Student Spotlight: Jazmine Aiya Marquez

Jazmine Aiya Marquez earned this year’s  Dow Chemical Graduate Fellowship. Her research is on fire testing and she has interned with Carlisle Construction Materials. Read further to learn about her PhD and internship experience.

1. What motivates you about your research?

 At first, I just thought that the fire tests were cool and unique but over time I learned how deeply ingrained plastics are in our society and the danger that it poses in the presence of heat or fire. It is common for plastics to escalate fires and this was proven in the Grenfell tower fire. That motivated me to pursue research on flame-retardant polymers.

2. What is a highlight in your PhD experience and what did you take away from  the experience?

 The large scale fire tests were definitely the highlight of my PhD career. I deal with fire testing and seeing the fire performance results of laboratory experiments get applied into scaled up practical testing for real-world use is definitely an experience. I would say my key takeaway would be working with what we can control . We're always told that large scale experiments are affected by external factors that we don't account for in the lab. Truth be told, we had to work with the weather, the available equipment, and limited time. It was easy to get lost in the chaos of preparing for these large scale projects but my group has learned pretty quickly that there is no point in stressing in what we cannot control and just prepare as much as we can.

3. What advice do you have for current graduate students?

 Keep moving forward. It doesn't matter how fast or slow, just do it. And if an experiment or simulation doesn't go your way, always remember that tomorrow is another day to try.

4.  Could you tell us about your experience in your internship?

I completed an internship with Carlisle Construction Materials where I joined the thermoplastic polyolefin team, and worked on flame-retardant additives for their roofing products. I had a great experience with them, as I was applying a lot of the skill sets I have acquired here in TAMU to my work there and the best thing is that I still got to work on fire performance, which I did not expect. I also got the chance to see the plant that houses the production of the materials that I was working on - giant extruders, mixers, and, endless rollers that ensures continuous production. I was also fortunate to observe one of the large-scale tests they perform on roofing membranes. My experience there allowed me to determine what kind of work I prefer to do and the people I want to surround myself with.