? The "fun" part, but with added time pressure. I have my data is a processable form now, but... I have 100's of thousands of rows of it. So, I will look at the trends by eye (I am looking for compounds that have reasonable calibration curves and R squared values, and presence in my samples, but less or no presence in my blanks) and then maybe run tests on variance to see how significant my results are. If I can finish setting up R on my computer, that may be the way to go. Once I have "significant" results, I'll try and visually see if there are trends by site, and analyze the compounds themselves to see what their properties are... are they things I will be realistically finding in sediment, or are they results from lab contamination or air? And most importantly, are they known mutagens? If I can get so far as to look at mutagenicity and trends, I can can compare my results to those of another student's, if I can find his research.

But unfortunately, I have life things to do to - a presentation about my research Thursday afternoon, a bus back to Lille Friday evening and packing to do beforehand, and a 30 or 40 page report to get work done on for my Master's and for WANA, complete with literature review. And so life keeps chugging on, and fast, even when I want it to pause so I can enjoy the last bit of my summer here in the beautiful city of Leipzig.