waddle

I gave up on a Princeton Review book I borrowed at my library after taking one practice test out of it. The questions were convoluted but way too simplistic, and the review material was presented in a way that only benefits one who has already learned it in depth (the typos didn't help, either). I figured I might as well spend the 3 weeks I had just condensing & rewriting my notes from my various classes, and trying to fill in the gaps in my knowledge (which were plenty).

Those of you who took the 13 Nov 2010 test, what did you think? (Belated, I know. I haven't gotten my scores yet.) I was surprised at the plethora of biochem questions, but other than that, I felt it was very similar to the two practice tests from ETS available on the web. I used two practice tests (i.e. actual exams previously adminstered) available free on the web: GR0027 and GR0627. ETS also sent me a copy of GR0627 in the mail a few weeks after I registered for the test. In studying for the test, I just went through my class notes & textbooks (I actually had to read them this time! ): analytical: Quantitative Chemical Analysis, 7e / Harris [one of the best a. chem. textbooks I've ever read]inorganic: Inorganic Chemistry, 3e / Miessler & Tarr [the Miessler & Tarr book is actually helpful for some of the p. chem. concepts]; and Descriptive Inorganic Chemistry, 4e / Rayner-Canham & Overton [i hadn't taken i. chem. before studying for the test, so the Rayner-Canham book is useful for learning the material at a basic level]organic: Organic Chemistry, 3e / Hornback [Hornback's pretty good about most reactions, and the mechanistic presentation is helpful for working out o. chem. reactions you've never seen before (like I had to--I didn't know anything about nitrile chemistry before studying for the test; wasn't covered in my o. chem. classes), though I admit, I'm used to the mechanistic view (my classes didn't focus so much on functional groups)]physical: Physical Chemistry, 8e / Atkins & dePaula [this is an absolutely terrible book, at least for poor me's puny intellect, lack of mathematical understanding, & not knowing how to use MATLAB. typos everywhere, terrible explanations, lack of clear derivations, ...]; Physical Chemistry, 2e / Mortimer [used this to learn quantum mechanics (never had a class on QM, so I did the best I could); from what I could tell, this did a slightly better job of explaining than Atkins ... but if you have time on your hands, you may want to pick up McQuarrie's p. chem. book--it goes against the classical paradigm and starts off with QM, then builds thermo & kinetics from a quantum perspective, or so I've heard]Also, if I had to recommend a g. chem. textbook for review or just some easy reading, it'd be, hands down, General Chemistry / Linus Pauling. Some of the material is outdated (e.g. his convoluted bonding models), but hey, you gotta cut the man some slack. It's the absolute best chemistry textbook you'll ever read. (Well, maybe 2nd best--Gonick & Criddle's Cartoon Guide to Chemistry is also really good. )

Penguins. They waddle.

I guess I'll post some of my impressions as well. I, too, spoke with two potential advisors with whom I had previously communicated by email. But I probably have much broader interests than you, katerific--I'm interested in at least a dozen research groups. I had met with some of the professors at their heads awhile back (during a visit to another campus), but those who attended don't seem to remember who I am .Oops, missed the biogeosciences reception. D'oh. Friday morning's poster session was the most interesting (relevant?) for me. Alas, couldn't talk to nearly all the people presenting their posters that I had wanted to; the aisles were packed.I only had one Minute Maid the whole week. The chanting dude on the sidewalk was inspiring, though. If only for his tenacity (even in the rain!).For the future: Friday afternoon is a terrible time to be giving a poster or talk. Everyone's gone by that time, except the random grad student from the group of Prof. Competitor who stuck around long enough so that they could harass you at your poster (okay, it wasn't that bad).Overall? Meh, I guess. Wasn't blown away, but maybe that'll change once I actually know one or two people who attend the meeting.

I've not submitted my applications yet, but y'all might want to try learning how to cube in your spare time ... just keep a cube in your pocket, and whenever you have a few seconds, take it out and solve it. Mentally-stimulating, plus, it's a great distraction (just don't overdo it--that gets you carpal tunnel )

What neuropsych said. Also, yes, your scratch paper can be replenished (I think they gave me a booklet with two leaves of yellow paper ( = 4 sides of letter paper)) if you ask the test proctor.

I feel the same way about teaching (albeit chemistry, not history) in secondary schools. What's Plan D, win the lottery?

Yes. It's called med school.

Make sure to differentiate between 'hot' areas and those that are merely 'warm'! Huge difference in comfort level during summer.

