Mark Ferrari was in graduate school, doing research at Berkeley on magnetic structures in superconductors, when he began to doubt his passion for experimental physics. His suspicion was confirmed after he was hired by Bell Labs, where he found physics to be "a pretty lonely enterprise." "I was basically working alone in a room with a machine," he recalls. "That didn't suit my temperament. Also, I was not getting a sense that the problems I was working on were making a difference to anyone." He moved to BARRA, Inc., a global investment technology firm in Berkeley, and found that his research activities supplied what was missing. "Here I'm reminded every day that what I do makes a difference. BARRA builds risk assessment and trading tools, and my research group develops the next generation of models. It's truly satisfying to give a presentation about your work and have clients call to find out how quickly they'll be able to get their hands on it." Dr. Ferrari emphasizes that his route is not for everyone. "I wouldn't say to a student, get a degree in physics because it's good preparation for a career in finance. The reason to study physics is that you love physics. What I would say is that you should keep your options open, cast your net widely, figure out what the possibilities are. If you like studying science and think it will be your career, that's great; you should do it. But don't treat grad school as a trade school. When you're interested in a subject, take a course in it, even if you have to fight with your adviser to do it. Talk with people who work in that field. What you can do with your education is limited only when you don't know what's out there."