What are pre-print repositories for math and physics alternative to ArXiv? Are there other widely used academic pre-print repositories other than ArXiv? My interest is especially towards mathematics and physics.

If possible, one characteristic that I'd like to find in other pre-print repositories is the possibility to update the paper without leaving the older versions online and a better organized "author page" (and, as a note, I personally don't like Research Gate or Academia.edu, which also, as far as I understand, shouldn't be considered pre-print repositories).

In mathematics and physics arXiv is by far the most used and reputable.

Of course, there are thousands other ways to self-archive your paper using not dedicated solutions (like personal website, GitHub, etc) and some general (like FigShare).

Yet, when it comes to pre-print services, they only one I am aware of is http://vixra.org/. It has policy of accepting everything; however, it has reputation of crackpotism (as arXiv is popular and editors rarely reject from it, so for the majority if researchers there is no reason to choose viXra (unless as a protest or something)).


Definitions and proofs in extended abstract(mathematics) I have to submit an extended abstract of my paper for a competition. The extended abstract must be about 2~4 pages, and the competition requires it to include all the methods and results. Of course, specific definitions and proofs are included in my original paper(about 20 pages), but I can't just summarize them all into 2~4 pages without omitting some ideas or methods. So my questions are

I have some concepts that are not frequently used. Should I write them in my abstract?
Do I have to write precise definitions?
How should I summarize my proof? Can I skip the specific processes and only state main ideas? Can I omit proofs of lemmas?

(My advisor said that he has no idea of how to write an extended abstract, so I hope I can get some help from here)

Before you start writing, try to create a 5-minute elevator pitch talk about your paper. Imagine you're describing the results to your friend (or actually invite a friend) and talk through the main idea of the paper. Practice it several times and note which things you keep in, and which you decide to leave out. This will give you an idea of what to include in your extended abstract.

It is simply not possible to squeeze everything from 20 pages into a 4-pages without losing something, so stop trying. Inevitably you will have to omit some results, or simply name them without going into details. You will have to drop some technicalities (which can contain some useful ideas as well) and so on. The aim of the extended abstract is to communicate the core ideas, not fully elaborated proofs and  methods. The elevator pitch technique above helps you to tell what's central and what's not.


To whom should the letter of motivation be addressed? I am applying for a Phd position advertised by the university. Should I address my letter of motivation to the potential supervisor? Please help me out.

Usually, you address your letter to the contact mentioned in the advertisement.

As last resort, you can always used an undetermined Sir, Madam.


Change title to arXiv paper I have a preprint in arXiv, which I submitted at the same time I submitted to a journal. This was a couple of months ago. It was rejected by the journal, and after talking to some experts and getting some advice, one of the changes that I want to make is to the title.

All the other changes qualify as a revision, so normally I would just submit the new version to arXiv. Is it possible to also change the title?

Another solution would be to start a new submission with the new title, but it would probably generate some arXiv overlap warnings, besides not looking too professional. I don't want search engines to find different versions of the paper appearing in different circumstances (what I mean is that I really do want all the old versions to be in the same arXiv page).

Finally, I could just keep the old title. It's not dramatically bad, but I feel the new title reflects more correctly the contents of the paper.

Is it possible to also change the title?

Yes, you can change the title when submitting a revision.  You'll be presented with the same web page on which you originally entered the title, and you can edit it (or anything else) there.

  Another solution would be to start a new submission with the new title, but it would probably generate some arXiv overlap warnings, besides not looking too professional.

The arXiv would certainly not allow this if they noticed (when I think they would), and you are right that it would look unprofessional.


Can post graduate students be forbidden to work in the institution they are studying? I have seen some graduate (PhD and Masters) students in Turkey, Nigeria, Malaysia etc that can not work in the university they study. In fact I am one of them as I am about to finish Msc mathematics and computer science in Turkey and planning to start PhD in USA. My question is, is it a policy of most universities in the world that post graduate students can not work in the institution they are studying and earn their living? Even to work as graduate assistant perhaps.

No.

In North America, at least in science and engineering, PhD students are generally expected to work for their host universities as either teaching assistants or research assistants, except for the relative few who win full-ride fellowships.  This expectation is strong enough that it is considered foolish to accept an offer of admission to any PhD program without a simultaneous offer of a fellowship or assistantship.  Sometimes these assistantships are also available to Master's students.


Is it ok to show up to a conference without registering if I don't eat any meals? I'm planning to attend a prestigious conference in computer science. The registration fees are very high (~150$ per day). I'm presenting as well, but on a co-located event directly after the main conference.

I don't know whether my university will fund my registration fee for the whole conference. They will most certainly fund the fee for the little event where I'm presenting. In case they don't fund the whole conference, is it acceptable to show up to the conference without being registered? (Of course, I wouldn't have the conference meals with the other participants on the days I'm not registered.)

No, it is not acceptable.

You can of course email the organisers and ask if you can participate without paying, but do not be surprised if they say no.

(Please note that conference registration fees cover lots of things besides the lunch. Among others, conference registration fees may cover the rent of the hall in which you are sitting, and expenses related to the speaker who is giving the talk. Conference organisers are definitely not expecting random people to come there without registering, unless they explicitly advertise this possibility.)


Applied to PhD position but no reply Recently I saw a professor advertising an open PhD position in his group. He asked students to submit CV and motivation letter. I sent an email but received no reply. Two weeks after that I sent a follow up email, but still no reply. How much time would be reasonable to wait? Should I give up already? I know the professor doesn't owe me a reply, but since the position was advertised I thought he would sent an acknowledgement that the application was received. Am I wrong? Is that the common thing to do?

Some people are spectacularly slow. I got a phone call inviting me to an interview for a PhD at one university four months after I'd given up, applied elsewhere, had the interview, received the offer, and accepted that offer. Wait as little or as much time as you feel like waiting, frankly. I'd certainly be looking for other PhD opportunities, regardless.


advantages and disadvantages of white-box testing of students assignments? This is a fork of my question homework-testing-method-for-schools but i'm taking it in another direction.

I was asking about a homework testing method that'll encourage students to write better code and reduce the TA's proofreading task to a minimum.

I was thinking of using unit testing, (or anything else you can think of), in order to turn students in the right direction (design wise), and hopefully giving them good thinking and coding habits (we're talking first programming course in collage).

so my new question is:

If you think there's something wrong and not educational about unit testing    students code please explain why do you think so..
If you think this is a good (or just an o.k) idea please tell me if you have any ideas of how to design the tests.

thank you for your answers.

A lot of what I said as an answer to this question is probably also applicable here, so I will not repeat it.

  If you think there's something wrong and not educational about unit testing students code please explain why do you think so..

I don't think there is anything particularly wrong about unit testing student code, but it will likely not do away with manual grading or direct lab sessions entirely. All things considered, the way how TAs traditionally check programming assignments (build, run, check behavior against assignment description) is pretty close to what a unit testing framework does anyway.

  If you think this is a good (or just an o.k) idea please tell me if you have any ideas of how to design the tests.

The major challenge I see is that you want your tests not only to serve as a framework to check whether students implemented the right functionality, but also to check whether they did it in the right way. I think unit tests and generally automated grading will not be able to help you here, aside from limited hard-coded rule checking.

A lot of the problem is already encoded in your use of terminology. You say you want "unit tests that do white box testing". This isn't really feasible, IMHO. Unit tests test interfaces. So, to cut it short, I do not think that unit tests will help you in this regard.


If my PI received research grants from a company to be able to pay my postdoc salary, did I have a potential conflict interest too? I was a postdoctoral fellow at a university and received nothing but the regular postdoc salary. I received no grants myself, but worked on various projects, many of which happened to be industry sponsored. My PI disclosed them as sources of potential conflicts of interest, but I never did. Assuming that my position couldn't exist without the industry research grants received by my PI, did receiving money from a company, although indirectly, generate a potential source of a conflict of interest for me?

Edit: Just to clarify, I am not interested in how to disclose/report this financial relationship, but in the ethical repercussions.

Yes, this is a potential conflict of interest. You specifically refer to working on industry-sponsored projects in addition to your salary being paid by an industry sponsor (even if indirectly): both can be perceived as conflicts.

Since your position is contingent on the industry funds, it would be possible for you to lose your position if the sponsor was unhappy with the results you produced.

That doesn't mean your work is by rule dishonest or tainted, but it means that for people to properly interpret the meaning of your work they should be aware of how you were funded: that's the purpose of conflict of interest disclosure.  You aren't saying that the work was unethically influenced, but you are allowing others to make that determination on their own.

As @BrianBorchers pointed out in a comment, the importance of this particular conflict depends on the rules for reporting conflicts of interest in whatever context you are talking about. In general, though, it's better to err on the side of disclosure.

To clarify further, if you are asking whether you are legally required to declare a conflict (for example, to abide by US federal law) then your question is probably off-topic for this site and you should instead be consulting with staff and training materials at your university that determine what is a reportable conflict of interest. My answer should be interpreted according to the question you asked, which is whether you had a potential conflict of interest.

