Training for and sustaining a career as Research Scientist Jim Rheinwald Associate Professor of Dermatology Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Skin Disease Research Center BWH.
Download ReportTranscript Training for and sustaining a career as Research Scientist Jim Rheinwald Associate Professor of Dermatology Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Skin Disease Research Center BWH.
Slide 1
Training for and sustaining
a career as Research Scientist
Jim Rheinwald
Associate Professor of Dermatology
Brigham and Women’s Hospital and
Harvard Skin Disease Research Center
BWH Dermatology Friday Research Meeting
June 29, 2012
Slide 2
Deciding whether to become a scientist
Curious about the natural world: how does everything work?
A need to investigate things yourself and not just read about it
Thrill of discovery
Learn that you can live with uncertainty and delayed gratification
Come to feel a sense of pride, and responsibility to society, in being a scientist
Have respect for the ethics of our profession, based on intellectual honesty
Get enough research training so you can learn whether you are good at it
Ultimately find a place for yourself that is satisfying to you
Slide 3
Today’s talk
Careers in science
Your education: as a student and life-long
Getting the most out of your research training
Starting a research career: choosing a field and a project
Conducting a project, publishing it, and getting grants
Scientific ethics
The scientist at mid-career
Some final thoughts
Slide 4
Scientific careers
Academic
o Research and teaching (university)
o Research and medical practice (hospital)
o Full-time research (hospital, research institute, NIH)
o Research administration
Industry
o Laboratory research (applied; business plan-demarcated)
o Liaison/collaboration with outside labs or clinics
o New technology/science evaluation
o Project manager; Group leader; V.P. of R&D
o Process Development, Production, Quality Control
Teaching full-time
o junior high, high school
o junior college, college
Science-related law; Science policy
Slide 5
You need a strong science background for all of these,
but what else will you need to develop?
Time management skills
Project planning and management skills
Interpersonal skills
Personnel management skills
Writing skills
Presentation skills
Organizational savvy
Slide 6
Your education as a student: in class and in the lab
Develop a solid foundation of science courses and statistics. If you can
connect new information to something you already know very well,
you will understand and remember it.
Learn the basis of everything you use and do: cell lines, vectors, buffers,
culture media, protein assays, PCR, microscopy, Westerns, FACS
In science, as in the rest of life, it is very important to be aware of what
you don’t know
Seek to acquire an extra “layer of knowledge” beyond what you are doing
Scientists seek to avoid at all costs the embarrassment of lacking
a bit of knowledge they should have related to their research field!
Slide 7
Your life-long education
Become and remain expert in the literature related to your project and field
Thoroughly read one good paper per week
Attend seminars: aim for one per week if a student or postdoc
Attend scientific meetings
Read Science to keep up with the world of science at all levels and to
obtain a perspective on where your own part fits into the whole
It’s also interesting and worthwhile to read about the philosophy and
history of science
Slide 8
Getting the most out of being a summer student
Ask about, read about, and understand your research area
Embrace your project: be responsible for it and “ponder” it
Learn good habits: how to keep a lab notebook; journal of results and plans
Be curious about and critical of your own data
Take the initiative to evaluate your results and plan the next step.
Then present to your PI and find out how good your thinking was.
Slide 9
Leaving a legacy to your lab and maximizing
the probability that your work will be published
Keep a complete and legible lab notebook
Organize and properly name your computer files and folders
It is essential to keep the raw data as well as any graphs, tables,
and composite pictures derived from them
Write up your experiments:
o Objectives; Materials and Methods
o Figures, Figure legends, Narrative of results, and Conclusions
o What part of the experiment/project you did yourself
For post-docs and graduate students, before you leave:
o Help yourself and your PI by writing a good draft of a manuscript on
your work, even if incomplete (of course, better if submitted/accepted)
o Leave good records of cell lines, extracts, vectors you made, etc.
and their locations so that experiments can be repeated or extended
Slide 10
Looking ahead to when you might start your own lab
Slide 11
Choosing a research area / scientific question
Finding your “niche”
o Your deep and abiding interests; are they also interesting to others?
o Your experimental and intellectual expertise; how are you unique?
