Physics
Spring 2009
Rashid Williams-Garcia began his graduate studies in the Department of Physics at Indiana University-Bloomington in the fall of 2008. Rashid chose IU Physics because of the opportunity there to study neurophysics – the intersection of physics and neuroscience. He presently studies neurophysics on the systems scale, looking at the behavior of networks of neurons.
Prior to arriving in Bloomington, Rashid lived in Los Angeles, where he was raised, attended college at UCLA, and participated in a post-baccalaureate program to gain further skills before going to graduate school. UCLA’s PREP program – Post-Baccalaureate Research and Education Program – trains small cohorts of college graduates from underrepresented minorities in order to prepare them for graduate studies in biomedically relevant science disciplines. While in the PREP program, Rashid studied with faculty mentor Dr. Dolores Bozovic, whose research focuses on the physics of hearing. His experiences in her lab reinforced his love of research. Rashid also attributes his enjoyment of learning to being home-schooled by his father. His only classmate – his sister – went on to major in Physics at UCLA as well.
Bloomington provided Rashid with a bit of culture shock upon his arrival from LA. However, he soon grew to enjoy the friendliness of the small city and its surrounding Midwestern culture. The novelty of “random people talking to you” and Bloomington’s compact downtown are two things that have surprised him.
A favorite quote of Rashid’s is by Francis Crick: “It is essential to understand our brains in some detail if we are to assess correctly our place in this vast and complicated universe we see all around us.” Rashid’s future plans definitely involve research in neurophysics. He may also look into improving the standard introductory Physics texts that have confounded him during his first year as a graduate student.