In response to your edit, and your comment that indicated you weren't aware of exactly where your funding was coming at the time: I think you can relax a bit and not worry too much about this potential conflict, as long as when you present your research either in talks or in published work that you make sure it is clear that the work itself was funded by an industry sponsor, even if no improper behavior actually occurred. I would definitely put it in a disclosure slide if you are talking about work related to the company that funded you and the work. If you are talking about anything unrelated to that project then I see no need to disclose: you have no continuing ongoing financial interest and there is no conflict of interests on an unrelated project.


How does doing a PhD with a pre-determined project vs. formulating your own affect your later career? Between

Doing a PhD by joining a predetermined research problem
Doing a PhD by formulating one's own research problem

is it possible to say that option #1 is a more advantageous choice in terms of future career?

Why or why not?

By selecting route one you are taking advantage of the potential that as your supervisor is more knowledgable of the field and so will know:

What the important/fundable/publishable problems in the field are.
Be able to judge if a project is likely to be successful
If a problem presents the correct amount of challenge to a graduate student.

Thus if you choose option one, your project could be more likely to be successful and produce publications and lead to fundable options in the future. This does of course rely on the supervisor actaully being better at these things than you. While not all supervisors will be (or will care enough to think about them), on average this will be true.

On the other hand, if you choose route 2, then you will be able to demonstrate independence and initiative, which are highly valued attributes in the postdoc job market. A stock postdoc interview question, at least for me, is: "Name a situation where you had an idea independently of your supervisor and followed this idea through to its conclusion".


Block-quoting a list: where to put the citation? Suppose I write something like this

  Jones categorises things as follows:

  little things
  big things
  medium-size things

... where the entire list is a verbatim quotation from Jones. The list is block-quoted (i.e., it is indented, but there are no quotation marks). How can I make it clear that the entire list comes from Jones's paper? If I put the citation on the last item of the list, it might look like the citation is only for the last item.

The best solution I can think of is to clarify the situation in the surrounding text, something like the example below. Is this reasonable?

  Jones categorises things as shown below. (Entire list is from Jones, 2015.)

  little things
  big things
  medium-size things

No matter whether you quote the list verbatim or paraphrase it, I'm quite sure you don't need to make it a big deal. Quoting a list of bullets isn't really quoting long pieces of text that would need a note about being a verbatim quote; I would say it's more like quoting a theorem in maths. I would therefore go for one of the following:

Jones [Jon15] categorizes things as follows: LIST
Jones categorizes things as follows [Jon15]: LIST
(Jones, 2015) categorizes things as follows: LIST
etc.

Use the one that is consistent with your citation habits.


Is it appropriate to email some new information to my recommendation-letter writers on Thanksgiving if the deadline is a few days later? I just found out one of my grad school electronic applications is having problem with a third party letter service company. So I have to ask the letter  writers themselves to upload the recommendation letters. The deadline is the first day after returning from Thanksgiving so I am thinking to email them today (Thanksgiving) would that be inappropriate? (But if I do, of course I will say Happy Thanksgiving but sorry to bother you....etc)

Asking is always possible.
Expecting any response or action ... well, that, as they say, is another story.


2nd post doc or job in industry? I am looking for a 2nd post doc position but i dont have any publications in my first post doc. Is that lack of publications really matters to get another post doc? or shall I stop applying and look for a position in industry? My field is materials chemistry.

When you have published some nice papers during your PhD thesis, it still might be possible to land a 2nd post-doc, even when you did not publish during your first post-doc. Try to emphasize your accomplished publications and enthusiasm in your letter and cv.

You should, however, consider that it very likely will be more difficult to find a second one, especially at a top institute. They have often enough candidates to choose from.

Academia is often a very competitive place, and can be very unforgiving for setbacks, especially when not being tenured yet. This is really a pity, because there can be plenty of valid reasons why talented hardworking people hit a dry spell regarding publishing. (Think of not getting along with co-workers or supervisors, picking a niche that in retrospect does not connect well to one's specialty, going through a rough time in your life, illness, ...).

For some (many?) 'publish or perish' feels like 'perish while trying to publish'. I think that science does not always benefit from this.


What questions do prospective advisors ask during first meeting? I'm in a PhD program and I'm preparing myself to meet a prospective advisor for the first time. I want to know what questions do they usually ask students in their first meeting? What do they expect? I've looked at the following discussions and they were helpful but did not answer my question completely.

How do I impress my prospective grad advisor? (first meeting)

Etiquette for an initial meeting with a prospective advisor: What is expected of the student?

From the perspective of the prospective advisor, their goal in the meeting will be to determine whether they want to take you on as a student, so their questions are likely to be based on accomplishing this goal.  This is very much like a job interview with a prospective employer, so you should prepare yourself in the same way.

(1) Make sure you have "done your homework" on the research interests of the advisor, and whatever research group they are in.  This means that you should have read their faculty webpages, read about the projects they have done, and have a reasonable idea of the kinds of publications that advisor has done.  I would expect that you have at least looked at the list of papers published by the advisor, and if you are well-prepared, you might even have skim-read a couple of them.  You might be asked questions about why you want to be supervised by that advisor (or work within that group), and you should be able to respond to these with specifics.
(2) Depending on how this university works, you should either have some existing knowledge of projects that they want to put you on, or if you are expected to come up with your own project, you should have some reasonable ideas for this.  If you are proposing your own ideas, make sure that they are within the expertise of the prospective supervisor, or else consider a different prospective supervisor.  If you have already constructed a research proposal, bring this with you.  You may be asked about your ideas for projects, or broad fields of research, and in this case the most important thing to do is to make sure you can explain your ideas in clear and simple terms.  When a potential supervisor asks you to describe a project idea, often they are just looking to see if you can communicate your idea in clear non-technical terms to someone who has never heard it before.  They want to know that you can communicate about your subject clearly, without falling into a muddle, or giving a stream of jargon.
(3) Your prospective advisor might ask you about your previous experience and courses, to get an idea of your level of existing knowledge.  If you have sent them a CV and academic transcript in advance then this will help to narrow down the questions.  Some advisors like to ask detailed questions about past courses, grades, etc., and others will just assume that if you got into the PhD program then you have the desired background.  This varies a lot, but be prepared to talk about your past education/work, and give some highlights of things you have done well in (without appearing to brag).
(4) You ought to be able to make a plausible case for how you will fit into the advisor's research group, and how you can add value to this group.  Expectations will be modest here, since you are a novice, so they are not going to expect you to have any expertise that is lacking in the research group.  Still, you should be prepared to explain why you think you would fit well into that research group/project, and show that you have the potential to learn the material rapidly.
(5) Make sure you display an attitude of eagerness and flexibility, and are not too rigid in your desire to work on a particular project.  A prospective supervisor will generally look for a student who is able to be slotted into projects where they are needed, and who can adapt to changes in a research project.  At the level of a PhD candidature your supervisor will also generally want you to have a broad interest in the field, rather than a narrow interest only in a particular project.  It is therefore helpful if you can display an enthusiasm and knowledge for the your field generally.  (Some PhD students occasionally ask if it will harm them to show interest in multiple research subjects at once, on the basis that this might dilute their commitment to one project.  Although academics often become highly specialised, this is not an expectation that applies to starting PhD students, and at this early stage it is best if the student has a broad interest in the discipline.)

Initial meetings with a prospective supervisor vary wildly, depending on the attitude of that academic.  For some academics it is treated as little more than an informal meet-and-greet, while others may ask detailed questions and "grill" the prospective student.  So, hope for the best, but prepare for the worst!


Should I participate in non-funded bioinformatics research? I'm a PhD student. I will have some months free after writing my Thesis. I've been suggested to participate in a non-funded research, involving some bioinformatics tasks.

There are also other funded bioinformatics work I could do.

In my opinion an unfunded research normally has weaknesses and lack of review by other experts.

The fact that work was funded says almost nothing to me as a reviewer of a paper about that work nor about the odds that such a paper is good. I think funded work is more likely to lead to papers, because the researchers have been paid directly to work on it and have better odds of making progress. That being said, funding is not a guarantee of goodness.

Your assertion that unfunded work is normally weaker and unreviewed is not well founded. Unfunded work is often preliminary work designed to prove the feasibility of an idea and lead towards some sort of publication (poster, presentation, or article) to bolster the case for later funding. This is very important work and is often done by researchers (establish and new) who are moving into a new area or working on a new direction or idea. To attribute lack of funding to weakness is fallacious.

Also, many, many good ideas go unfunded. The rejection of a grant application is not necessarily a reflection that the idea is bad, wrong, unsound or otherwise unworthy of funding. Sometimes, many times, it represents the fact that grant programs are highly selective and very competitive. Some have a less than ten percent funding rate. This means that many good applications will be turned away.

I would suggest that you soften your judgement about projects based on their funding or lack thereof and focus on which you think is a better idea for purely scientific reasons. If you truly get to pick, then I would suggest that you work on the one that's more interesting to you, will better promote your career, or may lead to the biggest breakthrough.


Apply for a cluster for scientific computing from a developing country for academic use? I don't have access to a computer cluster in my university. Is there website that accepts applications for free access to a computer cluster for scientific computing?

