Referee report ignored and not sent to authors I am early in my career (postdoc) and don't get many papers to review. Thus when I do, I try to put in the work, do a good job, and write a constructive report that is actually useful to the authors. This is the story of how a report I wrote got ignored.

A while ago I was asked to review a paper. I had 3 weeks to do it.  Partly due to my own fault and partly due to a lot of work coming up around the review deadline, I was not able to finish on time.  Before the deadline, I sent an email to the editor and asked for two more days to finish the review. There was no response to this. Two days later I submitted the review, as I promised.  I repeated most of the calculations in the paper (something I don't expect most reviewers do in this field) and found some – fixable – mistakes that affect the result.

Since I was interested in this paper, I checked its status in the editorial system several times, and it always said "under review".

Then about 6 weeks after submitting the report, I got a new request, with a revised version of the paper.  Surprisingly, the authors were clearly responding to only a single reviewer who only recommended fixing typos ... it was obvious that they have never seen my report.

Thus I contacted the editor and asked if there was a mistake and if the report was sent to the authors.  Just to be clear, at this point my report was still clearly shown as submitted in the editorial system and could still be downloaded.  I got back a (probably canned) response from the editor within an hour, saying that: (1) they asked me to review a paper but they never received a response from me (2) due to time constraints they decided to make a decision without my input.  At the same time, my access to the manuscript in the editorial system was revoked.

I wrote back again, explaining that I did in fact send a report – which was confirmed received by their automated system –, and offered to send it again.  The editor never responded after this.

Questions:

I am extremely disappointed because of the time I put into this and because of what I see as dismissive treatment by the editor.  It's really hard to let this go.

Should I keep pushing this and write again, or just let it go?  I want at least an acknowledgement and and explanation of why the report wasn't sent out.
Is being two days late with the report (though giving advance notice before the deadline) a serious offence?
I am worried that the misunderstanding that I never sent a report will leave a permanent black mark on my record with the publisher.  Is this possible?  This is another reason why I want to push it.
At this point I am quite tempted to just send the report to the paper's authors privately. While I would have preferred to remain anonymous, I would rather reveal myself than let it all go to waste. I made an effort to keep a constructive tone throughout the report. I do think they will find it useful, whether they will act on it or not. Is it a bad idea to do this?

I posted this question because I am upset and want to do something about the situation but I am worried that I might end up doing something stupid that will damage my career.  Some comments from people who are themselves editors will be helpful.

In the end I am thinking of just giving the report to the authors privately with a short explanation and not bother with the publisher any more.

Update:  In the meantime the problem got resolved.  It turned out to be caused by an editorial system problem, and the rest can be explained with the editor being busy, as many people suggested.  The moral is to always have good faith ...

I agree with Patrick that you should let things go with the journal and not take things personally--what happened was probably just a result of everyone being too busy.  I doubt your relationship with the journal or editor will improve by pushing more.

To address your last question, yes I think it's worth contacting the authors.  You have a chance to fix some mistakes in a paper before it gets published, so I would probably contact the authors, and just say that you were asked to review but couldn't finish on time so the journal didn't accept your report.  (You also don't have to send them the exact report, but could just point out the mistakes.)  Edit: To be clear, I am suggesting your explanation of this situation is short, and matter-of-fact, in a way that doesn't blame anyone or anything except your tardiness.

I think this is okay, because you did not end up being a referee for the paper, you don't need to maintain anonymity.  There should certainly be no problem if their preprint is publicly available, in which case you don't even need to tell them you were supposed to be a referee.  However, if their paper is not public, you may want to first check any secrecy agreements you may have made when you agreed to referee the paper.


As an undergraduate, should I have done research on all of my research interests listed in my resume? I am an undergraduate student, writing my resume for application to grad school.
During my undergrad I have done research on some topics through internships and research projects. However, there are also some interesting research topics that I have read about them and explored their goals in research groups' websites, but have not done research on them myself. These subjects are among my interests to pursue in grad school.

Can I list them in the Research Interests section of my resume? I mean, is it necessary for undergraduates to have done research in all of their research interests when applying for graduate school?

Yes, include potential research interests that you are interested in and not just those you have participated in. Graduate schools like to know your goals and where you want to go with your graduate degree, so including what research would be interesting helps them know if they have faculty that can guide you in that direction.


How to handle colors of photorealistic images in publications A long time ago in a classroom far, far away, I was taught that printed media should be understandable also when in monochrome, e.g. when printed out in black and white (cf. the issue specifically for logo design). This could naturally be seen as also applying to academic publications (journals, books, conference proceedings, etc.), but judicious use of color can be effective when accounting for e.g. colorblindness and vision impairment. How, then, can I best include photorealistic images with many colors in a way which retains meaning both in cases where colors are available and where not available?

In my specific situation, I am illustrating sample items used as stimuli in an experiment which is strongly but indirectly related to color (i.e. models I've conditioned on the data include features which encode color). For this reason, it would be helpful for readers to get the best possible perception of what the stimuli look like in real life. Unfortunately, however, some of the colors are hard to discern from others even on an RGB monitor, let alone printed  in black and white (which is actually part of the reason for doing the experiment).

Currently, I've tried adjusting brightness and contrast measures for the images, which has helped to a small degree, but I'm afraid to try anything more radical out of fear of misrepresenting the sample items.

One possibility is to use the colour image, but add text labels for the important elements so the user can understand the image even in black and white. For example, in a picture of a stoplight, I might label the red light as "stop indicator" (or even "red light"), the green light as "go indicator" (or "green light", and so on.

The user will know that the text labels must have been added after the picture was taken, so you will not be misrepresenting anything.


CV still not graduated I'm doing a CV for PhD application but still I'm not graduated. How can I say that My starting mark before final dissertation are full marks?

I'd put the number of credit points you already have as well as your current weighted GPA (in /30, of course. The conversion in /110 may be misleading, especially for potential employers outside Italy, who may be unaware of the fact that, in the Italian system, the thesis mark is added to the weighted GPA, and thus read the grade as "final".)


Is it absolutely necessary for a researcher to have an institutional email? I was creating a researchgate account and it says it wouldn't let me in if I can't provide institutional email.
I do research in an University and I don't have any Institutional email. But the way researchgate website is creating account, makes me think like is it an absolute necessity to have an institutional email to do research.
Bonus question: What are the benifits of having an institutional email address?

Every employer, including universities, should create email accounts for their employees/students to use for official purposes related to their jobs/studies.
There are many reasons that using private emails for these purposes can be a problem. Depending on what country you are in, these can include government records requests laws that would allow the public access to your private communications if you're using that private email for public purposes (in practice, this isn't quite as dire, but it's potentially a massive pain).
Not sure why your institution has not provided you an email address, but this seems very unusual. It isn't that uncommon for your institutional email to be used to authenticate that you are indeed the person you say you are and that you have some association with that institution.
I won't go so far as to say it's "absolutely necessary" but I'm having a hard time imagining doing any of my own work without an institutional email, and I would find it very very weird to work somewhere that wouldn't give me an email address.


Dressing etiquette for interviews in academia Are there expected dressing norms at faculty interviews? Will a casual tee-jeans be discouraged?

In the same vein, what is expected when a student visits the campus for an interview?

While its not mandatory to wear a suit for a faculty interview, it doesn't hurt, and may actually be expected in certain disciplines. Best to ask around beforehand. I've never heard of a dress code for student visit, but something semi-formal doesn't hurt.

As a general principle, it doesn't hurt to be more dressed up than necessary. The reverse can often be embarrassing. But as with most such thing, the departmental culture is the most important factor.


Preparing for the GRE Mathematics Subject Exam? I'm a prospective graduate student in mathematics, I intend on applying this upcoming Fall so I only have two shots at this exam. My goal is to get into a top institution, so from what I have heard it is imperative that I do well on this exam. I'm aiming for a score of >75%.

I have done a ton of reading on how to prepare for this exam, and have found great information both on this website and others, however I'm still a bit in the dark as to how to go about preparing for it. So far I have so far gone over the bulk of the courses that appear on the exam. I feel strong in most subjects, but vector/multivariable calculus seems to be my weak point. With the test being only two months away, what would you guys recommend be the best study method? Taking numerous practice exams? Consulting textbooks? The textbooks I have been using so far are Stewart's Calculus - Early Transcendentals, Schaum's Outline in Linear Algebra, and Rudin's Principles of Mathematical Analysis, and the Princeton Review Guide for the exam.

I'm very curious to what you all have to say, especially those who have already took the exam and have done well. Sorry if I rambled on a bit, thank you for your time!

I am a student at a "Top 10" applied math program in the US. For us it was not the case that we needed top scores of the math gre for admission/fellowships (thought this was not the case for my pure math cohorts). So maybe this will help with the stress of the exam.

To answer, since you say that you are the weakest on vector calculus, I would spend the most time reviewing this materiel. Calculus makes up a majority of the questions and from my experience these questions were either you knew the "trick" or you were going to lose a lot of time doing it from the fundamentals.

