Graduating a year early? I'm considering graduating a year early and I'm having a bit of a hard time making the decision. I'm going to be as specific as possible so that I can get the best advice possible, so sorry if this becomes a bit lengthy.

I'm going into my third year as an undergraduate, majoring in mathematics. Here is a list of courses I have taken:

Calculus III, Intro to Linear Algebra, Differential Equations, Modern Algebra I, Advanced Linear Algebra, Modern Algebra II, Discrete Math, General Topology, Real Analysis I, Real Analysis II, Algebraic Topology, Complex Variables, Abstract Algebra I (a graduate course in Group Theory).

I am currently participating in an REU, and I am attending Math in Moscow in the Fall, where I will (most likely) be taking Algebraic Number Theory, Commutative & Homological Algebra, Riemann Surfaces, and possibly one other course.

I've done a fair bit of reading outside my courses as well: Group Representation Theory, some classical Algebraic Geometry (Fulton's Algebraic Curves, so I haven't been exposed to schemes yet), and Category Theory just to name a few.

Here are the upsides I see to graduating early:

opportunity to take more advanced coursework earlier (my university doesn't have an overly active graduate department, and it's likely that most of my learning would come from independent reading courses if I were to stay)
being in an environment with stronger students will probably force me to develop better as a student

and here are upsides I see to taking a fourth year:

more time to figure out what subject I want to pursue research in
opportunity to have more coursework under my belt before I apply
it might be difficult to apply from Moscow, so I wouldn't have to worry about that

I'd like to hear other people's opinions. I've of course asked my professors first. One is adamant that I should graduate early, he's actually the one who suggested it to me. Another says he thinks I'll be fine either way, it's just a matter of if I want that extra year to prepare.

So according to them, I should be okay. But I can't get the idea out of my mind that I might not get into as good of a graduate program if I graduate early, so I wanted to hear other opinions. Am I just being paranoid?

You are obviously in a good position either way, but as you suggested, graduating early appears to be your "practical" decision.

If you are considering a doctorate or masters (it sounds as though you are), graduating will allow you to get a head start on it.

However, if you you truly don't know what what graduate degree to pick, and don't decide to go with that, consider doing an independent study with a favored professor or doing some tutoring at your local university, as it would not only contribute to your resume when applying for a masters program, but also give you opportunities to dabble in subjects you find interesting, and ultimately help you decide which field you'd like to master in.


How to label figures in response letter, so as to distinguish between figures in the letter and figures in the manuscript? I am looking for the correct way to write the caption name of figures in the response letter for a submission to an Elsevier journal. In the manuscript, the name is

Fig. 1. This is caption

I need add some figures in the response letter as well as revised manuscript. The figure number of these files will be different. So, if I refer to "Fig. 1" in the letter, the reviewer will not know which one I am referring to, the Fig. 1 in the manuscript or the Fig. 1 in the letter.
I am not sure about using

Fig. L-1. This is caption
Fig. L. 1. This is caption

to label figures in the response letter, or any solution...

I am going to take a contrary opinion to what has been suggested so far, and strongly suggest that you do not put figures in your response letter.

My reasoning is this: as a reviewer and an editor, I often see an author put material into the response letter that would be better put into the manuscript.  If you need to explain something clearly and carefully to a reviewer, you probably need to explain it clearly and carefully to your readers as well.  That goes not just for text, but for figures and tables and references also.  Rather that writing it twice (and typically ending up with significant differences between your two instances, since they're in different contexts), write it once in the manuscript and just refer to it there from the response letter.

In short: if you think it's important enough to put in the response letter, it's important enough to simply put into the manuscript.


