My PhD during lockdown - Valeria Filippou

As everyone, during the last few months I have had my ups and downs. I never imagined that the COVID situation could happen, however I was able to adapt to the new circumstances. The last few months have helped me grow and see the world from a different perspective. Even though there were some initial difficulties, this did not stop me to continue my work.

With respect to my PhD project, it is about developing algorithms for activity recognition and step count for people who have normal or pathological gait. Luckily for me, my PhD is a computational project, and during lockdown I was able to continue developing and testing my algorithms. After the completion of this work I started writing my thesis and this is what I am focusing on at the moment. I am a few months away from the submission of my thesis and I am overwhelmed. Writing my thesis has been exciting, but sometimes it can get boring, so I always try to find ways to keep me motivated and continue writing efficiently.

For people that might be in a similar situation with me, I would suggest:

• Don’t be harsh with yourself the days that it is hard to concentrate
• Schedule your day and include some breaks from your work
• Go for a walk during the day (this saved me!)
• Praise yourself for the work you've done
• Have a work-life balance

My highlight during lockdown is that I managed to submit a conference paper at the 2020 42nd Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine & Biology Society (EMBC) and it was accepted.