South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, United States
I have been interested in science and looking up at the stars at night for as long as I can remember. My mom once bought me a book about constellations, and I read it so much and used it so often to look at the stars that I had to duct tape the binding back together. I narrowed down to physics in high school. Other sciences like biology and chemistry required a lot more memorization, and I’m not that good at memorizing. Physics also seemed to answer the most fundamental questions about physical reality. In college I gravitated toward particle physics rather quickly because it answers the most fundamental questions, even in physics. How did the universe begin? How does everything begin? Even now I’m part of building the DUNE experiment on a gigantic scale that really continues that theme. On a more metaphysical scale I think one of the reasons I’ve been called into science is to try to be a bridge between scientific and Christian communities because they are sometimes at odds with each other and I’m a member of both.