Chillax, db2290. The OP's just trying to get some advice regarding his application. I understand your vigilance for trolls, but I don't see any indication that the OP is anything troll-like. Hey, at least the post is (mostly) grammatically-correct, and we really shouldn't sound like we're driving first-time users away from the forum. (I know you try to be helpful, but your tone comes across as slightly bitter--could be an artifact of the Internets, but nonetheless ...) Georgetownhopeful, I have no advice I can give (sorry!), as I'm not in your field. I'm sure others here will have much better advice, especially if you could give a few more details as to how this "verbal confirmation" was worded. waddle P.S. For the record, db2290, I canceled out your -1 rating.

Power-ish metal: Nightwish, Dragonforce (okay, this is more like pansy metal, but eh.), Edenbridge, etc. Yanni (New Age?) Canadian Brass (uhh, brass?) I dig theme songs (shows, games, movies, etc.), especially that of PBS' Nature (great show, BTW) IMO, Microsoft's best product is their 'Windows Welcome Music'--dug it up from the depths of my system files, and now it's one of my default play-while-trying-to-work tracks Jonathan Coulton (folk with a twist?) - Code Monkey Pigloo (erm ... not sure what genre) - Papa Pinguin (Deutsche version below)

Gripes with USC's: (1) Best cumulative score & percentile on the GRE?! Ok, fine, I can add up my section scores. But AFAIK, ETS doesn't keep tabs on people's cumulative scores! (2) Where/when I got my high school diploma?! REALLY. This is a graduate application, and I ain't no high school student, thank you very much.

What's the dress code for the conference & receptions? I'm assuming a leather jacket and jeans won't cut it?

Cool, I've done some research in cancer/cell/molecular biology, too, but not as much as you have. I'm an applicant this year, too, so for what it's worth, I'll tell you what I know. (I'm in a related situation, except I'm hoping a high GRE & GPA can make up for having no publications). I was told by a summer research program director (ex-faculty member of a top biomedical/biological science program) that when she sat on admissions committees, as long as you had >3.0, you'd be fine. Of course, this varies between departments & years. That said, a 2.82 science GPA from any school--even if it has a high reputation--is very low nearly anywhere you go. If we forget about the other applicants from top undergraduate institutions, there are still those applicants with high GPAs from no-name institutions against whom you'll be competing. Is there an upward trend to your grades? or is there a pattern to your low grades, that you could somehow explain? Cool story, bro. (Sorry if this comes off as terse or snarky--I most surely don't mean any offense, but I think you're better off not saying you slacked off.) I'm thinking that once your application makes it past the first round of screening, you're probably home-free. I don't think many programs really care about the GRE other than for awarding fellowships (yeah, I know, bummer). Once you're over, say, 1300, you're given the go-ahead. Good luck! waddle

Chumlee, if you can get access to a Windows computer, download and run PDF Split and Merge--free. Use the 'burst' option; it should work to split up your PDF file into single pages, without changing total file size or quality.

I registered for the GRE Search Service ETS offers after taking the GRE. Oops. I've been inundated with emails and increasingly-better-looking mailers from various schools, much of which is irrelevant, or downright creepy (Purdue even sent over a pamphlet with a tear-off postcard, apparently preprinted with all the information ETS gave them (i.e. name, address, undergrad institution, major, intended field of graduate study, intended degree)--all I have to do to get more information is drop the postcard in a USPS drop box somewhere. Best part of the mailer: a map of the Great Lakes states, showing where Lafayette, IN was. ) Man, what a waste of paper. I haven't had anything useful come my way yet, but anyone had anything good come from using the service? I'm probably going to un-register myself soon to save these schools some outreach costs if this keeps up.

My impression is that a Ph.D. in engineering/CS is 'worth' much more than a Ph.D. in, say, high energy physics or immunology. I know you're speaking from the point of view of a CS student--and I agree, seems like there are a lot of opportunities in that field--but in other fields, e.g. biology (especially ecology), physics, things aren't so great. I know a few postdocs in biomedical science who are struggling to get by on ~$40k / year. I know in particular of one who was finally able to land a job at a cosmetics company doing toxicology work, something that paid twice as much as the postdoc position at a top-10 medical school she left (the toxicology work is very different from her academic specialty--cell biology). Apparently, this was a very tough job search, since industry is hesitant to hire postdocs (they've been in academia too long), but it's kind of a catch-22: upon nearing completion of the Ph.D. most grad students look for postdocs (or are encouraged to do so), but as soon as one begins a postdoc, they can't easily get out of academia (and can't really move up in the academic food chain--except if (miracle of miracles) they get hired as junior faculty). Also, given the current economic situation, it's pretty hard to find research jobs in industry, even in big pharma--I heard through the pipeline that Pfizer laid off more people recently than Amgen employs.