Further information: I am in Cuba. I need something on the order of 30 processors, about 50 GB of hard drive, for a week or so. I need to run programs written in C++ and Python.

This doesn't quite answer the question, but in case you have some funds available (but not enough to buy a cluster): Various cloud services - Amazon in particular but probably others - will let you "spin up" a temporary compute cluster on their servers. You pay for this by the minute, or sometimes by more complicated systems where the price is according to demand.

For small projects this approach can be quite economical, and so may be feasible in some circumstances where access to a dedicated system is unaffordable.


Asking 'silly' questions to doctoral supervisor My doctoral supervisor is very helpful and I really enjoy working with him on various problems. I have officially entered my second year of doctoral research this month. During discussions, I get few basic (probably, 'technically silly' as I would put it) questions that occur to me at times. But, I don't ask these question to him as he might think I am 'dumb' and I lack technical fundamentals. Then, I suffer a lot on the topic by crawling in the books, internet; sometimes I find answers to my questions, sometimes I don't. I get annoyed with myself sometimes.

There are many supervisors and Ph.D. students out here in academia.SE. Could you please suggest me on the following questions:

Should I ask such questions at all during a discussion with him?
How would a supervisor feel about a doctoral student asking such dumb questions? (This part might be opinion-based. I would like to see some experience to interpret my situation.)

Note: The questions are related to the research he has pioneered in. It is not always true that I would find the answers to my so called 'silly' questions by Googling. Many research papers don't even bother to contain such internal details on the topic. The only possibility is either I figure out myself or ask my supervisor.

Some (un)related questions (in different situations and contexts):

How to ask dumb questions
"You are paid to answer my questions!" - how to handle silly questions?

Every PhD student "lacks technical fundamentals" in some respect.  That is why you are a PhD student and not a senior researcher (though they probably lack more "technical fundamentals" than you would guess, also).  You aren't going to trick your supervisor into thinking you know everything by never asking questions that might be "silly".

But learning to find answers on your own is an essential skill, so it's good that you are practicing doing this.  I don't know why you say it is "suffering".

I think a good compromise is to spend a reasonable amount of time trying to find the answer yourself.  If you can't, then ask your supervisor, and mention what you tried or what sources you consulted.  A reasonable PhD supervisor should not "think less of you" for this, and in any case, it's almost certainly better for your supervisor to have an accurate view of what you know.

If you are in the middle of a meeting and you need to know the answer now in order to proceed with a meaningful discussion, then it is reasonable to ask the question on the spot.  Again, it is better to be honest about what you do and don't know, than to potentially waste everyone's time by proceeding with a discussion you don't understand.

If you find yourself spending too much time chasing down answers to random questions, then prioritize them.  It's okay to say to yourself: "This is an interesting question, but I don't need to know the answer right now; let me set it aside and come back to it in the future when I have more time."


NIH F31 sponsor has not graduated students or post-docs I am currently applying for an NIH F31 (PA 14-147).  The application instructions, my university's instructions, and literally everyone I've talked to about this has advised that my sponsor needs to have a record of mentoring and graduating students, or else I need a more experienced co-sponsor.  I am my advisor's first student, and none of the post-docs have finished, so effectively my sponsor has no faculty record of successful mentorship.  I have gently brought this up to my advisor, but he seems to think a co-sponsor is unnecessary.

How big of a hit to my review score is it if my sponsor has no record of faculty-level mentorship?  Is this a deal breaker, and is it even worth applying without a more experienced co-sponsor?  I would appreciate advise from people who have personally sat on review committees for this or other mentored NIH grants (even post-doc level), but any informed opinions are appreciated.

I think the NIH sums it up well in their FAQs

Q20: My sponsor has little or no experience training postdocs. How should s/he address that situation when s/he writes my training plan?
A: Your sponsor should consider asking a more experienced faculty colleague to serve as a co-sponsor. S/he should provide a detailed, well-thought-out training plan, in which the roles of sponsor and co-sponsor are clearly delineated. In addition, a sponsor who has not previously trained postdocs should describe any other training experience that might be relevant, e.g., supervision of graduate students or mentoring of a collaborator's postdocs.

The NIH policy also says:

Sponsor(s), Collaborator(s), and Consultant(s). Are the sponsor(s) research qualifications (including successful competition for research support) and track record of mentoring appropriate for the proposed fellowship?

While the exact "penalty" to your score is not stated, the fellowships are competitive enough that any hit will be enough to make you unsuccessful.


How are grad.applicants selected after program qualifications are met? On another post of mine, someone said that the idea of a qualified candidate is "elusive" because there are always more qualified applicants than open spots in any program. I thought that was a valid point, and I wanted to ask how most programs select candidates once they've met or exceeded the minimum qualifications. I know research interests/match of faculty is a factor, but there still must be more applicants than any given advisor can take on. So once the "pile" is narrowed down to most "qualified" candidates, how are they chosen?

Mor Harchol-Balter has written a fantastic detailed description of the graduate admissions process in selective computer science PhD programs in the US, based on her experience at Berkeley, MIT, and CMU.  her description is also consistent with my experience at Illinois.
Short version: There are far far too many highly qualified candidates to admit them all.  The graduate admissions committee is looking first and foremost for concrete evidence of research potential.  Grades and GRE scores are used primarily as filters and only if they are low.  You need supportive recommendation letters from reliable sources (preferably expert researchers in your target area, who have a reputation for identifying strong PhD students) that describe your research experience and interests, in technical, personal, and credible detail.  Your statement must describe your own research interests, experience, and goals, in technical, personal, and credible detail, and in the idiomatic language of a researcher rather than a student.  Your research interests must match those of someone on the faculty who has advising capacity, and you must look more attractive to that faculty member than the dozens of other applicants who want to work with them.
And then you must get lucky.


Who applies academic CS research in the industry and how? After a paper is published, say in CS, who reads the paper? How are the ideas presented there applied to business and industry? How is industry collaboration done?
I'm asking this question per this comment.

I think it depends in large part on what the research is. Some fields lend themselves more readily to real-life application, while others like, say, theoretical physics, are a long way from being used by industry.

It also depends on the researcher. I am a firm believer in the "Last Research Mile" principle (disclosure: the man who wrote that is my advisor). The premise of the Last Research Mile is that a big part of doing research is taking it all the way through to implementation. Doing the early research provides a good start, but lots of important lessons, including research lessons, are learned as the idea is carried through to execution. I'm studying in an Information Systems program, and so my research is in business, computers, and people. While it would be easy to do the basic research and move on to another topic, I think it is important to continue to push and test the idea even in its implementation phases.

As a result of following the Last Research Mile principle, my advisor has created at least one company that sells the product of decades of his research. Many lessons were learned, and many publications resulted because of those lessons throughout the whole process.


Is it reasonable for an author to withdraw an accepted paper because they have since done better work? I submitted a paper to a good journal, it was refereed, and after a year it got accepted for publication.

But now that a year has passed, I no longer find the results or methods of that paper to be that great (novel?). And much of my more recent work, which has been submitted to other good journals but has not yet been published, is of greater quality and improves on the earlier methods.

Should I withdraw the paper, or just go ahead and publish it? To me it seems that there are negative consequences either way:

If the paper is published, then the readers may perceive the author to be shallow or inferior in some ways. Also, if the more recent work is published then people may think I'm over-using a particular method, or "salami slicing". Of course, the latter would not be accurate, as the most recent work was begun several months after the first paper was submitted.
If the paper is withdrawn, then the referee and editor (whom are very respected) may hold a grudge, or simply have a lesser opinion. That could impact future submissions and my reputation.

Although, if I formed a habit of submitting and withdrawing because of better and better results... my work would eventually be so wonderful that nobody would know about it!

No, this is not reasonable. It's up to you to determine that your paper meets an acceptable standard before you submit it, and stand by that determination unless you find a critical error in the work. Maybe it's not as good as what you're working on now, or maybe you're just overthinking things out of perfectionism, but it doesn't matter. Not every paper is a breakthrough, and that's alright.

Practically speaking, one less-than-exciting paper isn't going to give you a reputation as a salami slicer, and even if it did, this is much less bad (think several orders of magnitude less bad) than having a reputation for wasting editors' and referees' time because you won't stand behind your own work.

I'm not sure about the legal fine points, but you might not even be able to retract the paper at this stage without the editor's agreement (and why would the editor agree if there's nothing wrong with the paper?).


Hypothesis formulation Can hypothesis for doctoral dissertation be formulated as "to demonstrate that approach X can be used effeciently/successfully to model Y"?

I'm trying to use novel approach X that has been rarely used in my field to model Y in my country where X has not been used at all.

The problem is I don't have anything to compare it with Y to validate my results. I can only compare Y with Z which has been modeled using different approach and aggregates several other factors that are not the subject of my research. They are not directly comparable but both Y and Z should have similar trend. Nevertheless, I will compare these two to check external validity of my results.

In addition, there are some previous predictions about Y which I will also use for testing/proving validity of my results.

Are you required to write down a specific, formal hypothesis by your departmental or university dissertation requirements? Much of science is done without this level of formalism. If you are required to do such a thing, it might be better to write something like:

  Using approach X to model Y will lead to quantifiable improvement in Z.

