publications

[cherubie]

So in reading through many of the posts on this forum, I realize that almost everyone has at LEAST 1 publication under their belt. I didn't even think that this was normal for applicants. Do most people have a Masters (and thus published during this time), or is it the norm now for applicants to already have publications? My name is on one publication, but it was more so due to the generosity of the PI than anything else. The paper was based on the work I did, but heck I was a high school student, I hadn't even taken AP Biology yet lol.

I'm currently at a lab now and is *trying* to work towards publishing something (we have mounds of data that just needs to be extracted and published), but my main job is still to be a research ASSISTANT, not a graduate student. Am I missing something here?

P.S. sorry for saying publish/publication in every sentence.

Edited December 21, 2010 by cherubie

[ScreamingHairyArmadillo]

While I'm not in your field, I don't think having a publication is some "unofficial" requirement. I didn't have one, and no one made it seem like it matters. It's a plus, definitely, but I wouldn't worry over not having one. Besides, you do have a publication (from high school even!), which counts. I bet most other undergrads with pubs are not first authors, or the journal is low tier.

[laurend]

Depends on the lab. In my lab writing and submitting our own papers are a huge part of our job! Also, although all PIs don't do this, the person who does the work should get the credit via first authorship.

[eklavya]

Do most people have a Masters (and thus published during this time), or is it the norm now for applicants to already have publications?

While it's not the (established) norm to have some sort of publication before applying for grad school, I believe that most people work really hard to get something published... at least a/few posters if not a peer-reviewed article. It's needless to say that having publication/s definitely boosts up your chances to get into the programs of your choice. I don't know how many of us here have a masters, but you're right about the fact that most people do have publications. I think a significant bunch of people here have also taken some time off after their studies (post-BS/MS) to work in some research-based place and have had some publications this way. Some choose to do post-baccalaureate internships and have publications that way... whatever they can to raise their chances.

But that said, I know of at least 7 people who graduated from my lab (2 undegrads, 5 masters) within the past 3 years that had zero publications but still got into top 10 programs. In fact, 3 of them went to human research from plant research, and had no problem in getting full funding. And my school isn't particularly known for its research. So you see, publications aren't the only things that affect your chance of admission.

[cherubie]

While I'm not in your field, I don't think having a publication is some "unofficial" requirement. I didn't have one, and no one made it seem like it matters. It's a plus, definitely, but I wouldn't worry over not having one. Besides, you do have a publication (from high school even!), which counts. I bet most other undergrads with pubs are not first authors, or the journal is low tier.

Thanks for that reply. I was beginning to think that I've been living under a rock for the past 4 years and didn't realize how much the world has changed! Maybe a lot of people who join forums for the purpose of graduate school discussions are just exceptional students to begin with. (I mean if I didn't care about graduate school, I wouldn't spend time perusing posts on it, right?) Some people on here do mention publications as first author in "high impact" journals though. If that's the case that grad schools care a lot about that, it seems to be a very unfair disadvantage to those applying straight from undergrad, even though I'm not one of them.

Sorry, saw some other responses after I wrote this. No doubt I agree that publications will be a plus. But whether or not it's an expectation is something I'm slightly worried about (and by slightly, I mean just something to ponder over in my free time). As far as posters/conferences, I'm definitely not barred from going to them- but I have to do it on my own budget. I don't know if people have full time jobs or mom and pops to sniff up the money for them, but no way am I shelling out hundreds or thousand (for overseas conferences) to go to some conference and do a poster, at least grad students don't have to pay for them.

This is kind of off-topic, but it seems like the quality of grad students vary significantly. In my lab, there are 2 grad students, and one's a highly intelligent/motivated being, the other is well.....let's just say numbers aren't everything.

Edited December 21, 2010 by cherubie

[phoenix245]

I'd say most institutions recognize there is a considerable degree of randomness in whether or not you get a paper. A friend of mine published a first-author after 2 months of research just because something he made fortuitously turned out to be fluorescent. On the other hand, there are projects in each of the labs I have worked that have gone on for years without even a communication and it's driving the grad students crazy. That's science and you shouldn't be judged on whether you got lucky or not. Although I agree that having a paper can certainly not diminish your chances of getting in, and having several is an advantage and means there's probably more than luck involved.