Former PI lists a non-contributor as first author on a manuscript for which I did all the work. Next steps? I finished my master's degree several years ago, where I was responsible for developing/programming algorithms for a biochemistry lab. I have since successfully transitioned into industry and have been working ever since. I also have a very good relationship with my former PI.
Some time ago, my former PI contacted me and I did some work for him, pro-bono, and he was interested in publishing the results. I personally had no interest in the actual publication, but I did this work more so because it allowed me to explore an area of mathematics in which I had limited experience.
Lo and behold, I receive the manuscript for edits, and a student completely unrelated to this work was listed as the first author!
Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't care. Academia was only a stepping stone in my life and a publication doesn't benefit me in any way. However, something feels "wrong" about just listing someone who has not contributed to this work in any way as the first author. I would like to be listed as the first author. At the same time, I want to keep a good relationship with my former PI. What are my next steps? How do I go about this?
Edit: Based on the feedback so far, I think the next best step would be to follow up with the PI and determine what the student's contribution was. Perhaps the student did indeed use the results I obtained to actually write the manuscript, in which case I would have no problem letting the student take first authorship. Again, as of right now, I only see work that my former PI has done, so I want to clarify.
Edit 2: I think there is some confusion about how many authors there are in this paper. There is me, who wrote the algorithm and there is my PI, who wrote the paper based on my results. Would I deserve first authorship if this a multi-author publication? Absolutely not. But by default, since myself and my PI are the only persons who have worked on this, either one of us can take first author role.
I received an update from the PI. The student was placed on the paper because the student was "supposed to contribute" but they did not want to learn how to use git (which is how I initially decided to version any manuscripts I worked on). The PI has made a promise to make sure the student takes the lead in terms of writing the paper and learning how to use git.

Before you get upset, I think it would be important to learn more about the actual circumstances of the publication.  I say this because, based on your description of the situation in your post you haven't been acting like a first author.
You may indeed have done all of the initial work on which the manuscript was based, but based on what you have written, you don't seem to have been particularly involved in interpreting the results or writing them up (beyond the methods section).
The first author of a paper, in typical usage for the field, should be involved in every stage of the project and the production of the manuscript. From what you have written, it appears that you haven't been, and so you may not even be properly aware of what the other student may or may not have done for the project. Maybe your speculation is correct; maybe it is not. Ultimately, however, authorship order isn't really your call, because you have chosen not to lead work on the paper.
If you want to be first author on a paper, you need to involve yourself more deeply with the project, including the actual scientific interpretation of the results.
Now, if you are concerned that your former PI may be acting unethically, you can ask for a description of the work that the other student has done. Do this from a perspective of curiosity and surprise, rather than accusation.  Once their work has been described, if you disagree with your former PI's judgement, then voice your concerns. If your PI doesn't make a change after that, you can withdraw yourself from the paper --- you should not lend your name to something that you consider unethical.  But based on what you described, it's not really your paper, and in the end your choice is primarily about whether or not to be associated with it.


From the PhD thesis to a journal I'm on the task of transforming sections of my PhD thesis (field: Economics) as journal articles. I would like to know which are the key differences between these two formats, so I can optimise the task. I can think of three essential aspects to have in mind:

explain less. A thesis is supposed to be for a much wider audience, whereas journal articles are normally read only by those in that particular subfield.
assume more. Kind of the same thing, but important, for example, when citing papers. You can assume people is aware of them.
repeat less. Theses are long(ish), whereas articles are short(ish). In theses one reminds the reader of things in previous sections. For example, repeat an important equation listed twenty equations ago.

To me these are vital, but I could be wrong, and maybe you have more experience on this. Even if from other fields, I would very much appreciate your wisdom on this.

PS: I found this partly related question but to me answers seem highly unsatisfactory, as they focus more on processes than in actual content.

In some fields it is possible to publish long papers, in which case something very like your dissertation might be acceptable.

However, you seem to suggest you want to divide out parts of it for separate publication. This can be a good idea, of course.

The best advice I can give is that each paper should be complete without being pedantic. You still need to cite everything, but those things that are generally known to professionals/academics needn't be explained in a paper as they might have been in a thesis.