Where Z is the error in approximation, efficiency of the method, or some other quantifiable measure of the performance of the approach. You probably don't need to know what level of improvement will obtained before you start the work, but you're better off stating a quantifiable improvement in some specific aspect rather than a vague statement that X is better for modeling Y.


When you no longer want a professor on your dissertation committee If I already asked a professor to serve on my dissertation committee but I now longer want him on my committee for various reasons, how can I politely tell him this through email? I just don't know how to say this in a polite and not at all prideful way.

You do not need to tell them from the first place. They will implicitly understand that you changed your mind. It is fine. But if you send them the official forms and dissertation, I think you need to follow a certain procedure. In this case, it is not polite and not recommended to change a committee member unless there are strong reasons.

Contacting committee members should be done by the supervisor not by the student in most of the places. I highly recommend you to consult your supervisor as this is part of the supervisor's job.


Ph.D. in Geophysics while doing an online MS in CS Has anyone had experience working on two graduate degrees at once?
The goal being to gain mastery in CS, specifically machine learning so that it can be applied to research problems in the earth sciences.

I'm currently a first year Ph.D. student in geophysics focusing on applying machine learning to massive datasets of satellite imagery. I just got accepted to Georgia Techs Online Masters in Computer Science. I'm trying to decide if I should do it while working on a Ph.D. The CS program is part-time designed for working professionals and is low-cost $6,600.

While I can certainly learn the CS material on my own, I feel a formal credential will be taken more seriously. A tech career would also be a fallback plan, knowing how competitive the academic world is having a plan B is important to me. Any advice is appreciated.

In general, the CS and machine learning community is more interested in what you build than in what diploma's you have. There won't be many companies where a masters degree is going to significantly compliment a phd with relevant practical experience. A masters degree could give you a more solid theoretical foundation and the possibility to work on some other (toy) project giving you more broad experience. However you can also get that using coursera and personal projects.

The real trade-off is: a more structured program versus a more self-made learning path. The degree program also 'forces' you to do the work, which can be a good thing or a bad thing.


Is it possible to obtain a second PhD degree in Europe? As I have heard it is not possible to get a second PhD in Europe if you have obtained first PhD in Europe. Is it true? My 1st PhD is in Theoretical Physics which I won't find a fair job related to that. so I am trying to apply for second PhD in Mechanical engineering or applied Physics.

I am most familiar with the situation in Germany. There it is in fact possible to get more than one PhD degree. Different departments award different types of PhD degrees, depending on the academic field. In physics, you will typically earn a "Dr. rer. nat." (PhD in science), while in engineering you will get a "Dr.-Ing." (PhD in engineering). While most dissertation regulations will explicitly exclude the possibility that the same degree can be awarded twice, it is of course possible to earn a "Dr.-Ing." degree even if you already have a "Dr. rer. nat." or vice versa. Then you would have two PhD degrees.

In addition, there are honorary PhDs, which are awarded independently of and in addition to real PhD degrees. But I assume that your question wasn't aimed at those.

However, that it is possible to get two PhD degrees does not mean that it is a wise thing to do. To others, it may just be a sign that you didn't take the next steps in an academic career after getting your PhD, but didn't leave academia either.


Telling my department about switching to a new PhD program - moral dilemma Background
I'm a PhD student in a science PhD program in the US. I had a fellowship covering all costs + a stipend and so far I haven't  had to TA or RA. I'd be TAing from next year though.
I have had a shift of interest towards field B. I like to work (in academia) in a different field, and although I'm still interested in my current field, it's become clear to me through many discussions with the people in both fields that I should switch to B. I applied for PhD programs in B, surprisingly I got in despite lack of background, and now I have to make a decision within a few days to either stay in my current program and forget about field B or leave my current program and start a new PhD in B in the fall.
Interest-wise, it's clear to me that I like to migrate to field B. This is far from an over-night decision, and I let my interests in the field ripen over the course of a couple of years before getting to this stage. But I'm facing a serious challenge telling my current department that I want to leave for a new program, and I'd appreciate some advice on how I should do that.
Here is why this is challenging:

I've kept them in the dark about this decision so far (I know I shouldn't have, but it's part my personality not to share important updates until they're finalized and part the situation wouldn't allow me to do that confidently). I have signaled my interest in field B, but as an interdisciplinary interest, and as such, I've been encouraged to pursue it by my department.
My current department and advisor have been extra nice and cooperative with me. They supported me so kindly through a personal hardship I went through, while they definitely didn't have to.
So far, I've been on fellowship, only takin courses, exploring, etc., and no research or teaching output. Now I'm at a stage that I'll soon start "paying off" for the department's investment in me, and it feels morally wrong to leave now, after taking their money and giving nothing back.
There's an important milestone in my current program that's approaching within days, and I have to tell them before they actually start working on that, because that'd make it even worse if they put all the effort to send me to the next stage and then learn that I was planning to leave soon anyways.  Of course they know I've made serious decisions about this quite a while ago that now I have an offer. I'm afraid they might feel used if they learn as they were providing extraordinary support for me, I was preparing for leaving them without telling them anything about it.

My questions:

What's the best way to approach this and tell the department about this?
The truth is I've been in a situation that personally I couldn't put my mind into making this decision until this past week. I've had some time to clear my mind now, and I want to make this transition, but the items above are holding me back. As I said, I don't dislike my current field, so I'm even wondering if what I'm doing is so unethical, perhaps I should stay. Is this so unethical?

What's the best way to approach this and tell the department about this?

There is no magic incantation; the approach will be the same as for any other job. Tell them as soon as possible, thank them for all they've done for you, and emphasize that your decision is based on your evolving interests rather than any shortcomings of the individuals involved. See also this post.

I'm even wondering if what I'm doing is so unethical, perhaps I should stay. Is this so unethical?

There is nothing unethical about it; grad programs know that a fraction of students will choose to leave due to circumstances beyond the program's control. Losing a good student after investing effort is disappointing, but it goes with the territory. You should not let such considerations hold you back from doing what you need to do.

perhaps I should stay

You didn't really ask for advice on the decision itself, but I do want to say that many students fixate too much on the exact subject they're studying. The idea of a PhD, however, is to give you a foundation from which you can continue to learn throughout your career. Now if field A is art and field B is physics, yeah, you will have to switch; no way your art foundation will be that broad. But for most adjacent fields/subfields, either PhD should give an adequate foundation for your future work.
Beyond that, staying seems to have three key advantages:

Your department is "encouraging" you to pursue B as an interdisciplinary subject. From the outside at least, this seems like a "best of both worlds" situation.
You don't have to restart you program from the beginning, which will save you an entire year
You get to stay in your current supportive environment with a great advisor. Grad programs are a bit of a dice roll; rolling again introduces some uncertainty.

So I certainly recommend that you consider staying on. But at the same time, if you're not really passionate about A, you will not be successful in A, and it's certainly better to make the jump now rather than three years from now. So it is a dilemma, and one only you can unravel; best of luck.


What is a senior research fellow? How is a senior research fellow different from a lecturer and a professor? I suppose it has small teaching responsibilities? Would it then be a suitable academic career option for someone who chooses research over teaching?

I do not have a specific interest in a particular country, since I am not sure if the practice would differ between countries, but let us say it is UK.

It depends on the university. At most of the universities in the UK I know, a position is usually called research fellow if it either is a temporary position or a position with less teaching obligations.
However, there is no general rule about what one calls a research fellow. It may even be different from department to department (Oxford is an interesting example, there it can mean pretty much everything).
If it is a suitable academic career option depends therefore more on the university itself and the conditions of the position (how much teaching, is it a permanent position?), than on the name of the position.

About the difference between the countries: There are large differences between countries, not only in the names (which differ of course, due to different languages). For example in Germany most positions are only temporary positions without tenure track.


While applying for PhD in Deep learning, how useful are papers in some other topics like photonics? I am a EEE student. My plan is to go for higher studies on Deep learning and neural networks. Suppose, I have an opportunity to do research on a photonics/nano material/device physics project. How much would papers in any of these three topics help me during PHD admissions in USA for deep learning?
Secondly suppose, instead of doing journal papers in these, I may be able to do mediocre/good conference papers in deep learning. In such scenario which would be best?
Thanks in advance!

You can specialize later on, any research experience you have is definitely a plus. Here's an untold secret, researchers will often switch between subjects throughout their careers (depends on the field and the researcher, some choose to focus on a very narrow field). This means, that it is not uncommon for researchers to begin writing about a completely new subject that they have very little knowleage of simply because they received funding to investigate that topic.
That's a long winded way of saying, don't sweat it. Your previous experience is not useless. It certainly won't hurt if you can author (or co-author) a paper in deep learning.


How to collect data for dissertation if the work wasn't published I'm starting my dissertation in which I'm creating a mobile application for public use.

My problem is I need evidences to support my hypothesis and I was informed
that I will only be allowed to collect data from users inside the company
for which I'm doing the app, since the application won't be released in time
of my deadline.

I think this might invalidate my data since these are users who are aware
of the application development.