[Tall Chai Latte]

Given that you are not a grad student (yet ), if you manage to publish that'd be impressive already. Are you currently a senior in undergrad or a post-bac? Most undergrads (if they are fresh out of college at the time of application) don't have publications when they apply to grad schools. I didn't, and I still did ok. My program director was telling us that 12 people, out of a total of 100 incoming students of fall 2010, have published in peer-reviewed journals prior to matriculation. I'm not sure if this number means anything, but don't worry about having no publications; they are more like a bonus for someone at your current stage.

[iLikeTrees]

I didn't have any publications when I was applying to grad school and it didn't hurt me, at least where I was applying. Granted I had a lot of work experience to balance it out that most potential advisors saw as a bigger draw and my field isn't as competitive as maybe something like biomedical research.

Where I DID come into problems was when I applied for fellowships like the GRFP last year. I had some research experience that produced posters and was working on my masters degree and got slammed for not having papers published. Never mind I was still collecting data from my first field season when I was writing the #&$* application. (grrrr....) While this definitely hurt me, truth be told, it possibly wouldn't have mattered as much if my essays etc. were stronger.

In short, I doubt not having publications will be a major problem for getting into grad school unless you're applying to an uber-select program where most people work in a lab for a few years before going into it.

[robot_hamster]

Very few people published something as an undergrad at my school. It was a requirement, however, that everyone presented their senior thesis to a professional conference which I suppose counts as something when applying for graduate school. I was able to say "I presented my senior thesis at a professional conference".

[Eigen]

When I applied, the only "publication" I had was my BS Thesis, and I still got good offers. I did have several good conference presentations, at least.

If the body of the research is there, but you just haven't gotten it published, I wouldn't worry too much. I don't think anyone in my cohort had pubs when they got in, but several were able to get pubs from their undergrad research after starting grad school.

The research is important, the publications less so. If you have them, it's a huge benefit- if not, don't worry too much.

[hello! :)]

Depends on the lab. In my lab writing and submitting our own papers are a huge part of our job! Also, although all PIs don't do this, the person who does the work should get the credit via first authorship.

(General question) Should a student who did not do the writing, but did all the work, albeit mostly following instructions with little critical thinking, be the first author on the paper?

[eklavya]

[quote name=hello! ' timestamp='1293849911' post='173493]

(General question) Should a student who did not do the writing, but did all the work, albeit mostly following instructions with little critical thinking, be the first author on the paper?

[hello! :)]

this, in my dept, is a nay. there's a professor i know who makes his students do all the lab work, from scratch to success, but write up ALL of the paper by himself. he then lists the students from 2nd to bazillionth, depending on the amount of work they did. i guess this is alright. but if i were him (/a prof), i'd ask the students to draft the manuscript, and go over it periodically. then list myself as the corresponding author. looks for professional this way and the students get the fullest credits to their works. but it's just my idea, and might be different in other programs.

I agree with you, but I wonder -- what if that student really sucks at writing and the professor essentially rewrites the paper during the revision process?

[hello! :)]

this, in my dept, is a nay. there's a professor i know who makes his students do all the lab work, from scratch to success, but write up ALL of the paper by himself. he then lists the students from 2nd to bazillionth, depending on the amount of work they did. i guess this is alright. but if i were him (/a prof), i'd ask the students to draft the manuscript, and go over it periodically. then list myself as the corresponding author. looks for professional this way and the students get the fullest credits to their works. but it's just my idea, and might be different in other programs.

I agree with you completely, but I wonder -- what if that student really sucks at writing and the professor essentially rewrites the paper during the revision process?

[eklavya]

[quote name=hello! ' timestamp='1293853532' post='173505]

I agree with you completely, but I wonder -- what if that student really sucks at writing and the professor essentially rewrites the paper during the revision process?

[laurend]

I think the person that did the work gets the credit. However, in labs where PIs do this, they usually ask that person to work on the manuscrit first. Even if the PI is going to change it a lot it doesn't matter. Generally a lot of changes are made because the PI has a certain writing style they have developed and would revise anyones work, not just a students.

