Science Starts Here: Kitchen Takes an Unconventional Road to Research
By Amy Mast
The Magnet Lab employs people with many types of
degrees. Physics, engineering, math and chemistry
degrees, sure. But anthropology?
Mag Lab employee and FSU engineering major Jason Kitchen's
path to a career in science has been an unusual one. Kitchen
graduated from FSU in 1997 with a degree in anthropology and
headed out west to New Mexico, where his natural aptitude in
other areas led him to a job as a database manager for a defense
contractor.
Jason Kitchen assembles a probe. Plastic gloves keep the delicate parts clean.
Growing up, Kitchen liked both anthropology and engineering,
but he chose the former for his first degree.
"By the time I got done with the degree, I didn't think I wanted
to go on to graduate school and do (anthropology) as a career,"
said Kitchen. "I missed working with my hands, and I always liked
science a lot."
Other people at the defense company noticed Kitchen's
scientific bent, and he was soon splitting his time between
the database work and the more exciting field experiments
engineers were conducting. "Seeing the mechanical engineers
do the computer-aided design (CAD) work tied in with how
much I like to draw and I like 3D visualization," Kitchen said.
On a visit to see his brother in Tallahassee, Kitchen met his
now-wife. As their long-distance relationship grew, he made the
decision in 2004 to move back to Florida and get married. With
the move, he took the chance to go to college all over again
– this time with the goal of an engineering degree squarely in
place.
His new degree underway, he applied for a part-time position
in the Mag Lab's Geochemistry department. Sure, it was a
job pushing papers, but it represented one step closer to the
type of work he wanted to be around. He began to do some
bookkeeping work here and there for other departments until
he found himself in a conversation with Associate in Engineering
Peter Gor'kov, part of an innovative lab team researching,
designing and building magnet probes for nuclear magnetic
resonance (NMR) experiments.
Some of Kitchen's CAD drawings have made their way from concept to reality.
"I told Peter that I was a mechanical engineering student. He
kind of raised his eyebrows and said, 'What are you doing in
administrative position?' So the next time we met, I showed him
some of my CAD drawings. He showed them to the machinist,
Richard Desilets," said Kitchen.
Desilets was impressed, and Kitchen embarked on a new
adventure. While he continues to do some administrative work
for the group, he also produces CAD drawings and helps to
assemble probes. During the day, Kitchen simply walks from his
job at the lab to his engineering classes across the street and
back again.
"Jason was a real find," says Associate Scholar/Scientist William
Brey. "I admire the way he manages his life so that he can excel
in his classes, be an engaged father, and still arrive every day and
focus on his work at the Mag Lab."
Working on probes is detail-oriented, complex, and time
consuming, says Kitchen, and having a mentor like Gor'kov has
taught him some important lessons.
"In addition to being a scientist, Peter's got a strong aesthetic
sense," said Kitchen. "I think he feels things will work better if
they are also beautiful – if they look just right. I appreciate the
time he takes to do things right; instead of spending all our time
troubleshooting what's wrong with a probe you can give that
time to serving a user need."
Once his degree is complete, Kitchen's goal is continue working
in the same field, citing the combination of discipline and
inventiveness as the reason that this work, for him, is finally the
right fit.
