Python with Julian

We speak to Julian, a PhD student at the University of Bristol, about his research and his short and sweet videos available on the Taught By Humans website.

Towards our new short and sweet series, Julian has made for us 5 minute videos on Python programming, including how to make graphs. So, this week we spoke to him about the PhD research that inspired his choice of video topics as well as his experience of producing video content communicating his knowledge with the public, for your benefit!

Over to Julian!

What is the subject of your PhD and can you summarise why you are interested in that subject?

My PhD topic is Stochastic Swarms for Environmental monitoring. The project is looking at a large number of cheap, disposable and simple robots that spread out over an area using a very simple behaviour, randomly moving around. Once in place they can communicate what they sense (eg. toxic chemicals, PH levels) using colour changes and then biodegrade after the task is done.

The project is interesting to me because it utilises very simple behaviours. In contrast to making robots that are increasingly complex and precise these robots are deliberately simple and can still do something useful with their shear numbers. Part of my interest in the project also stems from the highly challenging constraint of making the robots biodegradable. This affects what materials are used and what behaviours are possible.

If someone were looking to learn about your subject, how would you recommend they go about it?

My research touches on a couple of different areas, from material science to swarm intelligence. To gain insight into swarm intelligence I recommend watching videos on Youtube about both natural and robotic swarms. I find natural swarms such as ant colonies, termites nests and bee hives particularly important in understanding what swarms do. This is because many ideas in swarm robotics are derived from these natural systems and seeing how they operate is both inspiring and humbling. In terms of finding videos on swarms robotics and intelligence often videos are released to go alongside major publications which are often much easier to digest compared to reading a full research article. I can recommend the videos on KiloBots and the TERMES project. Alternatively a number of academics have given talks on the subject and these are often also published in full.

Since Swarm Robotics is still a fairly new field there’s few text resources which are free, accessible and detailed. However, if you have access to an institutional library I’d recommend the first chapter of “Swarm Robotics: A Formal Approach” by Hamann Heiko which is a fairly recent and detailed introduction to the area.

What topic did you choose for your short and sweet videos and why?

I chose to focus on loading and plotting data in Python as I think it’s a really useful skill to learn. These techniques can remove a lot of tedious manual work from these kind of tasks. When you try doing these things manually in something like excel you’re always thinking “there must be a smarter way to do this” and with some fairly basic python commands there is! I also liked the idea on focusing on a skill that people could use right away in their day to day work.

What made you choose to take part in the content creation scheme for Taught By Humans’ short and sweet series?

I chose to participate in the series as I enjoy teaching people skills they will find interesting or useful. The 5 minute time limit really makes you focus on the core messages you want to communicate and I think in the end makes a sleeker and more engaging experience.

Your videos are brilliant and very informative, what advice would you give to those interested in content creation?

I think keeping your content accessible is key, there are ways to ensure every type of learner is supported and they can take from it what they want. For example, if the content is designed in such a way that people can go at their own pace taking more time over some bits, or skipping sections out completely if they already know them, then that’s very accommodating. Also including a section on where to go next with the topic is a really easy way to encourage learning beyond what is in the lesson if people found it interesting.

Apart from that making a plan is a good way to shape your content before you commit the resources to producing it. That’s not to say this plan can’t change and in fact will change as you begin fleshing it out. Reviewing this plan and your content regularly is also important. For example, you could record a draft of your video before you get all the graphics and things ready or you could time how long it takes you to read through what you’ve written so far. This will help you make sure the content both meets its objectives and helps keeps things succinct.

However, I think the important advice I can give is to have a go and be excited in sharing your skills and knowledge! Not only can it be personally fulfilling but you pick up so many skills simply by working on projects and getting your stuff out there.

Thanks to Julian for taking the time to talk to us about his research and video content. If you would like to see Julian’s videos on Python programming, follow our social media pages and watch out for our posts later this week.