Since you say that you are going to take it twice, here is my biggest advice. Try your best to remember the questions from the first exam. Especially if you don't know how to answer them. I also took the exam twice and ended up getting a couple of questions that were identical. So when you are done I would try to write down as many questions as you can remember to learn how to do for the next one.


After the on-site interview I visited the campus for an in-person interview 2 weeks ago.
They supported my flight and hotel.
I thought I was good at the interview and the director stated that she will be in touch after several weeks.
Is it okay if I send follow-up email?
I am so nervous and cannot focus on my work.
Any comments will be appreciated.

Unless they gave you a specific time frame, then yes, it is fine to ask them about the current state of your application.

If you have other options, then keep them open until things are definite, but don't bring them up when asking for an update.

Don't become a pest, but a couple of weeks is a pretty good interval.


Paper in high impact journal duplicates work done a decade prior, how should I respond? This paper was published in a high impact journal for physics, Physical Review Letters, in 2010, and basically duplicates work done in 2000 by another author in the field, here.

What is strange to me is that, in our subfield of optical polarization theory and measurement, the author of the second, older paper, is well known.  There is no way that an adequate reviewer couldn't have known about the second author's work in 2010.  The 2010 paper doesn't cite this former work.

What is the protocol for this situation?

The first, newer paper, has a more elegant and easily understandable derivation, but it still duplicates the older paper, and isn't original, just more concise.  However, the 2010 paper, disingenuously states that "non-quantum entanglement" is used to resolve an issue (the issue solved in 2000).  This needs to be called out, because mathematically all we have is a 2 element vector with elements that are not linearly dependent, and this is what they are denoting the "non-quantum entanglement."

In my opinion, this lack of citation of the original work by the authors of the first paper above (newer), likely where they got the idea in the first place, is potentially unethical.

Edit:

Now that I've been in academia for awhile, I find myself often disappointed and disheartened by the following problems, most of which are primarily political :

The unfortunate view that retractions are so unpleasant that they almost never occur.  Everyone is wrong occasionally, the literature shouldn't be polluted with incorrect results.
Everyone always being afraid to be wrong, and subsequently afraid to fail.  Failure is essential to developing new frontiers.
The lack of risk taking in mainstream science.
The focus on positive results, especially in experimental sciences.  I'm sure we would all love to know when not to spend years going down a fruitless path.
Ethical issues being addressed as just ignore it.

Retractions (for ethically sound reasons, like mistakes, etc.) really shouldn't be so unpalatable that we end up with incorrect results proliferating in the literature.

Ethical problems like the above, failing to cite likely known prior work shouldn't be swept under the rug and just ignored for political reasons.

This is a very opinion-based answer, but ...

  What is the protocol for this situation?

Letting it go.

You say that the paper got published in a high-impact journal 4 years ago. It reproduces results from another well-known paper. It is pretty much guaranteed that you are not the first person to notice that. It seems unlikely to me that the paper is indeed perceived as "suspect and unethical" by your peers.

Maybe your peers value the "more concise" write-up? Maybe there is a subtle difference that you have not noticed? Maybe, for some types of (empirical) papers, having a reproduction paper that basically just confirms that the observations from the first paper are indeed general is a really valuable contribution (although not citing the first paper is of course very bad in this case).

If you feel the case is indeed bad enough that something needs to be done, you have two options:

Mail the authors of the first paper.
Mail the EIC of the journal.

However, realistically, the chance of retracting the paper based on a years-delayed decision that the contribution was not novel seems very small, as long as there was no clear case of unethical behavior or a significant technical problem with the results.


How to care less about teaching? Fifth year math grad student as of this Fall. ABD, currently on target for six years in total.

I have very strong feelings about the way courses should be taught, graded, and organized. I have thought extensively about this issue and experiment with my teaching every chance that I get.

I teach my own course, and spend lots of time on teaching it the right way (according to me). This includes designing my own course plans from scratch, planning engaging lectures, writing my own problem sets, projects, and homework assignments. I also tend to give too much individual attention to students, like holding extra office hours when students have schedule conflicts.

My teaching philosophy is fundamentally at odds with the majority of the lecturers in the department. It makes me feel like a pariah, and privately makes me feel incensed when I see others teaching in a way that I consider unethical. Though I'm not vocal about my disagreements, I have been consistently passed over for teaching awards, despite constant effort, innovation, and shining student evaluations. I wish I didn't care about this.

I know I'm being paid the same as other apathetic TAs who give every lecture off the cuff, assign whichever book problems are easiest to grade, and contribute as little to the education of their students as their contracts will allow. I'm not being paid to be a lecturer, but I'm giving at least a lecturer's effort to this job.

Most importantly, I know that putting this much time, effort, and emotional energy into teaching is taking away from my research. Sometimes I feel terribly guilty after a big exam or project because I realize I haven't even looked at my research in a couple of weeks. My advisor hasn't said anything negative about my progress, but I know I could be doing better.

Every time I try to pull back and adopt a more traditional model, I get depressed and frustrated, because my students aren't learning anything, I'm as bored as they are, and I wonder what the point of my existence even is if I'm just going to give up and be another trash teacher who goes through the motions all day. Especially when I have the ability to be the change I wish to see in academia. (Which maybe isn't my place, but then again, everybody passes the buck, that's why we have this problem.)

How do I get myself to step back and refocus my efforts onto research?

Please note that this differs from this question in that I am not asking whether or not it is possible to balance teaching and research, but specifically on how, emotionally, to scale back a focus on teaching for one who has begun to let it eclipse his research. I know I am making a mental error due to idealism, and I'm trying to figure out how to break out of it.

Superficial solution: Control your behavior with a time budget

Sit down and set priorities for your current life. Your research is probably more important in the long run than the joy you get out of teaching. If you agree with this, set a time budget for each area. E.g. assign 70% of your time for your research and 30% for teaching. Plan your teaching preparation accordingly. If according to this budget you can only spare 2 hours a day for the teaching but making custom exercises takes more, use prepared exercises. Also do not offer additional hours if your daily budget does not allow that. You can use a time tracker software. You may also try to do x hours of research related activities first before you "allow" yourself to spend time on teaching.

In-depth solution: You are not responsible for everyone and nobody will pay you back

It is admirable that you sacrifice yourself for other students. I also had mixed experiences with other tutors and when I became a tutor myself I wanted to do it better and often stayed one or two hours longer to make sure everyone understood the material. It felt like I had an effect on the world and could show them that there are people who care about them. It is a great feeling, BUT...

...will these students help you with your research? Will they give part of their earnings to you when they start working as a thank you for what you have gave them? Probably not. There will be no additional compensation for your excessive commitment. Nobody takes care of you, but you. This is sad, I know, but this is the hard cold reality. Few people care about you, unless they get something out of you.

Additionally the apathy of the tutors is the shared responsibility of the faculty, not yours alone. Don't let your ideals guilt you into feeling responsible for it.

You are not a trash teacher if you do less

The other teachers might have realized the previous point. Sure some just don't care and are trash teachers but maybe some of them, in their hearts, are just as idealistic as you but realized that spending time on their research or with their families is more important for their life and happiness. They are not ascetic monks that devoted their whole life to the "holy cause of teaching". If you realize that they are not bad teachers but just have created boundaries and a healthy work-life balance you will not be afraid to become one of them because you will not be afraid to be seen as someone who does not care about students but just someone who also has limited his working hours to a healthy pensum.

Make small steps to improve your universities teaching standards

Identify the most hindering problem with the easiest solution. Try to focus on one at a time. I don't know how your department works, but maybe you can mention this in a weekly meeting or talk to the head. Unless you are the head of department you most likely can't change the department on your own, small steps is all you can do.

Think about a teaching career

Not sure if this already crossed your mind but would you consider a career in teaching? It may suit your passion, although it might be depressing if this becomes your profession and you are stuck in a apathetic institution that does not value your dedication.


Choosing and training (admitted) PhD students for research What do you expect from a PhD student before being an advisor for him? I mean do you expect from him to fully understand your papers and to be able to contribute your research from the first day or first month? Or, do you ask him to join your research group meetings and ask him to do some minor tasks in the group (collecting data, maybe some coding) while still learning about your research and other relevant topics he needs to understand the papers.

For example, assume that you are working on manifold learning and your PhD student has some experience on machine learning and has a very superficial knowledge about topology and manifold learning. Do you tell him to go and not to come back till getting some advanced math classes. Or do you rather tell him: "You did well on the general machine learning class which I taught why not come and join my group and lets have a look what we can do"?

Do you tell him to go and not to come back till getting some advanced math classes. Or do you tell him: "you did well on the general machine learning class which I taught why not come and join my group and lets have a look what we can do"?