Can a working professional be expected to understand your paper without spending too much time chasing references? If the answer is yes, you are probably pretty close to the mark.


Does papers under review/revision has any value for faculty application in mathematics? Does papers under review/revision has any value for faculty application in mathematics ? In detail, when reviewing faculty application does the committee checks the content of the papers or just checks the journals where it is published ?

Yes. It's an anecdote but I got a permanent position pretty much because I had a paper under revision at a very top journal. It still doesn't count as much as a published paper, though.

One thing you can do is ask the editor if she/he would be ok with you mentioning it in a job application and whether you can pass on contact details so that the job committee can ask for confirmation. You also have to take the reports into account, moreover; an extremely positive report with some minor modifications asked is not at all of the same value as a lukewarm report with a lot of major modifications asked.


Using the same control pictures/data in two different papers :-)
We would like to ask a question of general interest, as it might be the case in other studies. It is the first time I stumble upon this situation.

In our research, we have used the wild-type of a microbial strain and mutants for about 7 distinct genes. They were all subjected to different treatments and assessed by the same response variables. The seven genes, however, are not strictly related to each other, so that 3 of them as a group make-up one story, and the other 4 make-up a different one (thereby, two distinct manuscripts). The reason why they were all worked together (the wild-type and the mutants for these genes) were simply logistics and efficiency of resources usage.

One of the authors are concerned with the fact that for both papers with different groups of mutants (hence very different stories), the wild-type controls were the same!  Therefore, he is afraid that using the same pictures and data in this case would configure a self-plagiarism issue between the two manuscripts.

Could you please help us on deciding whether this will indeed be an issue, or not?

Thank you very much in advance for your kindness and attention to this matter.

Best regards,
Dr. Leandro.

This is a recurrent issue in biological sciences, and seeking for peer advice is a commendable step. Most colleagues would just move on while trying to conceal the fact that the results of two different manuscripts have a significant overlap.

My general advice is quite simple: focus on the scientific outcome of your research and aim for robustness. Transparency is essential, so that others judge whether they can trust you. Give your readers & peers all they need to follow your steps and rationale.

In short: as long as you explicitly declare the overlap and you unbiasedly trust it cannot affect your conclusions on both papers, I think you should be just fine.

Of course, independent controls and higher numbers of repetitions are always better for more representative results, and there will be always those who will not appreciate your "strategy". You cannot please everyone. Rest assured many of your critics include those who just don't like the concept of transparency.

Can you publish both papers in the same journal? Consider depositing all raw data in the same repository, to be linked to both papers.

Good luck!


How do some researchers have such beautiful figures in publications, while their homepages look simple? Do some PIs who publish in Nature, Cell or Science collaborate with professional designers?

The thing is that I have never seen it mentioned in their work. Is it a service offered by the journals? Or do the PIs pay for these services and outsource them?

There are a few reasons not to waste time with web design:

academic web pages are read mostly by other academics who are looking for information;
the information a professor needs to put on pages is about group members, papers published and talks, courses, books and none of these seems to require sophisticated web design skills;
learning proper web design skills is time taken away from research. Most professors don't have that time. But, it can happen that graduate students or postdocs are capable of making nice web pages, so the professor asks them to do that.

The beautiful figures that appear in journals, are most often the work of postdocs and graduate students. Again, most professors won't spend time making them, unless they can't rely on anyone else. It was quite common back in the day to have someone else from within the university or research institute make figures and typeset, but now, there are plenty of great software packages one can use to make figures.


Is it common / advisable to add my personal web site to my curriculum vitae? Generally one puts more things about itself than s/he puts in his/her CV, and I think a CV should standalone and be a guide for someone who is trying to learn about me, so

  Is it common / advisable to add my personal web site to my curriculum
  vitae ?

If it is a research oriented website, or even the website of your research group (where you are PI), it could be useful and won't do any harm. If it is your anime review website (see comment by @Azor-Ahai) the CV is probably the wrong place for it. That is, unless you apply for an anime related position.


