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Dago

Sun Apr 29 2007, 08:48PM

Registered Member #538 Joined: Sun Feb 18 2007, 08:33PM
Location: Finland
Posts: 181

I was going to write a really long story here but it was so messy so I though about cutting it short: Should I go study technical physics (specializations include topics like plasmaphysics and fusion reactors, nanomaterials and surfacescience (semiconductor coatings, coatings for optics etc.) or electrical engineering?

I find that technical physics sounds the most interesting but the negative things about it is that it contains a lot of mathematics (math not being my strong side, I'm more of a physics guy :P) and is quite hard subject to study overall. One big negative thing about it is that it will probably be quite hard to find a job with an education say in plasmaphysics especially finland (but I'm not against moving elsewhere either). The bonus being that I would get to work with stuff I really like and am interested in (fusion reactors <3) and the salary wouldnt probably be too shabby either (IF I find a job). Technical physics is fairly hard to get in but I think I will make it if I really want to.

Material technology sounds quite interesting too, but I'm interested more in stuff like superconductors and other more exotic stuff than basic metallurgy (material technology contains a wide range of subjects to study) and I'm not 100% sure how thoroughly you can specialize to subject like superconductors).

EE is a good "basic" choice and a subject I'm interested in but the thing with EE is that its a pretty common education (most of the people graduating from the place I'm applying to are EEs) so the salary wont be as good etc. But it would prolly be a tad easier subject to study and alot easier to get in than technical physics.

I'm looking for comments on stuff like how easy/what kind of jobs I could get in with some of the aforementioned educations etc. :)

Steve Ward

Sun Apr 29 2007, 10:25PM

Registered Member #146 Joined: Sun Feb 12 2006, 04:21AM
Location: Austin Tx
Posts: 1055

I find that technical physics sounds the most interesting but the negative things about it is that it contains a lot of mathematics (math not being my strong side, I'm more of a physics guy :P)

I would think that ALL of the mentioned areas of study will involve extensive mathematics. But maybe my perspective is a little skewed since im told that the school i attend is unusually math-oriented compared with other engineering schools.

Do you enjoy building stuff? Or would you rather just think about things (sometimes its more fun)?

Anyway, i dont think anyone is going to have a good answer to your question, but technical physics sounds like a cool area if you really do enjoy physics. EE is likely to get you into more digital electronics, which begins to get further from physics.

Steve Conner

Sun Apr 29 2007, 10:47PM

Registered Member #30 Joined: Fri Feb 03 2006, 10:52AM
Location: Glasgow, Scotland
Posts: 6706

How can you be a physics guy and not like math?

If you want to get far in any of the subjects you mentioned, the stronger your maths is, the better.

What you study doesn't necessarily determine what you end up doing for a day job, and that doesn't necessarily end up being what you are actually interested in, either. I have a PhD in mechanical engineering, but I ended up more or less a computer programmer. Horowitz and Hill, the guys who wrote The Art Of Electronics, both started out as physicists, IIRC. Wes Montgomery worked in a radio repair shop most of his life, but the world remembers him for his innovative jazz guitar playing now.

Also, sure you love fusion reactors, but how many fusion reactors are there in the world? How many jobs do you think there are in fusion research worldwide? What do you think the odds are of you getting one of them? I'm not saying you shouldn't try, but if you study technical physics, you are far more likely to end up in the semiconductor or optics industries, since there are orders of magnitude more jobs available there.

Finally, they may well let you transfer from EE to physics, or vice versa, up to the end of your first year, if you start one and realise you would rather have done the other. I'm not sure about this, though.

Simon

Sun Apr 29 2007, 11:51PM

Registered Member #32 Joined: Sat Feb 04 2006, 08:58AM
Location: Australia
Posts: 549

I'm sorry to disappoint, but all the really cool physics you mentioned involves a lot of slick advanced maths.

Astrophysics doesn't involve much maths and it can take you out to big telescopes and radio arrays, full of expensive equipment. Maybe you can look for something like that.

wrote ...

Also, sure you love fusion reactors, but how many fusion reactors are there in the world? How many jobs do you think there are in fusion research worldwide? What do you think the odds are of you getting one of them?

But, Steve, fusion is the power of the future...

Dago

Mon Apr 30 2007, 08:56AM

Registered Member #538 Joined: Sun Feb 18 2007, 08:33PM
Location: Finland
Posts: 181

Really good points. About the math thing, I know that pretty much every area in engineering involves alot of math so I'm kinda prepared for that and I'm pretty sure I'll manage through it. But by saying I'm more of a physics guy I meant that I like physics more because it tends to deal with "real" things (except stuff like theoretical physics where it starts to go pretty abstract) and math is more abstract and it gets alot harder for me to think through it.

