Demolishing Tacit Knowledge and My Commitment to PHYSDepot
A short blog post dicussing tacit knowledge, and my commitment to reducing tacit knowledge barriers in physics/astronomy curricula through my work with PHYSDepot.
Ask any undergraduate physics or astronomy student what took them the most time to master, and they might say “quantum mechanics” or “general relativity.”
What they might not tell you, however, are the endless hours spent wrestling with a Linux terminal, trying to decipher why their LaTeX document won’t compile, figuring out how to format a poster for a conference without looking like an amateur, or learning why their default plot colors are completely inaccessible to colorblind peers.
These are the essential skills of doing modern science, yet they are almost never taught in formal coursework or lectures. They represent tacit knowledge: the practical, hands-on craft of research that students are expected to acquire on their own through trial, error, and sheer grit, and is rarely taught through formal coursework or guided mentorship.
The Unspoken Barrier in Scientific Education
Because tools like Bash, Git, LaTeX, vector graphics, and accessible data visualization fall outside traditional academic rubrics, they are treated as side effects of an education rather than core competencies.
This creates a massive, hidden tax on early-career researchers:
Inefficiency: Students end up reinventing the wheel, wasting days brute-forcing basic workflows instead of focusing on physical concepts.
Equity Gaps: Access to these “unwritten rules” often depends on whether a student happens to join a lab with senior peers who have time to pass down tips.
Frustration: The steep learning curve of the tooling itself can make research feel demoralizing before the actual science even begins.
We often tell students to “just pick it up as you go.”, that this is just a part of being a physics/astronomy student. But “picking it up” shouldn’t require months of unnecessary struggle.
Making the Invisible Explicit
The goal shouldn’t be to eliminate grit, but to direct it toward solving hard physical problems rather than struggling with basic toolchains.
Tacit knowledge becomes manageable the moment someone takes the time to organize, structure, and document it clearly. When we transform “things you just figure out after three years” into clear, step-by-step references, we free up mental bandwidth for real discovery.
My Commitment to PHYSDepot
This is the central mission I’m shaping using PHYSDepot.
I am committed to building an open, accessible repository dedicated specifically to these often-overlooked practical skills. From mastering terminal commands and writing clean LaTeX to building publication-grade, CVD-friendly plots and preparing scientific presentations, PHYSDepot exists to unpack the craft of physics and make it explicitly available to everyone.
Science progresses fastest when the tools of the trade are democratized. Let’s make the tacit knowledge explicit.