[Haustier]

I'm not sure how much stock I put into some of the profiles on here. For instance, I saw someone say that they got rejected from Berkley Bioengineering and they had 6 papers and one of them was in Nature....that is highly unlikely. In my Bioengineering group, we recently had 2 PhD candidates graduate. They had 4 and 5 papers respectively...but thats over 6 years. I think it really depends on the field.

[randomname01]

I'm not sure how much stock I put into some of the profiles on here. For instance, I saw someone say that they got rejected from Berkley Bioengineering and they had 6 papers and one of them was in Nature....that is highly unlikely. In my Bioengineering group, we recently had 2 PhD candidates graduate. They had 4 and 5 papers respectively...but thats over 6 years. I think it really depends on the field.

4 and 5 first author papers?

Just wondering: are non-first author papers in the life sciences not worth much? (a lot of papers I've seen in the life sci. world include authors who didn't really contribute substantially)

[Eigen]

Non-first author papers aren't nearly as important... Really, when you "count your papers", you should look mostly at first author papers with a smattering of second authors that you contributed significantly to... At least that's what I've been told.

[Genomic Repairman]

First and second author papers are what counts. Some folks have one or some have a few. This depends on the research (some projects are not time intensive and lend themselves to gobs of data that you can publish) and where they are publishing (The Journal of Really Specific Subfield That Needs Papers to Fill Out This Month's Issue vs a higher impact journal). Middle authorship papers do count, just not that much. Oh and review articles really don't mean much to us. You didn't do any substantial new work, just summarizing the existing literature and the gaps in the knowledge.

[Haustier]

Some schools take a really hard stance on paper authorship. For instance, in my group there are generally only 2 names on the papers: the PhD student as first author and the PI as the 2nd author. Sometimes a post-doc might show up as a third author depending on how much they contributed. But it seems like alot of the people with publications on here, if you pull their paper from PubMed there are literally like 12 authors on them.

[Eigen]

Most of ours will have at least 4- Grad student, Bio Collaborator PI, Instrument Collaborator PI, PI.

Depends how much collaboration you routinely do- we usually have at least 3 PIs on our papers, and then the grad students who worked on the project. And since almost all of the grad students in my group have at least one undergrad working with them, you get the undergrad in there.

[Genomic Repairman]

Some schools take a really hard stance on paper authorship. For instance, in my group there are generally only 2 names on the papers: the PhD student as first author and the PI as the 2nd author. Sometimes a post-doc might show up as a third author depending on how much they contributed. But it seems like alot of the people with publications on here, if you pull their paper from PubMed there are literally like 12 authors on them.

That's because we do integrative multi-disciplinary science and that is the way it seems to be going. A lot of high profile publications require a ton of work and its usually more than one lab can handle or has the expertise for, so you branch out and collaborate. You could do the work yourself but it costs you time and money to start up and assay, optimize and validate it, before using, so why not just send your samples off to a collaborator who already has it up and running and is pushing out publishable data with the technique already. I do a lot of cell biology and biochemistry but I'm not going to do Xray crystallography myself, I'm going to hand my protein over to someone else for that because I'm not trained in it and it would take too long to learn how to do it at the high level that I need. The pressures of science (funding cycles, and the push for data) are sometimes too much to invest time into doing certain experiments when they can be given over to others.

[waddle]

we do integrative multi-disciplinary science

Off-topic, but inter/multi-disciplinarity and collaboration seem to be buzzwords for everything nowadays. Like, "In our lab, we take an interdisciplinary approach to exploring the cellular machinery of toothbrushes."

A lot of high profile publications require a ton of work and its usually more than one lab can handle or has the expertise for, so you branch out and collaborate.

True this. But at least we're not in high-energy physics, where they have publications like this (>2000 authors!).

[Genomic Repairman]

Science is becoming a team-based sport. To put out the best work in a fair amount of time you sometimes have to lean on collaborators that have more expertise with this technique or model system. Part of this also boils down to grant funding, the NIH/NSF aren't going to give you money to do the work if they don't think you are proficient in an area or technique. That's why if you are not, you get letters of support from collaborators to package into your grant proposal saying that they will either do the work or oversee your lab conducting it. So while interdisciplinary and integrative are buzzwords, and annoyingly so, they are the future of academic science. The days of the single author paper for particularly life sciences papers are long gone.