And Steve C. that what I'm worried about the fusion reactor stuff, not enough job opportunities. I guess you can get a lot more diffrent jobs with an education in plasmaphysics (ion thrusters for satellites?) but I'm afraid they will still be pretty scarce.

And about EE, I'm the LEAST interested in digital and programming stuff and I guess EE is mostly about digital stuff nowadays. I guess you can specialize in to something not digital like powerelectronics.

wrote ...
Do you enjoy building stuff? Or would you rather just think about things (sometimes its more fun)?

I'd have to say I'm more of a designer but I'm not saying I dont like building stuff :)

Dr. Shark

Mon Apr 30 2007, 09:55AM

Registered Member #75 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 09:30AM
Location: Montana, USA
Posts: 711

If you think you can manage physics, jump at the chance! While it is quite unlikely that you will end up doing anything remotely related to plasma physics in your later day job (I should know, I went from laser physics into computational Neuroscience), it just gives you a GREAT sense about how the world works. Most stuff you ever need to know you can get from books, but a degree in physics really teaches you to think hard. You can always go to something less abstract from there, but you will find it very difficult the other way round, e.g. working on fusion reactors with an EE degree.

Duh, you can see I am rater biased! But if you really don't like maths (even if it deals with real things like quantum wavefunctions

) physics might be quite tough for some, I know I struggled at times!

Simon

Tue May 01 2007, 12:20AM

Registered Member #32 Joined: Sat Feb 04 2006, 08:58AM
Location: Australia
Posts: 549

As a typical sort of applied physics thing that you could easily find yourself doing if you do physics, I know someone doing research on MRI scanners.

He's modelling the fields inside the scanners and using that to do, well, things. The maths involved is Fourier-Bessel series stuff. This is a lot like your usual Fourier transform stuff (if you've seen software that takes a signal and produces a spectrum graph from it, that's Fourier Theory) but instead of decomposing into regular sine waves, the decomposition is into things called Bessel functions. All the computation is done on computers, of course.

If you think you could handle that, that's applied physics. You can get a long way in applied physics if you just pull out of books formulae that other people have worked out. The main skill is to be able to rearrange and solve equations.

More theoretical stuff is almost certainly not for you. Even very concrete problems in advanced physics tend to be solved with indirect (and hence abstract) mathematical tricks.

HV Enthusiast

Tue May 01 2007, 01:03AM

Registered Member #15 Joined: Thu Feb 02 2006, 01:11PM
Location:
Posts: 3068

Just a note that tomorrow's engineers are not going to be doing the hands-on technical designing that engineers of past have done. This is especially true in the US where even now its reality for most new graduates.

Almost all of the large companies hire incoming grads and place them in leadership programs where they instead of actually designing and working real engineering programs, they are instead given management tasks such as cost accounting, scheduling, and many other administrative tasks.

Personally, i wouldn't wish engineering on my worst enemy these days. If i could do it over again, i certaintly wouldn't be an engineer.

uzzors2k

Tue May 01 2007, 10:10AM

Registered Member #95 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 04:57PM
Location: Norway
Posts: 1308

EastVoltResearch wrote ...

Personally, i wouldn't wish engineering on my worst enemy these days. If i could do it over again, i certaintly wouldn't be an engineer.

What would you choose then? I was thinking engineering myself, but if it's as drab as you say... But who does the engineering if everyone is in administration?

Steve Conner

Tue May 01 2007, 10:16AM

Registered Member #30 Joined: Fri Feb 03 2006, 10:52AM
Location: Glasgow, Scotland
Posts: 6706

Oh, well that's too bad, but they still need some people to actually make stuff, right? I did loads of hands-on work in my last job. When we designed a new product we would start with a ratty looking prototype that we made ourselves by hand in the lab, and once it worked well, we would fire up all the fancy CAD software and try to make a neat one that could be mass produced. I spent a lot of time building prototypes and measuring their performance, and I believe it's a good way to do things.

If someone tried to chain me to a desk doing nothing but bean counting, I would probably quit. Sure, I need to understand project planning and accounting. Everyone involved in the design of something complicated that needs to meet a deadline and be sold at a profit needs to know about that. Newbie engineers often don't realise how and where to make compromises and cut corners to meet cost and time constraints.

But ultimately what I do best is make things, and people seem to hire me for that.

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