If by "advisor" you mean "research mentor/collaborator", definitely the latter!  In my experience, strong students can jump in and learn as they go.  Even the most inexperienced student can ask useful "stupid" questions, precisely because their backgrounds aren't yet firm.  Moreover, struggling with research (either reading or thinking or coding) while taking their first topology class tends to drive the relevant topology deeper into their heads.  I don't expect most new PhD students to contribute real research results in my area (computational topology) in their first year, but I've been pleasantly surprised more than once.

On the other hand, if by "advisor" you mean "provider of research funding", my expectations are a bit higher.  Before I hire anyone as a research assistant, I need concrete evidence of research output (not just potential), preferably in the general area of the grant.

On the gripping hand, if by "advisor" you mean "guy who signs paperwork", things are different again.  Regardless of their background, I'll agree to be a student's official advisor only after we've worked together for at least a semester and they've worked with at least one other professor for at least a semester and we both agree that we're a good match.


Do graduate schools dislike when students take 5 years in undergrad? I am currently a junior Materials Science and Engineering major at a top engineering university, and have done research in a very physics-based materials science lab for the past two years. I love this research, and plan to continue in the field for graduate school, but I am realizing more and more that I will need to strengthen my physics background significantly.

I have the option to double major in physics, which I can also use as part of the requirements for the honors program I am in, but it will mean taking an extra year to graduate (5 years instead of 4).

I am honestly OK with taking a bit more time in undergrad., as I have had a wonderful experience so far, but I want to be sure it is not frowned upon by top graduate schools (in either MatSE or Applied Physics) that I am taking 5 years instead of 4. Is this usually the case?

You want to make a double major program, I don't know the issues in your university but here they still finish their own undergraduate degree in time and took their diploma, and in their extra year solely took courses of double major. So actually no extra year in the curriculum as a result.
Still, graduate schools demand explanations for an extra year. I have finished Chemistry (4 years) in 6 years in my university. First 2 years are simply filled with N/A or FF grades of retaken courses. I was unable to attend my classes and even most of the exams due to the economic reasons. Most of the time I had worked in places with more than 40 hours in a week, and sometimes 17 hours a day for most of the week.

In short, if you prove to graduate schools you applied, that you have an extra year not because of incompetence or other serious lackings, but due to living conditions or meaningful academic reasons; they will tolerate that. However, be wary of some schools which count your retaken/replaced courses as another course in your curriculum, so in their way of calculating your GPA might be worse.


Are student evaluations of teaching assistants read by others in the faculty? Are student evaluations of teaching assistants read by faculty who assigns teaching duties to TAs or by the primary instructor of the course for which the TA is assisting?

I recently met the professor whom I was assisting and he said: "...and you got good evaluations last semester...". I was not expecting that.

You should expect that your teaching evaluations will be available to any faculty members in the department.  The lecturer for the class will certainly have access (and this is important for you, if you subsequently look for an academic position; your evaluations will help them to write you a letter of recommendation addressing your teaching).  Other faculty members may also see the evaluations.  In my department, any professor who wanted to see a grad student's teaching evaluations could get them.  Most faculty members are not going to be interested, but whoever makes the teaching assignments may well review your scores.  Other people may also look at your scores, for various reasons; for many years I reviewed all the grad students' teaching evaluations in my department, to look for evidence of any systematic problems.


Is it alright to reapply to a PhD program you got rejected from if you work on your application? The main weakness in my application was my weak research experience in the field I applied to. Say I got two new writing samples and greatly improved my research experience. Would it be acceptable for me to reapply to a school I got rejected from? I really want to go to that program.

Generally yes (with improvements). Consider emailing their admissions to make sure they don't have a policy against reconsidering applicants some time later.


My advisor signed a contract to hire me, but then external funding fell through. Should I force him to take me anyway? I'm in a very strange situation. I have been accepted to a PhD program in the UK which was supposed to be financed by an external company (this was arranged by the advisor). I've already accepted and met my conditional offer and stipend but the external company withdrew their support and I (implicitly) understand from my advisor that without funding he will not be able to take me on.
From what I understand the accepted offer and stipend are considered contractually binding and that the lack of finding is not "my problem" anymore. Is that so? and if so, can I and should I really insist that my advisor take me on regardless of finding new funding sources?
Clarifications:

I have discussed this with him already; he is actively looking for positions for me elsewhere.
My contract does not say anything like "contingent on availability of funds."

Edit:
My goal was never to litigate the matter or get some compensation out of it but to find a way to do the PhD program. As many said in the comments it is not realistic to force such a relationship even if "i am in the right". He is already doing his best to find a solution and I will work with him to that end. I guess that if it fails I will simply move on.

Your offer is made by the University, not your advisor. Someone in admissions probably messed it up, but fwiw this is neither your, nor your advisor's problem. As soon as University gave you an offer, and you met the conditions, it's legally binding.
Many other answers are written under assumption that PhD is an employment and hence "probationary period" or "redundancy" can be applied. This is not correct. In the UK, PhD is considered "training", not employment. The University's offer for you is their promise to provide you with a particular service. Even if the industry partner goes bust (which is not impossible), the University is still under obligation to fulfil their side of the deal. If the University absolutely can not serve you (e.g. the only qualified professor has just left, the lab building collapsed, their license is revoken), they must find another suitable program for you and pay your tuition fees and relocation.
These obligations are not merely ethical, but can be and often are enforced. The relevant regulator in the UK is  the Office for Students. Obviously, I am not a lawyer,  so I can't give you any legally reliable advice. But I believe you are right and OfS will be able to support you if the University disagrees with your arguments in this case.


How to report to journal when work published in it has already been done by some other researcher? I came across a paper published in the Journal of Mathematical Physics in the year 2016. In the paper, the authors claimed to have developed a methodology which extends the dimension of an existing method. But this extension has already been discussed in a paper published in 2014. This seems to be a kind of cheating which the reviewers of journal failed to identify. The bibliography also appears to the suspicious as a large number of papers of a particular author has been cited without any motivation. I want to report this unscrupulous work, how can I report to the journal?

PS. This is not a case of plagiarism but a kind of unscrupulous research.

For the case of the "forgotten" reference to previous similar work, I'd say you should assume good faith: maybe they just missed it. If it's not plagiarized then it's not really fraudulent. Re-discoveries happen all the time and it's not generally expected that all papers cite all the relevant literature. It can however be frustrating to the authors of the original paper.

If your intention is to notify the community that a very similar work exists, which can be very useful, then you could write a letter to the editor. These are often published if the journal find they are of value. Word it without hinting that you suspect the omission was made on purpose as this will not achieve anything.

For the large number of citations to seemingly unrelated papers from a given author, again it might just be a coincidence. But you cannot exclude a "citation ring" scheme. What you can do is communicate your concerns privately to the journal. If you gather enough evidence of an organized fraud you can also make it public through post publication review-websites (pubpeer.com, etc.). Do not hold your breath though, it's very possible that it will have no consequences whatsoever.


Finding academic collaborations by location What is the best way to find academic collaborations between two locations (e.g. Berlin and Australia) occurring within a certain field / topic?  Some variety of massive, searchable, citation / co-author network map would be ideal, but the examples I can find so far seem quite limited.

You can, to some extent, use traditional publications databases for that. For example, with Web of Science:
(CI=Berlin) AND (CU=Australia) AND (SU=Chemistry)

will give you the list of publications with affiliations listing both Berlin and Australia in Chemistry. You can then skim through the list, or analyze it further, for example here by institution:

Another way to find a destination for your next holidays can be:

Start with a senior colleague you know well

Try to see who he's been working with recently: find papers, sort by institution

Pick your location and ask him to put you in contact with them!


Is It Acceptable to Contact the Professor of a Publicly Uploaded Lecture? A full graduate level course is publicly uploaded as a series of videos on Youtube.  Within the housekeeping section at the beginning of the course, the professor provides an email address as a means to contact him with questions.  No attempt is made to obscure this email address when the video is later uploaded.

Obviously, the professor's primary intent was for members of the class to have a way of contact, but would it be within the bounds of etiquette for a Youtube viewer following the course to email a question about the course material?  Suppose the question is of a sort that would not be well suited to ask in a Youtube comment.  Perhaps the question is long and includes images for clarification, but let's assume that the answer would not be proportionally long, that the professor could answer it fairly quickly and easily.  Would it be okay for a Youtube viewer not enrolled in the course (perhaps after the course had ended) to send such a question to the professor, maybe with the qualification, "Please do not feel compelled to take time out of your busy schedule to answer this, but I was watching your lectures on YT and was wondering..."?

Of course it is acceptable. But you also might not get a reply. The professor has to prioritise their actual students over someone who saw a Youtube video, and they are generally busy people that may not have time to respond to your question. However, they will not find it rude that you ask. You can find most professors' email addresses by simply Googling their name anyway.

