Hi
There's a couple of really interesting PhDs that have come up, and I'm certainly going to be applying for them. The only problem is doing any research, since I am not currently working within a university, and as such don't have access to any journals.

This is particularly a problem when "key references" are sited in the advert, but I'd need to do research for all applications.

Does anybody else have (or had) the same problem? What do (did) you do about it? :s
Thanks ^_^

Do you live near a uni at the moment? Some universities will let you join their library as a reader only, so you could access any journals but you cant take books out. The other option is trying to get a copy from the British Library but Im not sure if/how that would work.

When I was looking for journals when applying I asked friends who were still at uni to download papers for me and email them on to me.. Any chance you could do that?

Maybe you can ask to borrow a mate's Athens account? Then you can log in to most journals.

JA: Hmm, I didn't realise that was possible. I'll look into doing that, because that seems the best way of staying in touch with the scientific world without getting my mates to do it all for me!

Tricky: That too is a good idea. I suppose when lists of papers are given it's easy to get someone to get them for you. If they haven't, though, it'll be a case of researching myself, for which I'll have to try JA's idea.

BurgerKing: Both uni's ive been to have had automated access to Athens, so I didn't really think along those lines. That's a possibility, too.

Well, I guess I'd better go hassle some friends into giving me their account info! Thanks a lot, guys ^_^

You may have borrowing rights at your old uni as an alumnus - this shouls give you online access as well

If you want a PhD so much buy the articles, thats what i had to do i spent about 100 pounds of them.

I emailed my supervisor when I was applying and asked him to send me the PDFs, which he did, no problem :)

Wow, Huntie, they really do that? From the way you worded that, I'm guessing you got that PhD, too. If all else fails, I'll give that a go.

All well and good Keehaa, but if you apply for, say, four PhDs, you're going to be spending £400, which is no small amount of money.

Wow Keehaa, I think youre crazy!

I am crazy, but if you want to do a PhD that badly then 400 pounds is worth the money. However i was lucky there was only one phd i saw i wanted and lucky enough i got it.

No problem to e-mail the person advertising the project to ask for copies of the papers, it just shows that you are keen to learn more. Good luck!

Ann - There is that, but I'm also concerned it looks as though I can't be bothered to go and get them myself :s

If you were concerned, you could add an explanatory note to the e-mail.