Considering a research area to enter
o New?; established and active?; in decline?
o Are there good meetings to attend?
o Are R01 grants being funded? A designated study section?
o Who are the leaders? Competition within your own institution?
A distinction between “fashion” and enduring scientific questions, e.g.:
o “War on cancer” vs. mechanisms regulating growth, migration, gene
expression, immune system interactions
o “Stem cells” vs. cell biology, developmental biology
o “Systems biology” vs. physiology
o “-omics” vs. genetics, biochemistry, molecular biology
Slide 12
Deciding on a project
You will get excited about many more scientific questions than you can pursue
Write down your ideas and review them a month later—still interesting?
What has been done already? Literature; meetings and seminars; ask experts
Is there a key reagent or feasibility result you need before committing?
Will you need to collaborate? Expands your possibilities but beware!
If this is a change from your current direction, can you spare the diversion of
time and resources to do this? Assessing the “opportunity cost”.
Can you, and will you want to, extend the project after the first stage is finished?
Deciding whether to work on a very competitive subject:
o
o
Do you have a unique talent or a unique cell line, mouse, set of clinical
samples, or reagent that gives you a clear advantage over everyone else?
If “scooped”, will your efforts still advance your knowledge and experience
in your long-term area of interest?
Slide 13
Planning and conducting a research project
Establish a tentative plan for the entire project: goals, experiments, timeline
Envision the results and figures: can your approach yield convincing results?
Strategize for a home run but be sure you can at least hit a double
Begin with the “sine qua non” experiment
Repeat experiments!
o true experimental repeats, not just sample repeats
o multiple isolates, cell lines, transgenic founders, etc., so results are
generalizeable
Organize and keep all relevant original data and supporting documents
Keep a weekly project journal in which you summarize results and plans
Slide 14
Publishing your work
Begin writing when the project is about half done: how best to present?
any weaknesses in the results? changes in emphasis?
Pick appropriate journals. Read info. for authors and recent issues:
subjects, types of data, length restrictions, page charges, editorial board
“Impact factor” is overrated and miscalculated. It’s worth aiming for
a Cell paper if all goes as hoped, but there are many respected,
well-refereed journals and very important papers are published in them.
Use the Title, Abstract, and Introduction to get the attention of the editors
and to interest as broad an audience as possible
During your career “cultivate” a small set of journals. After your first paper
is published in a journal, your subsequent submissions will receive more
favorable editorial treatment.
Take your scientific papers seriously: “books”, not newspaper articles;
quality over quantity
Slide 15
Getting and keeping research grants
Write well and seek suggestions and criticism from your colleagues
Make the ideas that you propose simple and open-ended
Are R01 grants in your area being funded? (NIH Reporter site)
Cultivate at least two study sections; stay updated on their composition
NIH grant review criteria: Significance, Innovation, Approach, Investigator,
Environment
The real “secret” of success: the number and relevance of your recent
publications
Getting a part of a Program Project or Center grant very helpful
Industry grants: less competitive, but small budget, short time period, and
hard to renew
Slide 16
What is more important than publications and grants?
Conducting your research and other aspects
of your profession in an ethical way
Slide 17
Scientific Ethics: intellectual honesty
Science is all about trying to discover the truth. If you are not intellectually
honest, you don’t deserve to practice science.
Publication is a privilege, not a right—the reward of completing a project
while adhering to proper standards of scientific investigation and reporting
o
o
o
It’s not OK to pick and choose among the results of similar or identical
experiments. If you think one experiment is an outlier, repeat the
experiment enough times to establish the actual result.