To maximise the chance that you will get a reply I suggest writing your question in the most concise way possible (hint: not the way your question here is written) and in a way that clearly indicates that you've understood the basics in whatever field the lecture is about.


software to organize (1) research questions (2) secondary literature (3) own notes Is someone aware of software that can help me create certain goals and research (sub)questions (digitally) and connect these questions in an organized way with the secondary literature on my computer, as well with my own notes.
I have over 2000 pdf files on my computer. The problem is that I don't want to create a new folder (and copy of the file) every time I come up with a new question.
Ideally, but not necessary, the software should also keep track of edit history and I should be able to make notes on files. It would also be nice if I could access my research organizer from everywhere, though this is not a necessary requirement.
I have looked into some software to manage bibliographies, but the main goal of this kind of software is to export the bibliography, rather than organize my research-questions, computer files, and own notes.
I suppose I want to create some kind of database/tree with the following structure

WEEK 1 ("short title comes here")
-- more detailed description of research question; goal/workplan/etc.
-- literature to read this week (software links correct files on my pc)
------- book 1
------- book 2
------- article 1
------- etc.
-- output
------- version (monday)
------- version (friday)

The software, ideally, must have a "search function" which redirects me to the correct node of the tree (i.e. "WEEK 1" not "this-pdf-contains-the-string.pdf")

Try using Microsoft's One Note. It recently became free to use and is a very good application to store your content, no matter how lengthy it may be.


How should a series of articles be represented on my CV? I authored a series of three articles that were published in the same source over the course of a month or so. Each article has the same title with a different subtitle. Due to the identical titles, I find that the publications look somewhat awkward when listed separately on my CV:

  Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet: Quot tota id pri. Research Institute Magazine, Nov. 30, 2017.

  Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet: Ne vim delenit laoreet dissentias. Research Institute Magazine, Nov. 16, 2017.

  Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet: Id cum fugit voluptua voluptatum. Research Institute Magazine, Nov. 1, 2017.

Is there an elegant way to group them? To my surprise, I have not found this issue addressed elsewhere.

The way you do it is just fine. It allows the interested reader of your CV to find the articles in question and peruse them, which is exactly what you want to achieve.

(As a side note, it is not uncommon for people to publish sequences of articles that start out the same, then have a roman numeral, and then some further text. For example numbers 34 and 47 on my list of publications are of this form: http://www.math.colostate.edu/~bangerth/publications.html#x-reviewed . Here is a much longer sequence by one of my teachers: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C6&q=heywood+rannacher&btnG= .)


Can PIs compete for good postdoc/PhDs by offering better salary than others? Not sure if the pay rate for postdocs and PhD students are set nationally.  But I was wondering if PIs compete with each other for good students by marking up the (rather small) salary.  Is this current practice or a good idea or bad idea?

Thanks,
Shuheng

This will depend wildly on the setting in question. For example, NIH grants have specific postdoc rates, and while a professor could "tweak" those offers (usually in ways that involve a second grant/account/etc.) they may or may not have the ability to do that.

Additionally, there may be departmental requirements - for example, in my current department, all graduate students are paid a fixed rate, take their preliminary exams and get a slight bump to another fixed rate. There is no flexibility in this, by design.

As for whether or not it's a good of bad idea? I think it's a bad idea for my lab. Salary negotiations create an unlevel playing field among the members of my lab, and that's not a message I'm willing to send by "sweetening the pot" for one postdoc vs. another. The only differential benefits I'll accept is if the "unit price" of something is variable - for example, if I offer to pay for a postdoc's plane ticket when they move to join my lab, I pay for a plane ticket, understanding that someone coming from a state away is likely to be less expensive than someone coming from overseas.


How do journal editors and reviewers view previously published conference paper? I am submitting my paper to a journal, but a very small part of the work was previously presented in a quite prestigious international conference (although not the top). The journal policy allows for this, given the revised journal version has at least 30% novelty as a thumb rule. It even allows some copied texts and figures, which I do not have.

So from what I see, it is not absolutely necessary for me to mention the conference edition as part of this work although I am citing it as relevant, along with other references. But researchers will understand that it is not black and white, but gray. The previous research will always somewhat influence the future research.

If I do mention the conference presentation as part of the submitted work, will it make the work more authentic to the reviewers? Will they somehow take it more seriously, so to say? I am interested in the opinions of experienced reviewers and editors.

Just to make it clear, in my field, journals are considered more prestigious and they publish the more refined, expanded versions.

Also, this journal has an anonymous review process, but not double-blind.

I do not think you really have a choice here: if part of the paper has been previously published elsewhere, you need to mention that fact explicitly.  Not mentioning such is generally considered self-plagiarism and looked on very badly.

Now, depending on how you are re-using the material, there are two different ways that you might do it.  If you were doing a typical "extended version" paper, then the appropriate thing to do is to state this fact both in the introduction and in the cover letter.

It sounds, however, like it's less an extended paper than a repeat of a particular section.  In that case, I would instead recommend putting early in the repeated section a statement like:

  "This section has been adapted from [citation]"

For example, I often do this when presenting background sections, on which the new results of a paper will then be built.  The background section will be adapted to fit the circumstances, of course, but rather than artificially try to paraphrase definitions just for the sake of avoiding self-plagiarism, I prefer to handle the issue by making a clearly stated reuse of background material that is similar in spirit to a block quotation.


I sent an email asking for letter of recommendation almost a week ago and have not received a response. Does it mean NO? I asked my ex-professor for a LOR almost a week ago and I have got no response yet. It is making me pretty nervous and I am not sure what I should do now. I was thinking about visiting him at the department and asking him in person, but I am afraid that his silence means "no" and it will be quite an awkward situation when I ask him.
I know that maybe he is on holiday, or the mail could fall into the spam folder, but I do not think so, because it never happened with any mail I sent him before.

Is it good idea to see him in person and ask him like that? Can no response mean "no"?

EDIT: He knows me - when he was my teacher we talked several times outside the class and I wrote him an email one month ago and he answered it, so I guess there shouldn't be a problem.

No, it doesn't mean "no". The most likely scenario is that your email is one of many waiting to be dealt with.

I would suggest politely and non-presumptively following up on the email. Reply to yourself to maintain the thread and include the date you need the letter by.


In what sense are UK universities public? You often hear that almost all UK universities are public.  Wikipedia, for example, says "There are four fully-fledged private universities in the United Kingdom, the University of Buckingham, BPP University, Regent's University London and the University of Law."

However my understanding is that funding for UK universities comes almost entirely from tuition fees and grant income.

What is the legal/technical/practical difference between a public and private university in the UK?

However my understanding is that funding for UK universities comes almost entirely from tuition fees and grant income.

This is incorrect. Tuition of UK students is subsidised (to varying amounts in the constituent countries of the UK). In the most extreme case, Scottish students pay no tuition at universities in Scotland. If you compare 'home' fees with international fees at any public university, you will see that UK and EU students pay substantially less than international students (although it is not the case that the UK government tops up the UK tuition fees to the amount paid by an international student).

Sheffield University has some informative pages on how exactly this funding works. In particular, student tuition is subsidised via HEFCE grants, which vary depending on the course. This page appears to date from before the new variable fee regime in England, so the numbers and formulae may be out of date. But the funding mechanism subsidises the clinical years of medical, dental and veterinary students the most, then lab based courses and the non-clinical years of the medical courses, then courses with some lab or fieldwork, and then everything else.

Private universities do not receive this funding.


What is the term for intended consequences of an activity other than intended learning outcomes? Question might be a bit strange.  I am looking at a series of activities that we run every year.  These activities have some intended learning outcomes (ILOs), but these outcomes are stated in terms of what students will know or be able to do at the end.  I'm trying to explain not just the ILOs but rather the intended experience that the students will have.  For example:

"Students will keep up with their homework and review course material throughout the semester, rather than cramming during exam times"

This isn't really an ILO, but it is an intended thing that students will do this due to the nature of the activity.  Is there a term for this type of thing in pedagogy? "Intended Student Experience", perhaps?

Presumably the distinction is between those intended outcomes that can be measured in some reasonable way at or soon after the end of the course and other intended consequences that can't be measured effectively. Any distinction will probably do the job, even "Other intended outcomes" or "Unmeasured intended/potential outcomes" or "Hoped-for behavioral changes".

Just make the distinction clear both in how you intend to both have students arrive at the outcomes (perhaps not the same for the two categories) and how you distinguish between the categories.


Benchmarking my research results with related work's results I have an accepted paper in CS, in which I proposed a new method in data-science related topics (data-intensive analysis, a lot of hyperparameter tuning and design decisions).

The reviewers opinions are positive, the method is clearly described and the results are validated properly. Thus, the conclusions of the work are valid.

However, one of the reviewers wrote that the paper lacks an empirical comparison with other similar works.

From my point of view, comparing the result of my method to the results of the related work is not viable for many reasons, such as the problem I am tackling is slightly different, the type of the dataset I am using is also different.

So, I see a fundamental difference between my work the related work that makes any comparison really not valid, though both my work and the related work are in the same area.

Any suggestions to improve my paper?