I thought I could do some quizzes and try to have "outside" people to fill them
but I'm not sure if this enough to support my hypothesis since these people
didn't had any contact with my application.

So my question is if using data from quizzes about a possible solution (like
mine) is enough to support my dissertation since I can't let people try my app
by themselves.

Very hard to answer without knowing the details of your work, the app in question, more background, and what other contributions you can make part of your dissertation. But… even if a formal release isn't possible by the deadline, couldn't you arrange for testing on outside people but on your devices (instead of theirs)? That way, you can load the app on a series of say, 10 devices, then have people test it (sort of a focus group)…


Interviewing for teaching position in a department that is similar to, but not exactly, my own field I'm going to be interviewing for a teaching faculty position in department X.  My own PhD was in a field that included many concepts from X, but I am not strictly a "researcher in X" - I am contributing to a different field entirely.  As a result, I am not up on the exact lingo/journals of X.  However, the courses that are offered by that department include many, many things that I can easily teach, as well as a few that are specialized that I'd have to learn a lot before teaching.

I really want the job, since it's a great department and, of the courses that are offered, I feel comfortable teaching a great many of them.  However, there is a nagging suspicion in my mind that they will start asking me questions about so-and-so's work, or important publications in the field, and I'll obviously have no direct experience.

How can I demonstrate my value to the department while also acknowledging that my field is not entirely the same as their own?

For a teaching position, it should be much more important to your interviewers that you have a firm grasp of what you will need to teach for them than that you be current on the most cutting-edge research in the field.

Spend some time looking at syllabuses for the courses they want you to teach. Syllabuses from the school itself, of course, but also a few from other similarly-situated schools if possible. If the department's own class materials aren't publicly available, don't hesitate to contact them directly and ask if they could share this with you. It should be a good sign to them that you want to do a bit of research into the position.

Of course if there is anything in the basic classes that is currently really beyond you, you can do a bit of background reading. This shouldn't involve entire books or fields of literature, just enough so you know what more you would need to do to prep the class.1 Again, you don't need to be ready to teach the class when you arrive at the interview, but you should be ready to explain what steps you will take to get ready before the class itself begins.

If I were interviewing you, a great answer to this question would be something like (assuming these are the right topics, scholars, etc.):

  I feel like my training in Field N has really prepared me for [these specified aspects of the course] as there is a lot of overlap with [these theories/methodologies/methods/scholars]...I do need to brush up on Scholar X's work and also get a better grounding in Scholar Y's theories.

Also acceptable would be:

  I'm well prepared for [these topics/methods] and will need to delve a bit deeper into [these very specific sub-topics/methodologies/methods].

A less comforting answer:

  I can teach anything; I just need to learn more about [the main topic of the course]

And this answer:

  What does that class cover again?

would be a big red flag.

You should also be prepared to answer questions about your future research interests, what kinds of advanced topics you might teach, and how those interests would fit with the needs of the department's students. Be honest here, but see how you can tie your expertise and interests to the subject at hand.

Finally, if you really want to be sure you at least know major journals and names in the field, you should ask a subject specialist. Either a friend or colleague in the field or, barring that, a subject-specialist librarian can probably give you the top-5 titles and names you should know, as well as any recent controversies or important advances in the field, just so you aren't left nodding along if they come up over lunch.

Good luck!

1 It doesn't sound like this is your situation, but if you need to do a LOT of reading for even the basics, then this may not be the position for you. For example you don't want to be in the position of needing to take the intro course in order to be able to teach it, just for your own sanity's sake. (Though this does sometimes happen...my high school French teacher told us that she learned right along with her first class of students, as she hadn't ever taken a French class before she was assigned to teach it!)


Costs for colored figures in Chemistry - A European Journal I am planning to submit a Chemistry - A European Journal "full paper" article. However, it contains many colored figures. The FAQ does not really answer the question if colored figures will lead to additional costs. Also, I have no idea of what costs to expect, i.e. 20 Euro, 1500 Euro? How is the situation in other journals?

The author guidelines report:

  The publication of graphical material in color is expensive, and we
  request that part of the additional costs be carried by the author. As
  a result of the production process, the online and print versions of
  the manuscript must be identical. If color is deemed essential for the
  scientific understanding and the author does not have access to funds
  for publication costs, the journal may consider covering the
  additional costs.

It seems that unlike many other journals, for what concerns colour figures, this one publishes a printed version which equals the online one. Note, however, the bold part.

An alternative possibility, which is less expensive, would be that of producing the manuscript with all black and white pictures and then delivering the coloured ones as online supplementary material. In fact, from the author guidelines,

  Color and animated multimedia applications are welcome and published
  online at no cost to the author or reader. Please refer to such
  applications in the article itself where appropriate (see the
  Supporting Information).

They might accept pictures too.

In any case, before making any decision, I'd suggest to contact the editor or the journal publishing services.


Shall I review a paper for my advisor? I am a research scholar who published a paper in an Elsevier journal recently.
My advisor had almost no contribution in the paper, but since it is mandatory to put the advisor’s name in the paper, I had to put it.
I was the first author and also the corresponding author.

Recently my advisor said he had got an article from the same journal related to my work and he wants me to review it as he does not have any knowledge in this field.
Shall I review it for my advisor or politely refuse my advisor that I wont do it?

I don’t understand why the journal contacted him and not me to review that paper though I was the corresponding author?
I feel very bad that even though it was my work the journals did not send me the paper for review.
What do journals usually look for when they send a paper for review?

UPDATE:

I did talk to my advisor that I would review the paper if he could mention my name to the Editor so that I get enlisted as a reviewer in their database.
But my advisor is not keen on saying that to the Editor.
He is arguing that this is how things work in academia.
He said that he also reviewed for his advisor but never asked anything in return like this.
When I published the paper he gave me the same explanation that in academia advisors dont work.
It is the duty of the scholars to do all the work and since he has read the draft once and I get my scholarship through him, he is entitled to get an authorship.

One way to resolve this would be that your advisor refused to review the manuscript and suggests you as a possible reviewer. Then the editor can decide what to do. Do not overthink why your advisor was chosen first. He has been around for a longer time and is therefore more known to editors.

I would prefer this procedure to a simple 'yes' to the request  (which would be the easy and probably common approach) because it makes contributions transparent. You made a good start with making yourself the corresponding author of your own paper, so it would be consistent if you sticked to this path.

Addition after comment: The answer above makes most sense if you already know how to handle a paper review resulting in a high quality report. Should you require some general support on this, asking your advisor to do the review together and communicate this accordingly to the editor is a possible and viable alternative.


Do academics have any standard system for annotating text? I teach secondary history classes. My principal is pushing for all teachers to introduce students to a annotation system which should be the same in all classes.  But the system doesn't seem appropriate for my student's needs, e.g. here are some of the 20+ items:

Underline key words.
Put a question mark next to questions you have.
Put a star next to important items.
Put an exclamation mark next to things you felt were interesting.
Write the infinity symbol next to a "connection" you made.
Etc.

The items don't help students to focus on achieving their goal at hand. The annotations might help students to closely read a text, but don't product meaningful notes that students can refer to for other purposes.

My students need to use annotations in two contexts, which I think also resemble the reason-for-annotating text in college:

To annotate a text, identifying items relevant to a given prompt, in preparation for writing a short essay.
To annotate a text, identifying items relevant to their own thesis statement (or possibly requiring them to reevaluate their thesis statement), for a research project.

I tried arguing for a simpler system that addressed these needs, but my suggestion was dropped, because the principal was using a method from a "credible" source, one downloaded from Pinterest. My principal might be swayed if I presented some "standard" method used in academia (i.e. something with a name).

Just as there is formal "Cornell Notes", which was even created by a Cornell professor, is there a named, standard system for annotating in academia?

It's hard to prove a negative, but my experience is that there is no standard system of annotating text.


Advice for a career in healthcare management I have a bachelor's degree in Applied Nutrition and Dietetics and an MBA from a AACSB accredited university. I have about four years of work experience in the field of healthcare management. I have worked in corporate (pharmaceutical) and government (health) sectors. I am interested to further my education to sharpen skills specific to healthcare management. Is it a right career choice to go for a second Master's degree in Healthcare Administration (MHA)? or is it advisable to go for a Ph.D program in healthcare management? What would be the pluses and minuses of getting a second Master's degree (MHA) after MBA in terms of more employ-ability?
Any advice would be appreciated. Thank you!

Just some thoughts and hopefully others will provide more ideas for you. I am answering with the assumption that you're in the US.

First, I don't think a Master in HCM is going to be a good fit. These programs want to prepare workforce for the HCM but you have already done that with real experience under your belt. Unless their syllabus contains a good amount of materials that you absolutely want to learn, or you feel that you're lacking the theoretical base for a PhD, I wouldn't suggest that.

PhD program seems sensible. And I'd also suggest checking out programs such as DrPH (Doctoral in Public Health) degree which usually gears toward applied rather than theoretical. I believe a DrPH selection committee will value you more than a PhD committee does. Regardless, since you want to come back out and work rather than stay in academia, look for a large mix of applied components with perhaps 30-40% research training.

