Naturally Obsessed: The Making of a Scientist

Recently, I saw a documentary entitled Naturally Obsessed: The Making of A Scientist, which follows the lives of three graduate students in a Columbia University crystallography lab.

Much like PhD Comics, the movie is entertaining because it hits very close to home: both in terms of the characters and also the repeated frustration and failure they encounter.

The documentary follows three years of filming real science in a single laboratory and captures the nitty-gritty of the experimental process, stripped down, with none of the glamour of dyed-solutions or modified procedures for film. Everything from pipetting to interacting with the Principal Investigator (PI) is presented to the viewer right along with the "please-let-this-be-the-one-that-works" anticipation of watching the diffraction results appear on the screen.

While you might be captivated by the Hollywood ending, make sure to pay attention to the lives of the other characters in the film. They provide a wealth of life-decision scenarios that may help you decide whether long-term research is right for you.

And for some discussion of personality traits that make good scientists, check out what's being said about Naturally Obsessed on Scitable's Women in Science Forum here.

1 Comment

August 15, 2010 | 06:50 PM

Posted By: D. Jack Li

Funny that they chose to focus on a crytallography lab - sometimes it takes years to get good crystals and structures and even then, it may be to no avail...so things can get depressing...

Naturally Obsessed: The Making of a Scientist

share

Email your Friend