"I like to go where I have never been, to do what I haven't done before -- just keep pushing my limits."

Silke Sheppard

Born in Ludwigsburg, Germany, 1962

Graduated from Ulricianum Aurich (High school), 1982

Germany

Bachelor's degree in Physics, 1986 College,

Technical University Berlin

Diploma in Physical Chemistry in 1992,

Fritz-Haber Institute Berlin (Max Planck Society)

Doctorate Degree in Surface Science 1996,

Cambridge University Engineering Department

I was born in a town called Ludwigsburg in southern Germany in 1962. When I was four years old my parents moved to my dad's hometown Aurich at the German North Sea coast. Here I went to high school which I finished in 1982.

During high school I was very fascinated with planes and spent hours cycling to the next airbase, where I watched fighter planes taking off and landing. When I was sixteen years old, I even took some flying lessons on a glider, but my parents freaked out and thought it was too dangerous. Generally I thought anything technical was great fun so I wanted to do Physics. My teachers thought that wasn't a subject for girls, so I did Chemistry and Music instead.

I left high school to study Chemistry in Berlin, but I soon realized that Physics was what really interested me. During the Chemistry course we had a few Physics lessons where we had to perform our own experiments. I enjoyed this a lot so I changed subjects and luckily there was nobody who had any objections.

After receiving my bachelors degree in 1986, I specialized in investigating how atoms and molecules in a gas stick to a metal crystal surface. I used a special type of microscope to watch how groups of atoms or molecules were assembling on the metal's surface. The results were then used to make better car catalyst.

I liked doing microscopy and was very keen to do a new type of microscopy that makes it possible to see single atoms on a surface. This is called Scanning Tunnelling Microscopy. I left Berlin in 1992 and went to Cambridge University in England to do a Doctorate degree in the Engineering Department where such a microscope existed. During my time in the Engineering Department I built my own new Scanning Tunnelling Microscope, that not only works for samples at room temperature but also at any temperature up to 800 degrees Celsius.

After I received my Ph.D. in 1996 I started work for Schlumberger Cambridge Research in the Reservoir Treatments Group. I perform experiments to tell how different fluids flow through rock samples. The best fluids can then be used to treat oil wells to produce more oil and do so in an environmentally friendly way.