Writing the GPA in the application form, even though the studies have not finished yet In the application form of the master's program that I'm applying for, I'm obligated to write my GPA, and I cannot leave it blank, as the form cannot be submitted in that case. I still have one more semester to complete my Bachelor's degree studies.

What do you suggest to write in the field? Should I simply write my GPA, or should I add any phrases afterwards such as: 4.9 out of 5 (5 semesters)

Write your current GPA, and just say: "Current GPA: N.N" if the field allows you to add text and not just a number.  It is the current truth, and the people who are reading it will understand that it cannot reflect classes that you have not yet taken.


Explaining contribution of book and journal I'm writing a scientific paper and I want to add the contribution of a book in my paper. Generally, we use to write like that way ''authors in this work present [1].....'' but this is the case when we are writing about any other scientific paper. But for the first time I'm using the reference of book, could you kindly elaborate how do I add the book reference that makes my work relevant.

Thanks in advance...

X, Y and Z present ABC [1].

is appropriate regardless of whether [1] is a technical report, published manuscript, thesis, chapter, book, ...


Is time from acceptance to publication purely a matter of space issues? While it is clear to me why time from submission to acceptance can vary a lot (given that this involves that most fickle of creature: the reviewer), it is less clear what determines how long it takes for an accepted paper to be published.

Is this purely a matter of all accepted papers being put in a queue and then the journal selects from the top until they fill out each issue (possible going a bit further down to make the page counts fit)?
Or is it common that papers are "pushed" forward in the queue based on various factors (and if so, which factors)?

If it makes a difference, I am mostly interested in math journals, but I am also curious about possible dependency on the field.

I'd say your second option, various factors impact the progression of an accepted paper.

Commissioning editors might decide that they commission an edited issue with academics deciding on the selection and groupings of articles, and that will disrupt the 'queue' of all accepted articles you mention.

Otherwise, commissioning editors might notice that some recently-accepted articles fit nicely around a specific theme or share a common characteristic that make publishing them together valuable, regardless of the order they were accepted.

Essentially, publishing is a human process, with the advantages and drawbacks that entails. If publication was only down to space, things might be very different.


Can I use an accented Chinese name when publishing a paper in academia? My name is in Chinese. When it is transliterated into the Latin alphabet, a lot of other names come out the same. Despite some journals accepting Chinese character names, most journals don't. In this case, instead of a plain Latin alphabet transliteration, I'm considering adding a diacritic (the tone of the character in Chinese). Is this acceptable? Would it cause any issues? I know about ORCID, but a unique name is still valuable.

e.g., instead of Hong I want to use Hóng.

I always list myself in all my papers as José F. Martínez. Some people are better than others at replicating the accents in citations. Search engines have become much better at matching papers to names with accents even if citations won't include them, so in terms of missing citations (e.g., Google Scholar) I don't think it should be an issue.

My students definitely know how to write the accents :)


Is it advisable to mention the dollar amount for grants on a CV? I'm a soon-to-be post-doc and am currently sending my resumes to people and applying to places. 4 years ago, I applied for a grant and got funding for 3 years for everything — meaning my tuition, pay, research, travel expenses, university overhead and then some more, all of which totals to a large $ amount.

My question is: Is it advisable to put the actual $ amount on the CV (to show I'm capable of getting and handling funds) or would that seem like showing off? I've seen some people (usually folks with more experience) list it, but they're also ones that have won several grants and fundings, so there's stuff to list. In my case, this is the only thing so I'm afraid of it standing out and attracting unwanted attention.