HAHAHAHA--sorry, katerific, just had to laugh at that--only in the geosciences would this happen (hope it works out though!) Ugh, but it's finals week ... if they move up their deadlines, I figure I just won't apply there.

Have you asked the folks over at the StudentDoctor Network forums? If you're looking for translational research, especially post-MD, that might be a good place to ask for advice--the biomedical science folks here seem to be more focused on basic work without a clinical background. (Sorry if I'm misreading your post; I'm not sure whether you want to do translational work or just pure benchwork.) That said, bhikhaari's advice is sound for beginning to search for research groups (looking in Nature, Science, PNAS, Cell, etc. would be a starting point). Good luck!

How'd it go?

Found an interesting article on one Douglas Prasher [link]. Poor guy, looks like he had a pretty bad falling-out with luck. What a waste of talent, going from characterizing GFP to driving a car for a living. Are there any postdocs/post-docs on this forum? If so, do any of you regret attending graduate school?

Oh, totally! But most of the groups I'm interested in (for grad school) are outside of the hydro & environmental geochem realms, so he doesn't know many of my prospective advisors.

Sorry to bring back an old thread, but I thought I'd add these. Just an undergrad in the sciences; using the following to write papers, manage organizations, keep my computer happy, etc. --> keep me happy. Windows XP (mostly) and 7; occasional user of Ubuntu Linux 7-Zip: free, file compression, (un)zippingAlfaClock: free, provides a handy customizable clock & calendar (useful for XP users who don't have the nice Win7 clock/calendar)CCleaner: freeCutePDF Writer: freeDefraggler: free, defragmenterF.lux: free, F.lux is great, saves your eyesight (& sanity) if you're working late into the night (adjusts your screen hue)foobar2000: free, probably the fastest, slimmest music player out thereGang Garrison 2: free, it's an 8-bit demake of Team Fortress 2, sure helps relieve the stress, and I don't have to pay Steam/Valve anything GraphPad Prism: $$, used for graphing & some statisticsIrfanView: free, for batch image editingKeyTweak: free, I just use this for remapping CAPS to CTRL (keeps the carpal tunnel away , besides, who uses CAPS LOCK?)LaTeX: free, specifically, I use MiKTeX + TeXWorksMetamorphose2: free, handy if you need to do batch renaming of filesMicrosoft Office: $$$, can't get away from this, can ya? (I still use Office XP ... never liked the ribbon in 2007)Microsoft Streets and Trips: $$, a good investment if you despise those little 'portable' GPS's and prefer to use your laptop, but don't have an internet connection on the road ... one of the better Microsoft products (up there with WinXP, in my opinion)Mozilla Firefox: freeMozilla Thunderbird: free, surprised nobody's mentioned this (I think)OpenOffice: freePaint.NET: free, great for image editingPDF Split and Merge: free, does exactly what it says on the box ... splits & merges PDFsRocketDock: free, hey Mac users, I've got a dock too! Scribus: free, I use this to make posters (still somewhat unstable and inconvenient, but beats shelling out $$$ for an Adobe product or using Powerpoint or OOo Impress, which are even more unwieldy)SSH Secure Shell: freeSyncBack: free, use mainly to sync/backup files onto an external hard driveSyncplicity: free, it's just like Dropbox; you have to be comfortable with your files being on the cloud, thoughTrueCrypt: free, keeps my disk encrypted, so my computer is safe from thieves ... well, at least the files on them areWordWeb: free, very very very handy desktop dictionary stuff I've tried for a bit: If you're looking for a plain ol' text editor, Q10 or DarkRoom are nice (they basically go fullscreen & blank out your desktop--gives you a zero distraction writing environment (at least, in principle))Tried out Mendeley for awhile, until it crashed and I lost most of my stored annotations. I'm just going to wait until Zotero Everywhere is released as stable.I agree with phid (post #32); PDF-XChange Viewer seems to be good for making notes on PDFs, but I haven't used it much (I still prefer printing stuff out and scribbling all over). waddle