If the paper was accepted, it means that the reviewers and the editor / chair considered it to have sufficient merit for publication. Comments in the reviews are suggestions to improve the paper, but being the author, it is finally up to your discretion as to what is appropriate.

In your case, assuming that you now need to send the final camera ready version for publication, you could update the paper with the reasons you think such a comparison would be invalid. This would also help future readers of your paper who may have the same question.


How to use data from a colleague who retired in my thesis without commiting fraud or plagiarism A colleague of mine who worked on the same project retired one year ago. I would like to use some of the data he measured and reproduce some of his figures. He gathered the data while performing a routine analysis of our raw material e.g binding kinetics or adsorption isotherms. In general, nothing groundbreaking. Unfortunately, he did not publish the particular dataset. As a consequence, I cannot cite him.

How can I use that data without being accused of plagiarism or fraud. Of course, I will ask him for the permission to use that data.

Would you state that in the introduction or the figure legend? And what would you write?

EDIT:

I forgot to mention that I will write my Thesis as a monograph and publish it later.

As PatW says in a comment: the general correct action in this case is coauthorship. This gets a little bit trickier with a thesis, which does not typically allow coauthors per se. For the thesis, the thing you should do is give explicit credit where the data is introduced. If it corresponds with the practices of your field, you can also put in a citation to your colleague as an unpublished document or personal communication.

When you republish this material as a journal manuscript or other conventional form that allows multiple authors, however, your colleague should be amongst the set of coauthors.


Presenting and disseminating research results before submitting a paper I got a PhD in math in another country years ago. Recently I moved to the US and have a tenured position. Assume I wrote a paper and want to publish it in a journal. Is it considered OK to present the work and/or post an electronic copy on arXiv, before submitting the paper to a journal?  In particular, does it matter in what order I do the following things?

1) Present the work in a seminar at my department.

2) Present the work in a conference in my field.

3) Present the work in a seminar at another department.

4) Post the paper on the electronic arXiv.

5) I submit the paper to a journal.

Overall, I don't think there are much such rules; but I am not in the US, so my expertise is limited.

I personally refrain from presenting a work in seminars (in other department notably) or conferences before it is on the arXiv. The deposit is indeed the moment I have checked everything, and I am confident it holds together. Before that, I may have doubts.

In rare occasion, the preprint takes some time to be finished, or deposited, and I am still confident enough to present it, but it is very rare.

I usually put it on the arXiv before submission, because it is a time stamp and I want my work to be available. Referees rarely check proofs in detail, so you need to make yourself confident about your work anyway. You should however remember to update the preprint to a so-called postprint when the referee reports come in (note that some publishers inexplicably don't allow that, OUP for example).

Another reason to deposit on the arXiv before submission is that Elsevier allows you to update a preprint to a postprint, but is quite unclear whether you have the right to deposit a postprint or preprint for the first time after acceptance. Well, not that I particularly urge anyone to publish with Elsevier, but that is to be known.


Starting a PhD without wanting an academic career afterwards: should I tell my advisor? I'm about to start a PhD in Europe. I'm seeing the PhD as a "normal job" that I'll do for a few years, because I'm interested in the job and I find it stimulating and interesting, and I want to do research in this field. I'm 100% committed to finishing the PhD and do as best as I can to produce good and consistent research, but I must admit that I'm not doing this with the goal of climbing the academic ladder later in mind, quite the opposite.
From what I can gather, getting a permanent academic position involves moving a lot and having a lot of uncertainty until you finally land a position (if ever). I seriously doubt I will want such an uncertain life beyond my PhD, I've accepted to move for it because of the reasons above and because I'm young, but in fact I intend to go back to my home country afterwards, whether or not I find an academic position there. What I'll do, I'll see later.
I have not discussed this with my future advisor, but I don't think I've deceived him either, we did not talk at all about my future plans for after the PhD. On the other hand, I fear that he might just have assumed it - who does a PhD without wanting to be a researcher?
Should I talk about this to my advisor?
On the one hand, my future beyond the PhD is mine to decide, and if he wanted to know about my future plans, he would have asked. Also, it seems too late now to bring this up, there's not much either of us can do about it and I fear it would just spoil our relationship before the PhD even starts.
On the other hand, I feel that I'm almost being dishonest by omission. If the default goal for a PhD student is to pursue an academic career, by omitting my unconventional plans I'm (unintentionally) deceiving my advisor into believing I fit into the default. What should I do?

This is pure opinion, of course, but I don't see anything wrong with getting a doctorate purely for the love of the field and a desire to know more. There are plenty of people in doctoral programs to fill the needs of academia in the future and some will be disappointed in their inability to find a suitable position. You don't need to apologize for anything.
But you may be a bit naive about the future and your ability to make a living. If you really aren't concerned about that, then there shouldn't be any problem, but understand that you may not find any position in which your new knowledge can be leveraged. But, there are other opportunities outside academia and industry if you have the financial resources to manage it.
Whether you talk about this with your advisor or not is a personal decision, and should be based on your understanding of how they might react. No one here can predict that better than yourself.
But you really aren't deceiving anyone. As you say, your future is yours to manage.

Back in the day, previous century, actually, we didn't worry about what came "after" since the economy was good and there was a lot of interest, both in academia and elsewhere in our skills (math, in my case). We were just able to assume that jobs would be there. But all of that ended when we successfully landed on the moon. So it was a shock to graduate into a terrible economy for folks with doctorates. But now the situation is very different. There is an abundance, not a lack, of skilled people, so the future is much less "certain" now than it seemed to be in the 1970's. Make sure you have plans, and back-up plans as well.


Can I put a preprint of a paper on arXiv without informing my co-authors? I am the main author and have three co-authors on a paper that I have been working on for quite some time now. Two of them have given me constructive suggestions and do think that the paper is a publishable material.

However, the other one, who also happens to be my supervisor, has been nothing but pessimistic and rather critical in a negative way. Moreover, his suggestions are totally irrelevant to the paper. I am beginning to think that he is trying to deliberately block my paper. Believe me when I say that I am trying to give him the benefit of the doubt; I am trying as much as possible to fulfill his irrelevant and unreasonable demands.

On top of that, my contract with the university is about to end soon. I have found another position in the same field. If this paper was even submitted, which it should have been months ago, it would strengthen my CV a lot.

Can I put it on arXiv without informing my supervisor? If not, what is the best way to deal with the situation?

First, no you should not upload the paper when not all co-authors agreed (and also not submit it to a journal).

On how to deal with the situation: If I understood correctly, there are four authors, one is your supervisor, one is you and there are two more. I think the way to go is, to get the other two authors involved in the process. For example, if you think that you supervisor has irrelevant requests for you, forward the requests to the full group of authors (including your supervisor) and ask about opinions on that matter. Be polite, focus on facts. Do not give the impression that you want to overrule your supervisor, but that you want all authors to be involved in the process. I should add that this approach may not work well with every supervisor, but I can't tell or guess what will be the case in your situation.


Editor not replying to emails long time after submission My problem is the following.

I submitted a paper to a journal of Elsevier almost a year ago.

Although I have written many times asking about the status of the submission, my emails have been systematically neglected and I have not received any news since last November of 2018.

In view of the long time lapsed, I wrote to the editor asking him to sure a date for an answer so that I can free myself of the commitment acquired with him so that I can submit the paper to another journal.

One more time the email was neglected.

The results of this submission have been already presented in congresses with very good reception of the audience. Now, due to a long time lapsed, I am at risk of missing them.

What can I do?

The way I see it these two scenarios are the most likely:

They feel they're being pestered by you and so are ignoring your emails. This would apply if by "many" times you mean you wrote them so many emails that they got annoyed. It's also more likely to be the case if, in your field, the average review times are up to 1 year (e.g. mathematics).
The other possibility is that the editor is busy/inactive, and isn't paying much attention to the journal.

Your options are:

Wait and see what happens.
Write to the journal office and ask for a status update. Check the journal's website and see if they have a contact email. If they refer you back to the editor then the chances of #1 having happened increase (although it's also possible that the desk editor is simply not very motivated and is passing everything on to the editorial board).
You can also ask the editor-in-chief instead of the handling editor.
Withdraw and submit elsewhere. If you choose this route, look around at the editorial management system and see if there's a withdraw option.


With some programming but no formal CS background, to develop fundamental CS knowledge should I get an MS or BS? I have 3 years of experience as a programmer now. I have worked on some drivers in the automotive domain and some medical applications.

Since I do not have a computer science background, I was thinking of going for a full time masters in computer science. I need to develop my algorithm and data structures, compiler theory knowledge.

I have studied algorithms and data structures through the book written by Cormen, and other stuff through books.

I do not have any published papers from my undergraduate degree.

Would it would be better for me to go for a masters or bachelors degree?

So, do you think it makes sense for me to go for higher studies now?