As employment potential... I guess that depends on what you want to be. But generally, if I am to read a resume of an HCM candidate, I'd value experience and knowledge in:

Program monitoring and evaluation
Health economics
Cost effectiveness analysis
Statistics, biostatistics, or econometrics
Qualitative methods
Leadership training and conflict management
Budgeting and management of organization
Grant writing and management

That should open up some doors. Save some credits to specialize (it's better to have a broad research/work interest and a focus one, because funding streams are different in these two levels.) For instance, if you want to work in some large hospital, you may add a couple courses (or summer training or capstone project) in clinical trail management and electronic medical record. If you want to serve more specific group such as undeserved Hispanic population in California, then you can add a couple more components in health equity, community participatory research, and coalition management.

I guess my ultimate confusion is that you have already worked in HCM for 4 years, which means you were/are employed. What prompted you to get more employ-able? What is that extra thing you want? If you want to advance to the management position, then I'd perhaps suggest checking what kind of degrees these people have, and perhaps talk to a couple seniors and mentors in your company.

Regardless, I'd suggest opting for a slower pace and complete your degree while keeping the job. The affordable health care act is going to be an experience and you should keep involved in the field while studying. Apply what you learn back to your office, make your company treasure you (or even invest more in you.) When the degree is done, and if you're not happy enough to stay, then consider leaving.


Use of bolded variables in conference paper I'm currently writing my first conference paper and am trying to determine a variable naming convention. I like the approach used by Di Carlo in Dynamic  Locomotion  in  the  MIT  Cheetah  3  Through  Convex  Model-Predictive  Control:

  [skipped irrelevant convention] Vectors are bold, upright, and lowercase (a,ω),  matrices  are  bold,  upright,  and  uppercase  (A,Ω),and  scalars  are  lowercase  and  italicized  (a,ω).

The conference recommends following the IEEE guidelines outlined here, which does not comment on the topic. I assume it is thus up to me as the author to decide. Is bolding variables frowned upon? Is there a alternative, preferred method?
Thank you!

For textbooks and self-published material, it is very good practice to follow a convention such as that proposed by Di Carlo, which is widely accepted as the general convention in mathematics.

However, it sounds like are talking about a submission to a conference to be collated and published as conference proceedings. This would typically have a review and editing process like submissions to any peer-reviewed journal would.  In this case, especially since they don't stipulate any conventions, it matters less because they will likely edit your notation where applicable so that all the submissions to the conference proceedings are consistent in notation and formatting.


Time out of Academic Environment (Mathematics) Earlier in the year, I applied to some graduate school master's programme in the US and have received a few offers last week.

My goal is to obtain a PhD. Ultimately, I have two options.

Take the graduate school offer. It is a top 15 programme for mathematics and after completing 1~2 years there, reapply for PhD programmes probably in the US or other places.
Try to wait two years when I qualify as a teacher. Work with a local professor to try and reapply again.

Bit of Background:
I spent many years outside of my country during secondary education and also during my undergraduate. After graduation, I had worked as a teacher to try and get my diploma to be a fully-certified teacher. Note, I worked in a country which is not my home country so to speak but I have relatives there and many family connections. This year was supposed to be my contract renewal year and after failing to get into a teacher training programme in the first two years of my teaching job, I had planned on other pathways which was to get back into academia. I had intentions of doing a master's and had made applications before to my home country and UK which is where I did my undergraduate. On those occasions, it didn't work out.

This time round, I applied to a dozen schools in the US with a good score in my subject GRE. As mentioned before, the school that I am considering is a top 15 school.

Personally, I want to take option 1, go to the graduate school programme and reapply for PhD but if I quit my job, I have no back-up options should I not be able to complete my master's or PhD. This is a real concern as I have been out of academic studies for three years and despite trying to do some mathematics when I have the time, there is no denying that I will be rusty.

The second option is to wait for two years. If I fully qualify as a teacher, I can always return back should I have to quit. I personally feel that five years out of academic study is quite long but this is something that some people have suggested. Is returning to academic studies really possible after such a long break?

TLDR: Got into a decent master's programme, want to accept it but worried about back-up options since I have been out of study for so long. Can I wait two more years to consolidate a back-up plan in teaching and try to re-enter?

This seems to me like a situation in which it is better to "go for the gold". Delay doesn't sound like a backup plan, actually. If you've been accepted and it is something that you really want to do, then just do it.

I suspect that it will work out better if you start sooner. If, on the odd chance that it doesn't work out, develop a backup at that point. But being overly cautions now might make it harder to achieve your actual goals.

Take the offer that seems best to you. Make it work. It would place you better for a later doctoral program than delay would and you have no guarantee that you would be able to advance in important areas if you delay.


Can I transfer during the last year of a 5 year Master's program? I'm planning on attending a university that offers a 5 year program that would allow me to receive my Master's degree in history education, however, my mom (who has the first 4 years covered) is completely unwilling to pay for the final one because she wants me to be back home and working. I don't like this for multiple reasons:

The first few years of teaching are extremely time consuming and I would have practically no time to finish my degree.
An employer might be suspicious about transferring colleges during the last year.
This could go over poorly with the university I transfer to, especially because not all credits would transfer, making my time much more difficult. The college doesn't even have a 5 year school, meaning I'd have to apply for grad school, making the process much more difficult.
The college she wants me to attend doesn't offer the same degree I would be working towards, only a similar one.
In the area I live in, it's harder to get a good job with a Bachelor's because you'll typically just be thrown in wherever someone is needed, rather than with a Master's where a choice is given.

Is it plausible for me to transfer during this last year, or should I convince her that I have to stay at the first school? Yearly tuition is about $20,000 so I'd have to figure out how to attain the money if I decided to stay.

(The college she wants me to go to is George Mason University -- if that information is needed.)

In general, most universities in the United States have a residency requirement (total number of credits that must be completed at the school that grants the degree) and/or a limit on the number of credits that can be transferred towards a particular degree.

So while you can in theory transfer at any time, you will not necessarily be able to bring all your credits with you  Similarly, if the new program has different requirements than the previous program, you may end up taking more courses in total (to satisfy these requirements) than you would have had you stayed in one program for the entire duration. (Joint B.S./M.S. programs in particular often have very inflexible timelines that make it difficult to transfer in middle without losing time and credits.)

You will have to check the policies of the school you plan to transfer to for more details, to see what this will mean for your plans. But be warned that the policies that will apply to you are those that are in effect when you first enroll - so even if you have it all figured out when you start your degree at University X, by the time you transfer to University Y, their policies may have changed.

TL;DR; while you may be able to transfer, the later in the program you transfer, the greater the likelihood of "losing" some of your past work and extending your graduation date (i.e. taking more than five years total to finish).


Length of a master's thesis and its literature review? I am pretty confident that I will be getting answers pointing out that this is something too specific and should/will be decided by my university and that a general answer does not exist. But anyway, I just want to have an idea.

I was aiming at 120 pages of my upcoming marketing master's thesis but I thought that I could reduce it to 100 (pure text speaking of course as I am pretty sure that with references and appendices, it will be +120 though). So what is the average length of a master's thesis? Business and marketing field. As for what I've found online, the general consensus seems to be between 60 and 120 pages.

As for its literature review length, again, the general consensus seems to be between 20% and 40% of the overall thesis length, any personal experience with that? I was aiming at 50% but after doing some research, I am decreasing it to somewhere between 20% and 30%. However my instructor demanded it to be between 30% and 40%.

Thoughts?

I found 5 theses related to my master's thesis topic on the Open Access Theses and Dissertations website. All of them were 120 pgs - 150 pages, although this was for engineering. The literature review was (appx) 30% of each thesis. My suggestion is to check the OATD website, find theses in your field and closely related to your topic to get a pretty general idea of the length and breadth of literature review.


How to format a teaching statement? I have already written a teaching statement for a faculty position as assistant professor.

I have three questions:

What is the right tense of teaching statement? (present tense or future)
Must I sign the statement of teaching like "best regards" etc? How should I put my name in statement of teaching? I mean is there any template for that?
In the last paragraph I put some words on the position that I am applying for, about the university and etc, is that Okay to keep this paragraph?

In writing research and teaching statements, I generally use past tense for activities that have been completed, and present tense for ongoing activities—the same way you would in standard "ordinary writing."

Statements such as these do not need to be signed, as they are not letters. (Your cover letter for the whole application is a reinforcement of this.)

As for talking about the position, it certainly seems like a good idea to me to talk about how your experience and teaching philosophy fits the specific position in the application, doesn't it?


If I delay my graduation for one semester and get accepted to a Phd program, can the submission be delayed? I'm in my third year, and I was originally planning to graduate end of my 5th year, but now I changed my plans, I'm going to graduate at the end of my 4th year.However, there is a pair of courses called Turkish I and Turkish II that every students needs to take in Turkey in any university, and I didn't take the first one the fall semester. Now, the next fall semester, I'm going to study abroad for one semester with Erasmus (hopefully).