If you're applying for academic jobs in the US, your ability to acquire funding is one component of your viability as an academic. So definitely add in the information about the amount of money. It will stand out (in a good way)


I screwed up the final. What should I do? I'm a master electrical engineering student in a state university and I just took my very last final exam on Wednesday. I totally screwed up. I could not solve any of the problems (4 problems). It has never happened to me before. I thought I studied enough for it but I guess not. I'm looking at like 20 on the final which is 35% of the total grade. I had about 80% before final. What's sad is that I did study for it and I feel crushed that I couldn't do it at all.
I had a 3.5 GPA before this. Since there are only 10 classes in masters, if I fail 1 class would be fatal to the GPA. My main concern is I'm about to graduate and look for a job, but this is going to ruin my GPA. I sent an email to professor yesterday saying:

I know I did very poorly on the exam. I thought I understood the material and would be able to perform similar like the midterm but clearly I was wrong. I spent a lot of time doing homework and study but I really don't have excuse for this kind of performance.
Would you please consider withdrawing me from the class if you are able? I really can not have a D or F. . . . I understand this is my own responsibility and thank you for the semester.

I sent it Friday 9 am. Of course, I haven't heard back from the professor. My question is: should I just wait for the grade to show up on Wednesday next week and see what happens or go talk to the professor?

As Nate Eldredge cautions in his comment above, it's probably up to you, not the instructor to submit a withdrawal request to the registrar.  Usually, the instructor's only involvement is to approve or disapprove your request.  But once you've taken the final and depending on your school's policies, it's probably too late to withdraw anyway.

That said, your life is almost certainly not ruined. If you wrote anything at all, you will likely get some partial credit.  And who knows how your instructor will curve the results.  If you had trouble even after doing your best to prepare, it's quite possible others did as well and that the curve will be much easier than either you or the instructor expected.  Sometimes instructors accidentally write a test that's too hard or has errors that make a problem impossible.  (I taught EE at Washington and now teach CS at Michigan, so think about how I would know this happens! :)

Finally, even if your final grade is low enough that you need to repeat, this is still not fatal.  Students are rarely aware of just how many of their peers have to repeat classes.  And guess what, they still get jobs.  Yes, of course I understand why you're upset.  But you're not dead yet.


Permited peer assistance in PhD and MSc thesis Where I live, it's quite common for MSc students to seek help from "professionals" in this field. What they do varies from simple peer-review-like service and in the worst case they provide a full thesis with tuition i.e. spoon feeding.

It's amazing how many people teachers and teaching assistants are (unofficially) accused of getting this type of degrees. But this accusation in most of the time actually holds due to obvious lack of fundamental comprehension of the topics they are specialized in.

However:

Peer review is quite common and a prerequisite for papers to get published in a respected journal.
It's typical for a professor to have one or more teaching assistant to help him doing some part of the work for example some CS professors delegate the proof of concepts implementation to a teaching assistant.

Besides the two examples above what else is allowed and considered an acceptable academic activity by a peer:

Translation for thesis written in another language to English which is the required thesis language in that university.
Writing a proof of concept off the record i.e. without citing the PoC creator in the thesis officially.
Writing the (Related Work / Literature Review) given the student claims full knowledge of the papers but having no time for writing it.
Does the above changes when it's done as a service i.e. paid, instead free peer assistant?

Note 1: I do have my own view for this but I would like to hear yours. Also I will mention my view later in a answer for this question.

Note 2: I'm concerned with the STEM fields if that makes a difference.

In my opinion, none of your numbered items (1-4) is acceptable. As for the two bullet points above, they must be carefully circumscribed:

You can of course get comments on your manuscript from your peers. This should not include solving your problems for you or writing parts of the work.
Some technical work may be performed by someone else: chemical synthesis of a compound you are using, specialized analysis of some samples etc. Each instance should be clearly specified: in the text, in the legend of the figures obtained this way etc. The reader needs to see clearly the distinction between your effort and that of other parties.

All this is codified in the saying: "Credit where credit is due". However, this principle is applied slightly differently to a thesis and to a journal paper:

A thesis demonstrates the ability of its author, who is assumed to have done all the work contained in it. That is why any external contribution should be indicated.
A paper's main goal is to present a scientific result. It is therefore less crucial to know "who did what", although some journals (e.g. PNAS, PLOS One) do require it.