Depends what you are hoping to achieve, of course. However, as you are already working in industry, if your goal is to get better pay or a better programming job, this may not work out the way you hope it would. If the goal is actually to (as you indicate) learn about fundamentals in computer science, going back to university may be the right move. However, note that for these basics, an undergrad may actually be more appropriate. At master level, most programmes would assume that you have a solid working understanding of these concepts from the start.

  What will my chances be of getting into a good university?

What is a "good" university for you, and where? There is also the problem that you indicate that your undergrad was not in computer science - this will probably hamper your chances of acceptance to a great computer science programme quite a bit.

Somewhat related: I feel that you are also overestimating the amount of industry experience you have accrued. Frankly, after 3 years, most people would not call you an "experienced programmer". So it is unlikely that your work experience will be sufficient to offset your missing undergraduate degree.


Should I be worried that I have no set dissertation near the start of my 4th year? I'm entering the 4th year of my STEM field PhD at a prestigious institute in Canada. My supervisor is a bit terrible; never around, and often with fantastical ideas that are much harder to realize than he thinks. I'm starting my 4th year this fall, and my first two projects have failed. Now, my supervisor has provided me a new project of which I am not too stoked on. It relies on a collaboration with another group, and involves a lot of waiting time. I'm worried that the clock is ticking and I have nothing concrete to work on. I have one 4th co-author paper in a reputable journal, but I don't foresee publishing soon due to a lack of success. Perhaps it's bad luck.

Others who are in or have done their PhD - is this normal to experience at this point? Or should I start to worry about my ultimate success?

There's wide variation in when people settle on a dissertation topic.  I don't think you can specify a particular time to panic or not.

However, it sounds like it's certainly time to sit down with your supervisor and negotiate.  You should agree on answers to the following questions:
What exactly are your supervisor's expectations for what needs to be in your finished thesis?  What are the "must haves" and "nice to haves"?  How long will it take to accomplish those goals?  What difficulties could potentially arise, and do you have plans to overcome them, or contingency plans in case of unexpected failures?  When do you expect to defend? What other publications do you expect to produce along the way? How does this relate to the timing of job applications?

In this process, you may have to be more assertive than you have been in the past.  Don't settle for vague answers.  If possible, put a plan in writing and get your supervisor to agree.


How to better prepare myself for the application to masters degree programs in the U.S.? I am an undergraduate student in China. I am currently a junior, majoring at Mathematical Economics and Mathematical Finance. My goal is to apply to a graduate school in the U.S. to learn Finance or Financial Engineering.

What can I do now to better prepare myself for the forthcoming application? How can I leave a good impression on the Admissions Committee? Except for higher GPA, GRE, Toefl, what else also make sense? To win a competition? To publishing papers? Or abundant internship experiences?

I know that the website of each school lists some requirements about the applicants, but those words are too general. Obviously there will be so many applicants who meet those requirements. What else need I show make myself outstanding, making them believe I am a good candidate? I am really puzzled.

Edit

I just want to obtain a master degree.

I also want to know that among GPA, GRE, TOEFL, competitions, publishing papers(if possible), good credible recommendation letters, etc, which ones deserve prior attention. It is unlikely for me to be that "superman".

End of edit

Aeismail’s answer points out that you need to foster contacts with people who can write letters of recommendation testifying to your potential as a researcher.

This is a definitely a good answer. However, it is hard to get good credible recommendation letters in China. You need to have not only strong academic performance but also strong social background to get them.  The same is true for internship opportunities. When there are more than a hundred applicants competing for 3 internships, the best 3 academic performers with the strongest social background will get them. (The population in China exceeds 1.3 billion).

My answer to the question. How can I leave a good impression on the Admissions Committee? Besides high GPA, GRE and TOEFL scores, (and possibly winning a competition, publishing papers, abundant internship experiences) and good credible recommendation letters, the only thing I can think of is an excellent Statement of Purpose.

Use that statement to convince the admissions committee why you’ll be an excellent student in their school. Why are you interested in finance or financial engineering? What have you learned in undergraduate school? What particular research program in that school you are interested? What do you hope you can learn from that school after you get the master degree from them? What do you plan to do after master degree? Etc.etc. Hopefully, they will be convinced by this statement and then accept you.

This is my 5 cents worth. I sincerely hope experts here who are currently in the admission committees can give us more and effective answers.


How do I cite a SDS in AMA format? Does anyone have any suggestions as to how I could cite a material safety data sheet (for a chemical compound) in the AMA format? An example would be appreciated, because I couldn't find anything helpful online.

You should cite it as a book and include additional information if it is electronically available.

  Author Surname Author Initial. Title. City: Publisher; Year Published:Pages Used. [Available at: http://Website URL. Accessed Month DD, YYYY.]

Example:

  Lenga RE and Votoupal KL. The Sigma-Aldrich library of regulatory and safety data. Milwaukee: Aldrich Chemical Company; 1993:23-34


Recommended rejection of a paper, but invited to review the paper again I was recently asked to review a paper, and ended up recommending a rejection of the paper. The journal has, apparently, asked the authors to revise their paper, and the journal has come back to me asking me to review the revised paper. There is, however, no option offered for me to decline. I will likely recommend rejection again as I see that the main problem with the paper is still not addressed. What should I do in this case? Should I write to the journal that I am not willing to review this paper again, or should I go ahead with the review and recommend rejection for the second time? Since I need to provide my comments to the authors again, what should I write while still being constructive? This was my first time recommending a rejection.

This has happened to me a couple times. As Peter Jansson has pointed out, what probably happened is that, while you recommended rejection, reviewers 2 and 3 said "it's actually publishable if the authors solve such-and-such problems". This is the kind of situation where a sympathetic editor will make a "revise and resubmit" decision.

In this particular case, you have it easy. Just write a very short review along the lines of "in my first review, I recommended rejection of this article because of [problem that made you recommend rejection]. As the authors have not addressed this problem, I'm regrettably forced to maintain my previous evaluation".

[FWIW, one of the times I reviewed a paper like this, the journal actually ended up publishing the paper in question, with the problematic section still exactly as it was  when I reviewed and rejected it. Go figure]


I have been pigeonholed, how can I solve it? I can program, write papers and research. I'm better at research, but due to the lack of programmers I've been assigned programming tasks in my current institution. Additionally, I have little evidence to support that claim in my CV, I am "good" now (and I have strong personal evidence), but I don't have a long track of publications to prove it (because, to be honest, I wasn't good before).

How can I prosper in research if my CV and the interests of my superiors point me in the opposite direction? Is there any escape?

PD: I was a PhD student in another institution, I'm close to finishing my PhD but I don't get any spare time from my current programming obligations in the new institution, where I am a postdoc.

It is clear from your recent questions that you feel exploited in your lab, and it is good that you want to do something about it.

However, first things first. What is your agreement with your current mentor / lab head / whoever? Essentially, what is your "job"? If you have been specifically hired to "help out with the programming", or something like that, it will be difficult to convince whoever is paying your salary that you now actually would like to do something different. Not impossible, but maybe also not easy.

On the other hand, if you have actually been hired to do research, but now end up being more of a scientific programmer because that's what the lab currently needs, it is time for a good one-on-one meeting with your lab head. You wrote in a comment that you do not foresee this going well, but I really see no way how you can change your situation without talking about it very explicitly to your lab head. It should be easy to see for most sane persons that not only your lab has needs, but you and your career have needs as well (and working as a scientific programmer can easily be a dead end for an academic career - no first-authored publications, no faculty job). Try to make a plan for a suitable compromise between you helping out the lab with your programming skills, will still being able to progress your own career. Should your lab head really not be willing to compromise at all, it may be time to move on.

Possible compromises could include:

Hiring an actual scientific programmer, perhaps with funding that you help acquiring
You training some of the junior staff to do their own programming
You helping others in their programming problems, but ultimately let them do the majority of it themselves
You supervising some undergrad or master students that can help out with programming tasks
etc.

  that they appreciate more (because they are their own PhD students and now postdocs, it's emotionally logical, I'd say)

That's not logical, that's BS. A lab where people "coming from the outside" are valued less than those that "have always been there" is a terrible, toxic environment.


Does assigning DOI numbers signal anything about the authenticity of a journal? Why do some journals not assign them? I have seen few journals which are indexed in well known databases like Zentralblatt MATH, AMS Digital Mathematics, CiteFactor but still does not assign DOI numbers to published articles, what could be the reason? Is this a common thing ? Does DOI number add any value to authenticity of journal ?
Most importantly which purpose does this DOI number serve ?

I am asking this because I have heard if journal do not assign DOI number to its published articles then it could be low profile journal or even could be fake.
The similar question has been asked in Why do some papers not have a DOI?, but my query related to quality/authenticity of journal could not be resolved.

PS. My question is related to authenticity of journal "Computational Methods for Differential Equations" published by university of Tabriz, Iran.

DOI, by itself, certainly does not add "authenticity".

