Week 1, Day 1

My quals for the PhD program in nuclear science and engineering at MIT are going to happen in the first or second week of February 2026, so I’m blogging my progress on my work (master’s thesis, qual practice problems, research, classes) to keep me on track and motivated.

I just came back from remote working in New Haven, CT for the past couple of weeks, so today, I am readjusting to routine here in Boston. While I was there, I finished a final paper for 22.103 (Nuclear technology and society) and did revisions for 22.103 assignments. I also visited Brookhaven National Lab earlier in November for a research collaboration to learn how to measure the heat capacity of a quantum material.

Overview

Classes

22.QTD: I need to finish the final pset for 22.QTD (quantum technology and devices, also a required class for my PhD specialization track in quantum materials), a final paper 2-4 pages, and a final presentation.

22.103: Complete! Actually, I need to attend an oral exam next week to defend my research paper, but I don’t really need to do that much prep work for that (yet at least).

Research

For research, my professor understands that I’ll be focusing on qualifying exam prep, so he isn’t expecting too much of me in terms of research for the next two months. However, this week, I need to finish writing the first and second chapter of my master’s thesis so that I can meet my goal of turning it in on Dec 16. This week, I also need to gather some data for a collaborator in the EECS department.

Quals

My professor is writing 100 small math practice problems to help us prepare for the qualifying exam, and there are some practice problems on the NSE website that are qual exam questions from past years. I’m also going to redo some problems from 8.511 (solid state) and 22.QTD to practice.

Things I accomplished today

Classes

I worked on a problem for my 22.QTD PSET. I’m just gonna do one a day until the deadline on Dec 9. The topic was trotterization. Trot! trot! trot!

Research

Scheduled a meeting with a collaborator in Zurich. This is not really research but administrative work to support my research; I resubmitted a reimbursement report with the required updates that had been returned to me. I didn’t really get a chance to work on my master’s thesis today. Ugh…

Quals

I worked on one sub problem of a practice qual problem. And I also asked CHAT GPT to create some conceptual questions from 22.QTD psets. Not as much progress as I wanted...

Miscellaneous

I bought some Ippodo matcha (sayaka) so that I can stay caffeinated for these next two months!!!! I also bought my tickets to fly back from Houston after the holidays. I’m always buying these holiday tickets last minute. And I did some house chores at the coop I live at and signed up for my dinner slots for the next month. Oh I also went to the gym and did some upper body workouts. I chit chatted with my roommates after dinner and caught up with home gossip.