When writing a paper or grant application (or an internal report if
working in industry), it is unethical to withhold an experiment that has
given a result counter to your (or your boss’s) model or theory
Always cite previously published results; don’t claim novelty falsely
Slide 18
Scientific Ethics: conflicts of interest; good citizenship
Never block or unreasonably delay publication of a competitor’s manuscript
If you become privy to confidential prepublication information (e.g., grant
applications; manuscripts in review), do not use such information in your
experimental plans or design until published or otherwise publically disclosed
A scientist’s research decisions should remain “pure”.
If you are an academic scientist, be sure that you aren’t changing the
direction or emphasis of your research because of a patent you have or
because a company is giving you a grant or has hired you as a consultant
Do not unreasonably withhold, or demand collaboration as a condition for,
cell lines, vectors, mice, and other materials that you already have published
Slide 19
The scientist in mid-career:
maintaining your stature, your interest, and giving back
Top priority: publish at least one good paper per year
Scientific meetings: 2-3/yr (goals: meet people and stay current)
Give (and host) seminars
Program chair for meetings
Serve on study sections
Review manuscripts for journals; editorial boards
Embark upon new research directions
Sabbaticals
Participate in your department (e.g., teaching, clinical)
Be a good colleague, generous with your time
Institution-wide involvement
Slide 20
Some final thoughts for young scientists
Take your life, but not yourself, seriously: be mindful, purposeful, adaptable
An “examined” life: think about your goals, make to-do lists, keep a journal
Take time to reflect: 20 min/day; 1 hr/week; 1 day/month; 1 week/year
Spend as much of each day as possible “unplugged”; learn to be comfortable
with, and interested in, your own thoughts!
Have a complete life: develop and nurture relationships, family, friends,
outside interests, physical activity, community involvement, etc.
Capitalize on your youthful energy and optimism and ride it to success
Learn everything you can from older people but never be discouraged by them
You will accumulate your own wisdom with age
Things are challenging right now but will improve within a few years
“Everything always turns out all right in the end.
If things aren’t all right now, it just means that it isn’t the end.”
Slide 21
Can read about my experience as an undergraduate and how I was
inspired to be a scientist by my first mentor:
“ Becoming a scientist: what I learned from Gunny”
(2003) BBRC 312: 61-64
see pdf on the Rheinwald lab website:
http://rheinwaldlab.bwh.harvard.edu
Training for and sustaining
a career as Research Scientist
Jim Rheinwald
Associate Professor of Dermatology
Brigham and Women’s Hospital and
Harvard Skin Disease Research Center
BWH Dermatology Friday Research Meeting
June 29, 2012
Slide 2
Deciding whether to become a scientist
Curious about the natural world: how does everything work?
A need to investigate things yourself and not just read about it
Thrill of discovery
Learn that you can live with uncertainty and delayed gratification
Come to feel a sense of pride, and responsibility to society, in being a scientist
Have respect for the ethics of our profession, based on intellectual honesty
Get enough research training so you can learn whether you are good at it
Ultimately find a place for yourself that is satisfying to you
Slide 3
Today’s talk
Careers in science
Your education: as a student and life-long
Getting the most out of your research training
Starting a research career: choosing a field and a project
Conducting a project, publishing it, and getting grants
Scientific ethics
The scientist at mid-career
Some final thoughts
Slide 4
Scientific careers
Academic
o Research and teaching (university)
o Research and medical practice (hospital)
o Full-time research (hospital, research institute, NIH)
o Research administration
Industry
o Laboratory research (applied; business plan-demarcated)
o Liaison/collaboration with outside labs or clinics
o New technology/science evaluation
o Project manager; Group leader; V.P. of R&D
o Process Development, Production, Quality Control
Teaching full-time
o junior high, high school
o junior college, college
Science-related law; Science policy
Slide 5
You need a strong science background for all of these,
but what else will you need to develop?
Time management skills
Project planning and management skills
Interpersonal skills
Personnel management skills
Writing skills
Presentation skills
Organizational savvy
Slide 6
Your education as a student: in class and in the lab
Develop a solid foundation of science courses and statistics. If you can
connect new information to something you already know very well,
you will understand and remember it.