The Digital Object Identifier is, by design, meant to be a method of producing and providing a persistent actionable identifier to entities. To put it in plain English: the DOI is an effort to prevent link rot, and importantly, does so by not only providing a registry of the numbered items, but also providing a mechanism for accessing/retrieving those items. The Wikipedia Article on DOI also explains pretty well what it is for. Notice that DOIs can be had for many more than just journal articles. In science, a growing practice is to use DOI referring to datasets.

As to why a publisher may decide not to participate in the DOI scheme: for starters, it does cost money. This may have contributed to the correlation that sham publishers typically do not make use of the DOI service.


Why do many PhD programs expect a higher average physics GRE score for international students than US students? Browsing various PhD admissions programs, I consistently find that there is a higher expectation of international students on the physics GRE for admission. For example, at UT Austin, the average score on the physics GRE for students accepted for Fall 2011 was 907 for international students and 777 for US students.

Why is there such a difference in expectations?

(Some) US departments seek to maintain a critical mass of US students. (I expect that) such departments accept a critical mass of US students - the best that they can get - and then accept some number of international students to fill up their ranks - the best that they can get. Since international students generally score higher on standardized tests such as the GRE general/subject test (for all sorts of reasons), this leads to the accepted international students having higher test scores than the accepted US students.

A more general point, I believe, is that international students are often 'unknown quantities'. While a US student might have recommendation letters, research experience, etc. that gives an admissions committee a well-rounded perspective on them and could potentially make up for less-than-stellar test scores, this is not always possible for international students. So in some sense an international applicant has to have exceptional test scores to make up for being an unknown quantity in other respects. I believe this partly because international students who have been undergraduates in the US seem to fall into the `domestic students' box more so than the 'international students' box.


I feel lost with my master thesis When I sit and start writing my master thesis, I write the first couple lines, then I don't know what to write and get stuck.
I feel like I'm not creative enough for writing.
The questions are. How to get around this blockage? How to organize the ideas? How to stay focused? Is this think typical?

I have to assume that you have done the required research and are now just at the writing stage.

This could be a lot of things. But one piece of advice is to not try to write it from the first word to the last. Work from an outline. Fill in the outline in such a way that it seems like a blurry picture becoming clearer and clearer.

In other words, if you have some idea about methodology, work on that section for a bit. If there is something about the conclusion that comes to you, write that down. Go through whatever notes you have made and add ideas to appropriate sections as you go.

Another technique is to use index cards effectively. Carry them around with you and add new cards or modify old ones as ideas come to you throughout the day. Index cards can be better than a notebook, since they can easily be rearranged and even discarded. As you mine the notes you have, write index cards for the ideas there. Rearrange as necessary.

Ultimately a deck of index cards could, in some sense, represent the entire work.

This isn't the only possible way to attack it, but a piecemeal approach might be able to help you avoid some forms of writer's block, such as being overwhelmed whenever you sit down.

Of course, this method will require heavy editing for continuity as you get closer to the end.

There is a more extreme method that was once mentioned to me by an English professor in an intensive writing course. He had a lot of contacts who were writers of various kinds. He mentioned one person whose method was to "make one page of progress" every day. The person would work until the current manuscript, including revisions, was one page longer than the day before. This results in a short story every three weeks or a novel every year. But, I suspect that it takes a certain sort of personality, somewhat obsessive, to manage that. And one page of progress is not the same as one page of writing. And it was creative writing he was speaking of, not scientific writing.


Will a 3.8 GPA and 1 F with an explanation on transcript allow me to get into graduate school? I am currently in my junior year, studying abroad in another country. The advisor at this school told me that I was enrolled in 5 businesses classes. I had asked her to drop one of them because I didn't need it and she said okay I will drop this course for you and you have 12 credits. I left her office and went on with my day and I came to find out later that she had not dropped my course and that I am still enrolled in 5 classes. The way the school works here is that you are unable to add/drop once that period is over.

Upset and frustrated, I went to her office and she said she can't remember what had happened because she has too many students. She had told me that I can either take the course or fail it and it won't affect my GPA. But on my transcripts it will say grade not available aka "F." I normally take 4 classes at home and I do want to enjoy my time here, so I don't know if I should take the "F" and explain what had happened to graduate school admissions office or just suffer and take the class that I don't need toward my major. It will not affect my GPA whatsoever if I were to take the F it will just be on my transcripts.

I trusted my advisor that she dropped my course, had I known that she wouldn't do it I would've done it myself. I do understand that I am at fault to for not checking it right after she'd done it, but by the time I found out it was too late. Thoughts?

Don't overthink things -- these things happen, and the people who make the selection among graduate students know this as well. If the rest of your grades are good and you have a good explanation, then that's all that's necessary.


Breadth or depth in math graduate school? I'm a recently admitted in a masters program in mathematics. My question is about "strategy" of learning. Should I focus on learning many things or should I pick an research area and start learning only stuff about that area? This is a problem because some scholars told me that if I want to get hired in academia, I must start publishing as early as possible so I better start to deepen my knowledge in certain area. However, actually I have not decided with area I fit the most, and I think that broadness is useful as well, because diversity is a necesity for creativity, just as professional musicians doesn't just hear say classical music, but rock music, or latin music to get inspiration, I think that mathematicians must not just read about their own area, but related areas as well.

In your experience, which "strategy of learning" is better for a begginer in graduate school? I must say that I have freedom for choose courses.

This isn't a question with a correct answer.  I think most people who've been around math departments for a while have seen students go way too far to one side of this or another: students who think they know the first week of their Ph.D. the only field of math in which they want to work, and students who seem to constantly be learning new things, but never seem to settle down and concentrate on something.  Lots of different strategies can work, and there's a lot of luck in how these things work out.

If you plan to do a Ph.D. in the US, then I would think about things this way: while you're doing your masters, you should be figuring out where you want to do your Ph.D. and preparing yourself for that.  If you plan on going to another school, there's not too much point in specializing before you get there, since don't know what advisors will be available there.  Taking some advanced courses, and choosing a brand area is fine, but you can feel comfortable trying to get a broad base.

You can reasonably expect to have 5 years to finish your Ph.D. after you arrive at the school where you will do so (so after you finish your master's degree, if you plan on moving).  If this is the case, then, I would worry if:

at the end of your first year, you don't know what broad area of math you'd like to work in (number theory, PDE's, etc.).
at the end of your second year, you don't know who your advisor will be.
at the end of your third year, you don't know what the underlying objects in your thesis will be and how to work with them
at the end of your fourth year, you don't know the statement of the main theorem of your thesis

You shouldn't take this as gospel (at some schools expect students to finish in 6 year, so you can sneak an extra year in there somewhere), and of course, being worried doesn't mean that things can't be fixed, but what you can relax if you haven't done yet.


When is the best time to start reviewing material for final exams? We know that "cramming" - starting one's study of material the day before the relevant exam - is not an effective study method. Ideally, such studying starts days in advance.

My question is, how many days in advance should one begin studying for a final exam to provide optimum retention of the material?

I'm going to go out on a limb here with a somewhat radical answer:

Don't study for exams.

You are correct that cramming isn't very effective for retention.  I don't think it's particularly effective for helping exam performance either, since cramming tends to a) deprive you of sleep and b) increase your stress level, both of which are terrible for doing well on an exam.  Moving that cramming behavior earlier in time doesn't change things very much: you're still studying in a way that is stressful and doesn't promote long-term retention.

The best way to really learn the material in a course is to put it to use.  Fortunately, most classes give you problem sets, projects, etc., that are designed to do just that.  I recommend studying by embracing these wonderful gifts:

Invest your time up front, working starting when problems or projects are given out, not at the last minute before they are due.  The amount of time needed is the same, but your stress level will be lower and your retention higher.
Remember that a problem is never really about getting the answer, it is about the process by which you get the answer.  If you are just following a formula, you should feel uncomfortable, because what if you mix up the formula?  Check your answers against intuitions and alternate routes to the solution to make sure that you are getting the process right.
Don't give up on any problem.  A difficult problem is a critical opportunity to learn key concepts in a class.
If allowed, work together in groups---but make sure that you all do all of the problems individually before comparing.  When you compare, arguing and explaining to figure out whose answer is correct will help you understand more thoroughly.
When you get marks back, everywhere that you lost points make sure that you understand why and learn how to do it correctly.
Also, go to class.  Even if you don't like the lecturer, you are more likely to learn well from lecturer plus textbook than from textbook alone.

If you do all of this, there is little need to "study" in the cramming sense.  By the time you walk into an exam, you will probably know quite well which parts of the material you know and which you don't.  Instead of studying, I recommend taking the time before the exam period to relax, sleep well, and do interesting things that continue to exercise your intellect in whatever way you find most personally stimulating and inspiring.

Do all of this and you will likely be able to walk into an exam with low stress and a well-functioning brain, get the grade that you deserve, and retain the important material from the class over the long-term, to build on in your subsequent classes and your career.


Post doctoral while working on self employed job I am in need to know if there is a provision wherein I could do a post-doctorate in the USA for a year or two, while I am owning my own Biotechnology firm back in my home country?