If I apply for a Phd program next year, and get accepted, at the end of my fourth year, practically I'm a graduated, expect officially I still need to take Turkish I course, which I'm hoping that I can take it in the summer term at the end of my 4th year (or maybe the fall semester of my 5th year). In such a case, is it possible for my submission to be delayed for one semester ? What are my options in this case ?

If you are not officially graduated from a degree which is required for beginning a doctoral degree, you can ask your new graduate program if you can defer your start, explaining your situation.

In some cases, they will simply say no - some departments have a standing policy that they do not defer unless there is a medical emergency, and otherwise you are just welcomed to re-apply the following admission period (some departments do that only once a year, but some allow rolling admissions or once every semester).

On the other hand, in many cases they will allow you to defer and start the PhD at a later date. The main issue here is that some departments have strong policies in favor official cohorts - sets of students who enter all together in the same semester. Other departments have strong policies that you can only start a doctorate in a given semester each year, so you'd have to wait 1 full year to start (so if you planned to start fall of 2020, you'd have to wait until fall of 2021, etc.).

These should always be used as a last resort, because departments are generally free to change their policy and often decide on a case by case basis, and that sounds like an unpleasant amount of stress to volunteer to have to deal with (if you can avoid it). If you are still in the position that you have a choice of whether or not you need to be in this position, it is better to contact them in advance to see what kind of option you might have - or, if possible, just don't be in that position in the first place. If you only need one course, check with your University what option there may be to get credit for an equivalent course taken elsewhere, or take an online equivalent, or take a class in a summer/interim period (if your University has such a thing).

So you have a number of options, and be sure to investigate the most conventional ones (being able to graduate on time) while checking on the others as a fall-back plan, just in case.


Big switch of field (from synthetic biology to cosmology) of research from PhD to postdoc? I am pursuing a PhD in synthetic biology in the EU. I will finish my PhD in approximately 11 months.

I feel my PhD has been mediocre. I should end up with:

3 first name research articles (two on a ≈3 IF journals, one on a ≈9)
1 middle name research article (≈9 IF) and 1 review (≈3 IF)
couple of courses I taught and, hopefully
Chapter for a book from Springer.

I am tired with my field. I want to continue in academia, but not doing wet lab research. I have become interested in cosmology after reading some books on cosmology.

Should change fields because of my changing interests?
Would I ruin my career? I also would like to remain within the EU, but I can also move to the US.

Does anybody know of specific fellowships for such extreme cases? I was looking into the Human Frontier Science Program but they would still require me to work into something related to the life sciences.

I think it's going to depend a lot on the specifics of the field that you are switching to.  You're actually doing a bit of a surprising direction of shift---I've known a number of people who made radical shifts in the opposite direction, from highly unrelated fields into synthetic biology, which works pretty well because it's a young and rapidly expanding field, both inside and outside of academia.  Cosmology, on the other hand, is much older, not particularly growing (to the best of my knowledge), and without a large non-academia research sector, so it may be significantly harder to transfer into that field.

That said, if you're going to transfer, postdoc is the right time for "retraining."  The key question is to look at the skills you have, and try to figure out how they can be remapped into something "close enough" that it will give you a chance to shift.  You might want to consider looking at ESA or NASA, who have both cosmology and biology and where they may be close enough to help move from one to the other.  If you do the shift, you should also expect a fairly long period of postdoc, probably multiple postdocs, while you retrain and build credibility for your new field.

Finally, speaking as a synthetic biologist, I might urge you to consider that your view of the field may currently be quite limited.  Synthetic biology is an extremely wild frontier with a lot of things you might be interested in.  Are you sure you are tired of the field and the wetlab, or are you just tired of your particular lab and how it uses its wetlab people?  There is a wide variety of labs and cultures out there, along with a lot of non-lab companies with good positions for people with prior lab experience. Unfortunately some academic labs have rather toxic cultures and treat their graduate students like underpaid lab techs, rather than investigators in training: if this has been your experience and what's driving you out of the field, consider that it may be much better elsewhere.


Is it unwise to start a Ms/PhD program without a stipend - will it upset professors if I leave with a masters to apply to funded programs? I was recently notified that I was accepted to a Ms/PhD program with a full tuition scholarship but I am waitlisted for receiving a Stipend. I don't currently have the best credentials so I don't think the prospect of me getting into a better program is too good.

Would it be unwise for me to start this program? For now my plan is to attend until I get an MS and then at that point apply to a better program if I still don't have a stipend. I figure a tuition free MS is better than the usual.

By "unwise" I meant, will it potentially upset professors if I leave after two years with the masters to apply elsewhere to potentially funded programs (if I still don't have a stipend at that point). I don't want to ruin my reputation in the process.

I think that you are more asking, whether it is common to start graduate school without funding. Generally at the MS level, it is not uncommon for MS students to be unfunded. All depends on the school. Most schools that I've encountered would much rather fund PhD students since you get more out of the students.

Now at the PhD level - I would not advise a PhD without funding. Trying to live 4-6 years without a salary is difficult, and most people I've seen try this failed. There are enough schools out there that you should be able to get funding somewhere (unless you really have bad scores/grades and shouldn't be in graduate school).


Letter of recommendation from professors without prior contact I am a postdoctoral researcher at a German university and aim to apply for a visiting lecturer program to be a visiting professor at a foreign university. For this, I am required to provide two reference letters from two professors working at German universities but not at my university. As most of my collaborators are either from my university or from international institutions, the options are pretty limited for me.
Isn't it silly to request such a letter from a professor without prior direct contact? If yes, how am I supposed to fulfil this condition?

Yes, it is silly. Boneheaded, actually. I assume that they don't want many applicants and I wouldn't put a lot of hopes on this position.
But you might ask some of your current colleagues for advice. It might be that your work has been shared with other German scholars who might be able to provide a (mild) recommendation based on your published work.
You could also ask for an exception, explaining your situation. Some other arrangement might be made to happen if you, otherwise, seem like a good candidate.
Good luck and keep looking.


Accepting an Assistant Professor position at a low ranked university I recently completed a postdoc at a prestigious R1 university, in a high profile lab. My publication record is not prolific, but those that I have published as first author are well respected journals, and a handful of middle author publications in top journals as well. I have a consistent teaching record throughout my graduate and postdoc training as well.

I applied to faculty positions at ~30 schools over the past two years, including several that I was not very excited about, but were in my target location and had open positions, so I applied. In total, I've had two on campus interviews and have been offered a faculty position at a low ranking liberal arts university (awards Master's but not PhDs) that seems like somewhat of a good fit for me personally in terms of the teaching I would do and the research interests of the other faculty, but lacks the prestige and resources of larger/more research intensive schools.

Would it be wise to take this position in the hopes that several years of faculty experience will allow me to jump to a different college/university that is a better fit for my professional goals (i.e., more research, higher caliber students, more resources for faculty)? Does this happen often, where someone takes a "starter" appointment and moves to a more fitting situation when it arises, somewhat like a Visiting Assistant Professor position?

The chances of successfully "moving on to bigger and better things" depend on one's discipline, and also what topic one studies within that discipline. Some topics look much more attractive than others to departments/faculties seeking to boost their standing; note that this is, erm, less than perfectly correlated with the actual depth/worth of those topics.

  Would it be wise to take this position in the hopes that several years of faculty experience will allow me to jump to a different college/university that is a better fit for my professional goals (i.e., more research, higher caliber students, more resources for faculty)?

This strikes me as risky, if you feel those professional goals are essential to your job satisfaction within the next 4–7 years. It's also the case, at least in my discipline, that people hiring in smaller places are not keen on applicants who give the impression — rightly or wrongly — that they are using such places as stepping stones.

Moreover, it may not be as easy for you to move on to "better things" as you might hope; you'll be up against younger people applying for similar jobs, and your rate of publication — if that is important in your discipline — will almost certainly be lower than those people, especially if you start work somewhere that has fewer resources than the place you did your PhD.

  Does this happen often, where someone takes a "starter" appointment and moves to a more fitting situation when it arises, somewhat like a Visiting Assistant Professor position?

I'm afraid I don't have anything more than anecdotes and a very partial sample based on my own discipline.

My own experience, which may differ from yours, is that permanent positions in my sub-discipline were hard to come by in my home country. Consequently, I ended up taking a job in North America which, although not in a liberal arts college, was not too far from the situation you describe as

  somewhat of a good fit for me personally in terms of the teaching I would do and the research interests of the other faculty, but lacks the prestige and resources of larger/more research intensive schools.

At the time I did not do so with the intention of moving on, but it was always a possibility I kept in mind, and subsequently I did indeed quit that job to take up a new one elsewhere, which unexpectedly arose. So I guess you could view this story as some evidence to support your initial idea — start somewhere and then move on — but I'd also counsel caution.


Time to read student evals again (shudder) Why do the negative ones hurt so much more than the positive ones feel good?  Should I even read them this time?  If so, please give me the courage.

Because, as every other desirable thing, Joy is a concave function:


how long does a company normally take to respond to the question asked for dissertation? Because of the late decision to change my dissertation topic , I have a month to finish my dissertation.
For my research I have to contact some company(construction company, domestic and foreign )and wanted to know the time they normally take to reply so I can plan out the structure for my dissertation.