Learn the basis of everything you use and do: cell lines, vectors, buffers,
culture media, protein assays, PCR, microscopy, Westerns, FACS
In science, as in the rest of life, it is very important to be aware of what
you don’t know
Seek to acquire an extra “layer of knowledge” beyond what you are doing
Scientists seek to avoid at all costs the embarrassment of lacking
a bit of knowledge they should have related to their research field!
Slide 7
Your life-long education
Become and remain expert in the literature related to your project and field
Thoroughly read one good paper per week
Attend seminars: aim for one per week if a student or postdoc
Attend scientific meetings
Read Science to keep up with the world of science at all levels and to
obtain a perspective on where your own part fits into the whole
It’s also interesting and worthwhile to read about the philosophy and
history of science
Slide 8
Getting the most out of being a summer student
Ask about, read about, and understand your research area
Embrace your project: be responsible for it and “ponder” it
Learn good habits: how to keep a lab notebook; journal of results and plans
Be curious about and critical of your own data
Take the initiative to evaluate your results and plan the next step.
Then present to your PI and find out how good your thinking was.
Slide 9
Leaving a legacy to your lab and maximizing
the probability that your work will be published
Keep a complete and legible lab notebook
Organize and properly name your computer files and folders
It is essential to keep the raw data as well as any graphs, tables,
and composite pictures derived from them
Write up your experiments:
o Objectives; Materials and Methods
o Figures, Figure legends, Narrative of results, and Conclusions
o What part of the experiment/project you did yourself
For post-docs and graduate students, before you leave:
o Help yourself and your PI by writing a good draft of a manuscript on
your work, even if incomplete (of course, better if submitted/accepted)
o Leave good records of cell lines, extracts, vectors you made, etc.
and their locations so that experiments can be repeated or extended
Slide 10
Looking ahead to when you might start your own lab
Slide 11
Choosing a research area / scientific question
Finding your “niche”
o Your deep and abiding interests; are they also interesting to others?
o Your experimental and intellectual expertise; how are you unique?
Considering a research area to enter
o New?; established and active?; in decline?
o Are there good meetings to attend?
o Are R01 grants being funded? A designated study section?
o Who are the leaders? Competition within your own institution?
A distinction between “fashion” and enduring scientific questions, e.g.:
o “War on cancer” vs. mechanisms regulating growth, migration, gene
expression, immune system interactions
o “Stem cells” vs. cell biology, developmental biology
o “Systems biology” vs. physiology
o “-omics” vs. genetics, biochemistry, molecular biology
Slide 12
Deciding on a project
You will get excited about many more scientific questions than you can pursue
Write down your ideas and review them a month later—still interesting?
What has been done already? Literature; meetings and seminars; ask experts
Is there a key reagent or feasibility result you need before committing?
Will you need to collaborate? Expands your possibilities but beware!
If this is a change from your current direction, can you spare the diversion of
time and resources to do this? Assessing the “opportunity cost”.
Can you, and will you want to, extend the project after the first stage is finished?
Deciding whether to work on a very competitive subject:
o
o
Do you have a unique talent or a unique cell line, mouse, set of clinical
samples, or reagent that gives you a clear advantage over everyone else?
If “scooped”, will your efforts still advance your knowledge and experience
in your long-term area of interest?
Slide 13
Planning and conducting a research project
Establish a tentative plan for the entire project: goals, experiments, timeline
Envision the results and figures: can your approach yield convincing results?
Strategize for a home run but be sure you can at least hit a double
Begin with the “sine qua non” experiment
Repeat experiments!
o true experimental repeats, not just sample repeats
o multiple isolates, cell lines, transgenic founders, etc., so results are
generalizeable
Organize and keep all relevant original data and supporting documents
Keep a weekly project journal in which you summarize results and plans
Slide 14
Publishing your work
Begin writing when the project is about half done: how best to present?
any weaknesses in the results? changes in emphasis?