This is a complex issue with a lot of variables. If your post-doc is for work completely unrelated to the work of the company then there is probably no serious issue as long as you faithfully complete the required work.

However, you will also face several issues if there is some relationship. For example, will you have conflicts of interest between the two aspects? That would make it hard-to-impossible to carry on. Likewise, are there intellectual property issues? In other words, is it possible that you will learn something in the post-doc that is, for contractual or other reasons, off-limits to your company. There may be other issues as well if there is any overlap.

For issues such as these, both the post-doc project PI and a lawyer should be consulted.


Reply an email from a potential professor? I'm applying to a PhD program. I contacted one professor and told him that I would like to join in his research team. He replied to me as below. Is this a positive response? How could I reply to this email?

  Thanks for the e-mail inquiring about the position of the Ph.D. candidate. I am very happy if you can join our laboratory and work with us. The enrollment to the doctoral course at Univ X is basically free if you pass the entrance examination, but I guess you have no problem because you have already passed the master's program at Univ Z. I think you need a scholarship for studying, don't you? Currently, Univ X has some scholarship positions. You can apply for these positions. However, these positions will start
  Fall 2021.

This is a positive response in that you can apply to take the entrance examination and you can also apply for a scholarship.

There is no automatic position granted or stated for you, so you have to follow the enrollment process for entry in Fall 2021.

You don't have to reply to this except perhaps to say "thank you for the information, I will (or will not) be applying for admission for the fall 2021.

Up to you if you will apply.


How important is the writing sample for PhD application in Political Economy I'm planning to apply for US's PhD program in Political Economy, and a writing sample of maximum 20 pages is part of the application requirements. The problem is I don't think that I have any recent high-quality writing to submit. I didn't write a thesis for the B.S. as my university didn't have that kind of requirement. I've been working for an international research center, but most of my works are mostly applied econometrics and I didn't really get to do any writing.

Bottom line is my writing sample will most likely be the weakest link in my application. If so, how bad will it hurt my chance? Is there anyway to get around this?

Of course this can vary from one department to the next, but in the humanities, the writing sample is generally considered very important.

According to the Department of Politics at Virginia Tech,

  Your writing sample is the most important part of your application.

Political science types are likely to weigh the writing sample more heavily than economics types, at least according to this political economist.

If you do not have a thesis, you should at least have a relevant term paper or similar paper from your coursework that you can use as a starting point. Your writing sample should demonstrate critical and analytical writing (not merely descriptive).


Is it possible to get a research grant without any degree as a person that has a self-learning mentality? With advancements in the internet and technology, I think that I can learn anything from internet with requirements of time and interest. I am very interested in quantum computing technology, but after finishing the learning process, I should do some research to find new things in that field. I am not aiming to get money or anything like that, I want only to get knowledge and have fun.
But in that stage, I guess that I will need a funding to build a lab and fulfill my needs to finish research. My writings above are my plan, I didn't mean any isolation,but I think that self-learning is the best way for me because I don't have enough money to get a degree and one of the reasons of plan is that. I also think that the internet can fulfill any needs for research except money.
Therefore,The aim of that question is asking you about your thoughts about my plans. Also,I want to ask about funding, is it possible to find research grant as a non-degree, self-taught person?

No.
Without a degree and a position at a university or research institute, it is highly unlikely you can get any kind of funding for research.
You can try to get a job at a company that does research in such topics (which requires who to have the background knowledge, not necessarily a degree), but this will also be hard to get.


Are Honoris Causa degree worth as much as PhD? Lately I have seen that some people (some ex-presidents in my country and some others) have been getting the Honoris Causa degree from some universities. Some of which have never even gone to University.  I would like to know how much is that degree worth. By "worth" I mean compared to a normal achieved PhD, can an Honoris Causa graduate give lectures at a university? Can that person be called a doctor at all? Is it possible for one to get an honorary degree in science, or engineering? How much demonstrated work would it take to get one?

I think your question indicates a fundamental misunderstanding of what a honorary degree is, and who gets one. Fundamentally, an honorary degree cannot be compared to a regular PhD. All the rules for getting a PhD fly out the window, as do all the perceived benefits for doing a PhD. If you get an honorary PhD, nobody will suddenly assume that you possess the subject knowledge of the holder of a regular PhD.

Similarly, you seem to assume that an honorary degree is somehow an easy way towards a PhD. This is not the case. By and large, by the time you get an honorary degree, you either already have enough degrees or you will never need one again in your life.

  Can that person be called a doctor at all?

Yes, as long as you don't pretend to have a "regular" PhD.

  can an Honoris causa graduate give lectures at a university?

Sure. Everybody can give a lecture given that he gets invited or appointed to do so. In the usual case, somebody important enough to receive an honorary doctorate is also somebody that an university would love to get for a lecture.

  Is it possible for one to get an honorary degree in science, or engineering

Sure.

  How much demonstrated work would it take to get one?

Usually none.


Should I warn my professor about some errors that I've found in his paper? A professor of mine gave me a paper, because he wanted to show me the kind of work that we might do together in future. It is the advance access version of the paper, but I've found some errors, like typos, and wrong references of some figures in the text. Should I warn him about those things? If so, what would be the best way to do that?

Update

I'm from Italy, but I would love to know about other different cultures as well, especially USA;
My professor is very open minded, nice and easy-going;
Let's put it this way: if I was a computer I wouldn't understood the meaning of the figures because the references in the text don't match with the right plot, but since I'm human being I've understood that he meant the other figures.

I believe that pride is less important than the truth, especially when it comes to scientific publications. I mean, everyone can be wrong, there is nothing bad about it in my opinion. But I know that not anyone think the same, so I've asked this question because I wanted to know if it's worth to risk what @littleScala pointed out, to spread higher quality articles around the world and to show meticulousness in reading the paper.

Basically I thought:

Maybe a professor could be nicely impressed by such a level of attention;
What if he find its own errors? He might think that I didn't read the paper with caution.

Ask him. It sounds like none of the errors is serious so if your question is just one of etiquette, all you need to say is that you think you found a few typos and little mistakes in the paper and ask if he'd like a list.

If the final version has already been sent to the publisher, it's probably too late to fix that, though there's the opportunity to correct small typos when reviewing the galley proofs. In many fields, people put their papers on their web page, too, so he'll probably appreciate the opportunity to fix that version, even if the version in the journal is already set in stone.


How to submit a manuscript in two parts? I have a new manuscript to be published in an Elsevier engineering journal that has a maximum limit of 8000 words. I can't fit the content in this space. Fortunately, the manuscript can be easily split into two manuscripts, say A and B. The first will be concerned with assessing the potential of, say, wind energy in country X and the measurements carried out, while the second manuscript B will be focused on simulating wind energy systems. The first manuscript will be independent, but I'll have to refer to it in the second one (although, the second article will be understandable without reading the first manuscript). So, I have the following questions:

Should I split the manuscript, or submit it to another journal with flexible space limitations?
Is it a good idea to do that, based on your experience? (I have read a lot about this, but I want to know what the editors prefer and how they handle this situation)
Most importantly, how do I submit the two manuscripts (to the same journal): at the same time or consecutively?

The answer to this is "it depends." Some journals do not approve of "series" of papers, expecting that each submission stands on its own. Others will publish extended series of articles (one such series had at least ten entries). So the question of what to do depends on how appropriate the journal in which you want to publish is for the content you're writing about.

If the journal you're publishing in allows it, then there's no problem submitting two manuscripts at the same time, and that's probably the best way to do it, because the related nature of the two manuscripts is much easier to assess. Waiting to send in the second one doesn't help.

As far as the appropriateness is concerned, my first four papers were published as two pairs of manuscripts, so there's nothing wrong with doing so to keep the length of the individual manuscripts reasonable.


Cannot complete thesis and blocked to go non-thesis. What other avenues towards a degree exist? I began my MS 3.5 years ago with the thesis option. The research objectives required by my graduate committee chair will require another half a year at the very least. I am not willing to offer any more of my time having already exceeded my anticipated graduation date by 1 year.

I decided to cut my losses and change to a non-thesis program. I am prevented from doing this by my committee chair who does not approve of this transition.

So my committee chair has me at a bit of an impasse. I cannot spend any more time towards his research, but I cannot switch to a program of study that no longer requires more research without his approval which he is not willing to give. Where do I go from here?

Where I am, a non-thesis option requires only the approval of the department (meaning the department chair) and the graduate school. A "non-thesis advisor" is considered an oxymoron. At best, graduate students in this position are advised by either the Department Chair or the Chair of the Graduate Programs for the Department.

Put together a Program of Study (PoS) based on the Graduate Catalogue for your university and department / program. Your university probably has an on-line form to complete and submit. Confirm that you have met all of the administrative requirements. Then ...

Talk to the Department Chair.
Talk to the Dean of the Graduate School.

When you meet all of the PoS requirements for the degree, and with their approvals and signatures, you should be done.