The time seems extremely short to me. Unless they know of the urgency and agree to expedite you could wind up without the data you need. A normal request could take a while as the person you contact needs, perhaps, to gather information from those who may be busy or unavailable.

They may be willing to work faster if prodded, but it might be better coming from your professor, if that is appropriate. A note that the information is needed asap to allow the completion of research might help if worded correctly. Unfortunately, people have their own priorities.

The more extensive the information, the longer it takes to pull it together, of course.

It sounds as if visiting the person you contacted, face to face, isn't an option here. But you may be able to use voice communication with your correspondents to get the data if it isn't too extensive. In that case, make appointments for calls.

I suggest that you don't wait for the information to come in before you start. There might be a lot you can do and only plug in the results in to a framework already in place in case the information is delayed. The structure of the dissertation shouldn't depend too much on the actual data, though the conclusions might.


How can I know if there is any journal interested in my proposed topic? After doing research for a while, I figured out a topic (1) that nobody has done it before (2) and I think It's pretty cool and valuable (3) to the community in my field. So, I proposed the idea to my professor with some drafts. But, my professor told me to find out if there is any interest in the topic in the publishing industry (journals) If no one cares about that It's not worth it.

It's like I created a paradox. How can I find out the interests in the topic if nobody has done it before?

If you guys have any ideas or tips that can help me I would be really appreciated!

Thanks

(1) I'm working on Fault Management Framework for Network Function Virtualization.

(2) I cannot find any relevant paper that employs it. They're mostly about Fault Management for SDN or cloud or on a specific problem whereas I want to design a complete solution.

(3) I think it is valuable because It will save time for the deployer/implementor by including all the best practices.

There'are several reasons why this question is different than the one at How to select a journal for publishing? because of:

It's not about selecting a journal to publish, It's about whether the journals are interested in my topic. I've already known which ones I want to publish to. It's just that I'm not sure if they're interested in my idea.
The question in which mine was marked as duplicated with is much broader than mine I think.

You should

Make a list of journals that might be relevant to your research.
Look at the scope of each of these journals.
Decide the extent to which your result can fall within the scope of these journals.
Tailor the story of your paper to the journal whose scope best fits your result.


Does equipment purchased with grants stay with the PI? Similar to this question What happens to equipment purchased using a startup package after an academic leaves the university? , I was wondering what happens if the items are not part of a startup package, but instead from grants received.  Is there a universal rule or does this change between universities/countries?

I would like to know about all funding, but if it varies, let's say specifically an industry funded project.

I am not sure if this is relevant, but when receiving grants, I have been told if I were to leave the department, I would be able to transfer the grant to my new location (given the funder agrees).  This was, however, with the grant money itself, and nothing stated about after its completion.

The fate of equipment purchased with research funds generally follows one of three trajectories:

Small common equipment below a certain threshold of cost is typically categorized as something like "office/lab supplies" and is effectively treated as part of the overhead costs of doing research.  Different organizations have different ways of categorizing and budgeting such equipment, but it generally includes things like laptops, pipettes, staplers, etc.  These items will be owned by the research organization, but below some threshold they are ignored and treated as being owned by individual researchers (they care about your pipette, but nobody's going to track your pencils).
Specialized and/or costly equipment typically belongs to the funder of the project, unless specified otherwise as part of the contract.  For example, the US government almost always retains ownership of equipment purchased using research contract funds.  After a research contract ends, one of two things happens with such equipment:

A. The equipment remains in the hands of the organization, either rolled over into use by another contract or simply ignored and abandoned by the funder.  In my experience, this is by far the most common outcome with research equipment, since it is generally useless to others and/or difficult to transfer, and the funder is often not interested in holding it in inventory.

B. The funder requests that the equipment be shipped back to it.  This is most likely to happen when the funder is concerned about alternate uses that the equipment might be put to (e.g., supporting an industrial competitor) or is planning to give it to another organization.

One of the common frustrations is that it's often difficult to tell whether you're dealing with 2A or 2B, especially when dealing with the government, which may take years to get around to requesting something back.  In the meantime, the organization still needs to track and maintain custody as though expecting the funder to want the equipment back.

Now, in all cases, the PI does not own the equipment, but if it is worthwhile to transfer a piece of funder-owned equipment to a new organization, the funder may be quite willing to do so, just as they may be willing to transfer funds to follow the PI.


How to denote the contribution of a co-author who did not do any experiments or analyses? We are resubmitting a paper. One co-author was part of the project from the beginning, assisted in all group discussions, gave intellectual feedback, but did not do any experiments/analyses. He also wrote a small part of the discussion. What should I write regarding his/her contributions in the respective section?

This does not sound like a special case at all, but rather like a typical contribution of a supervisor.
When describing such a co-author’s contributions, I would let myself be inspired by other similar descriptions for supervisors.
The definite answer may depend on the particular style of this section and details of the contribution, but one suggestion would be:

  X designed the study, supervised the research, and wrote the manuscript.


Is there any API service to retrieve abstract of a journal article? There are some API services to give title, citation and authors of an article by its DOI. I wonder if there is a service to provide abstract of a journal article by providing its DOI.

For the MEDLINE database, with the E-utilities you can:

Use the esearch function to retrieve the PubMed ID (PMID) of the article that includes the DOI as a term (presumably only one article):

http://eutils.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/eutils/esearch.fcgi?db=pubmed&WebEnv=1&usehistory=y&term=10.1021/bi902153g
Then, use efetch function to retrieve the abstract among other bibliographic attributes of the article (you need to pass the query_key and WebEnv returned earlier by esearch).

http://eutils.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/eutils/efetch.fcgi?db=pubmed&retmode=XML&rettype=abstract&query_key=1&WebEnv=something

If you have the PMID, it is one step with efetch:

http://eutils.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/eutils/efetch.fcgi?db=pubmed&id=17284678&retmode=XML&rettype=abstract


If a reviewer makes significant contributions to improving a paper, may he/she suggest becoming a coauthor? I was asked by the editor of a mathematical journal to review a submission by an author (unknown to me) which heavily relies upon some of my earlier work. I do not have much experience with writing peer reviews, but I have a good grasp of the topic of the submission.

The new results in the submission build heavily on earlier results in my published work; they are interesting and, in my opinion, worth publishing. However, while reading the mathematical proofs, I couldn't shake the feeling that they were overly complicated. Indeed, after thinking about it some more, I found that the proofs can be dramatically shortened by using insights that the author may not have had. For instance, one proof would go from roughly three pages to around half a page. For another proof, it seems that it can be reduced to a more standard situation, again drastically shortening it.

My work-in-progress report on the paper now 1) sketches the shortened proof for the first situation, 2) describes the needed insight to reduce the proof in the second situation to the more standard situation. At this point, the suggested changes seem to amount to a significant contribution to the paper since they touch not just minor parts of the paper, but the bulk of it.

At this point, I wonder what the best way to proceed is. Should I just submit the report with these suggestions? Or may it be appropriate in this situation to suggest to the editor that, if the original author is interested, he may contact me so that we can co-author a revised paper together? Or would that be considered unethical?

I do not want to overstep my bounds as a reviewer, but on the other hand I don't know how common it is for reviewers to contribute significant improvements to a paper anonymously.

At this point, I wonder what the best way to proceed is. Should I just submit the report with these suggestions?

This is indeed the high road to take here. As a reviewer, you explain your ideas on how the paper can be improved. The authors will or will not take all or some of them into account.

Asking for co-authorship in return for your service would likely be perceived as very cocky and unprofessional. I doubt that either the editor or the authors would be pleased about this or seriously consider taking you up for your offer.


Non-citation of basic knowledge We all know how important proper attribution of ideas is. At the same time, certain things have become basic enough that citing the paper where they were first discussed is overkill: to give an extreme example, if you need to do some differentiation in your math/physics paper, you don't need to go and cite Newton and Leibniz. Now, on occasion students ask me how one can determine if a piece of knowledge is common enough that they can forgo a citation. The rule of thumb I give them is:

  If it is something that is explained in a standard first-year undergrad textbook, then anybody who is going to read your papers knows about it and you don't need to provide a citation.

[Here I want to emphasize that I give this to them as a rule of thumb, and I always tell them to ignore it and provide the relevant citation if they think it is necessary to do so in a specific case]

Are there better or alternative ways of drawing the line?

I find Latour and Woolgar's spectrum of "facticity" a useful tool for thinking about these questions (a nice summary can be found at this link).  It breaks scientific statements into five rough categories by level of certainty in the assertion:

Speculations - don't have to be backed by anything
Descriptions - not established, so need to be directly backed by evidence
Tentatively established - need to be backed by citations
Well accepted - should be stated, but don't need evidence or citations
Tacit - should not even be stated

Where exactly a fact lies on this spectrum depends on the community and state in discussion.  In general, the broader the audience, the less well accepted facts should be assumed to be.  I think the notion "Should everybody reading this have been taught in a class?" is a good one, though undergraduate is not necessarily the stopping point.  For a machine learning audience, for example, you should assume everybody has had graduate level machine learning courses, while for a biology audience you should not assume they have even had undergraduate computer science.