Pick appropriate journals. Read info. for authors and recent issues:
subjects, types of data, length restrictions, page charges, editorial board
“Impact factor” is overrated and miscalculated. It’s worth aiming for
a Cell paper if all goes as hoped, but there are many respected,
well-refereed journals and very important papers are published in them.
Use the Title, Abstract, and Introduction to get the attention of the editors
and to interest as broad an audience as possible
During your career “cultivate” a small set of journals. After your first paper
is published in a journal, your subsequent submissions will receive more
favorable editorial treatment.
Take your scientific papers seriously: “books”, not newspaper articles;
quality over quantity
Slide 15
Getting and keeping research grants
Write well and seek suggestions and criticism from your colleagues
Make the ideas that you propose simple and open-ended
Are R01 grants in your area being funded? (NIH Reporter site)
Cultivate at least two study sections; stay updated on their composition
NIH grant review criteria: Significance, Innovation, Approach, Investigator,
Environment
The real “secret” of success: the number and relevance of your recent
publications
Getting a part of a Program Project or Center grant very helpful
Industry grants: less competitive, but small budget, short time period, and
hard to renew
Slide 16
What is more important than publications and grants?
Conducting your research and other aspects
of your profession in an ethical way
Slide 17
Scientific Ethics: intellectual honesty
Science is all about trying to discover the truth. If you are not intellectually
honest, you don’t deserve to practice science.
Publication is a privilege, not a right—the reward of completing a project
while adhering to proper standards of scientific investigation and reporting
o
o
o
It’s not OK to pick and choose among the results of similar or identical
experiments. If you think one experiment is an outlier, repeat the
experiment enough times to establish the actual result.
When writing a paper or grant application (or an internal report if
working in industry), it is unethical to withhold an experiment that has
given a result counter to your (or your boss’s) model or theory
Always cite previously published results; don’t claim novelty falsely
Slide 18
Scientific Ethics: conflicts of interest; good citizenship
Never block or unreasonably delay publication of a competitor’s manuscript
If you become privy to confidential prepublication information (e.g., grant
applications; manuscripts in review), do not use such information in your
experimental plans or design until published or otherwise publically disclosed
A scientist’s research decisions should remain “pure”.
If you are an academic scientist, be sure that you aren’t changing the
direction or emphasis of your research because of a patent you have or
because a company is giving you a grant or has hired you as a consultant
Do not unreasonably withhold, or demand collaboration as a condition for,
cell lines, vectors, mice, and other materials that you already have published
Slide 19
The scientist in mid-career:
maintaining your stature, your interest, and giving back
Top priority: publish at least one good paper per year
Scientific meetings: 2-3/yr (goals: meet people and stay current)
Give (and host) seminars
Program chair for meetings
Serve on study sections
Review manuscripts for journals; editorial boards
Embark upon new research directions
Sabbaticals
Participate in your department (e.g., teaching, clinical)
Be a good colleague, generous with your time
Institution-wide involvement
Slide 20
Some final thoughts for young scientists
Take your life, but not yourself, seriously: be mindful, purposeful, adaptable
An “examined” life: think about your goals, make to-do lists, keep a journal
Take time to reflect: 20 min/day; 1 hr/week; 1 day/month; 1 week/year
Spend as much of each day as possible “unplugged”; learn to be comfortable
with, and interested in, your own thoughts!
Have a complete life: develop and nurture relationships, family, friends,
outside interests, physical activity, community involvement, etc.
Capitalize on your youthful energy and optimism and ride it to success
Learn everything you can from older people but never be discouraged by them
You will accumulate your own wisdom with age
Things are challenging right now but will improve within a few years
“Everything always turns out all right in the end.
If things aren’t all right now, it just means that it isn’t the end.”
Slide 21
Can read about my experience as an undergraduate and how I was
inspired to be a scientist by my first mentor:
“ Becoming a scientist: what I learned from Gunny”
(2003) BBRC 312: 61-64
see pdf on the Rheinwald lab website:
http://rheinwaldlab.bwh.harvard.edu