Responding to different requests to contribute a book chapter I received a request to contribute a book chapter about a month ago, which I turned down. This was from a university in another country, and from someone I have personally met.

Today, my own supervisor asked me to contribute a similar chapter to a book which she has been asked to be an editor of.

Given that the two requests happened in a relatively short time, and the reason I gave for declining the former request might still stand, would there be a problem if I accept the latter request, when I have declined the former?

This is not an ethical issue at all. You are free to contribute to whatever book / project you like. There is no obligation that you can't join a different book project just because you turned somebody else down before.


Using slang in a Scientific Paper We are writing a paper about an algorithm that takes a group of solutions and sorts them by their likelihood of being equal to the one and only 'good solution'.

Internally, we refer to this 'good solution' as meromero, which is a Mexican street slang for 'the most important' or the precisely for 'the one and only'.

I like the word because it allows naming an important concept with a funky and short sound. Also, it forces you to draw your eyes towards it, creating some kind of highlight about the ideas related to this 'one and only good solution'.

However, I'm not sure of using it, precisely because it is a slang word and I don't remember ever reading a paper using slang words.

Therefore, my question is:

Is using a slang word to name a concept bad taste in a scientific paper?

Notice that this is merely a personal curiosity, we have already choosen not to use the word.

Mathematicians frequently come up with questionable names drawn from a variety of questionable sources. And then at some point there will be the inevitable MathOverflow thread about why such-and-such is named what it is. I personally rather like "meromero," but in the context you're describing, I don't see how it's an improvement over saying "unique 'good' solution," where you define what exactly you mean by "good."


Knowing when the code is good enough, for research My question is in a similar vein to this one.

My research requires code. I can write code and I know some things about writing good code. Both for readability, (e.g. standardised doc string, descriptive variable names, comments that describe the intention) and safety (assertions in the code, unit tests, sensible error messages). Adding these things takes me more time than omitting them.

At present I will typically do a bare minimum on my first attempt. So I will put a one line doc string in; use descriptive, but occasionally inconstant, variable names; and few comments. If the code doesn’t work first time I will go back and add unit tests and generally improve it's quality until it is functional.

If at a later stage part of the code needs altering significantly, (perhaps I realise I need it in parallel), then lots of the "polish" will need redoing. This does not make it enticing to polish more earlier on. Occasionally I will chase my tail over a fault that turns out to be originating in an older section of code, that I might have caught if I have been more thorough first time.

The code I write is almost always only used by myself.

Clearly there is a trade-off between doing things by the book and producing results fast. What would you look at to decide if you had found a good balance between these things?

As the

  code I write is almost always only used by myself

you only have yourself to please. So the only sensible answer is to balance things to minimize the frustration to yourself. Don't do things you see as frustratingly slowing you down until you are more frustrated by the problems caused by not doing them.

However, the more strategic question is whether you want to continue writing code that will only be used and seen by yourself. If you want to advance your career through collaboration with peers, or by building a group of researchers to work on and with your codes, then it will be better to do more earlier.

You then know you've found a good balance when the collaborators you want to work with still want to work with you after they've spent some time with your code.


Is it worth it to write a book with my advisor instead of focusing on journal/conference publications? Is it worth it to coauthor a book with my advisor in place of spending time publishing resrarch in journals or conferences?

Would the fact that the book is a much larger piece of work contribute more to my academic reputation? Or not as much because it won't contain as much novel research.

No, you should focus first on publishing journal papers in journals with high impact, these are the "real" things , while a book should be for later. The most important goals on any PhD would be becoming sufficient independently in order to ask questions in the field, see the connections, and publish the "played" results.


Venue name structure for citing papers I have noticed in some citations that the journal or conference name is split up, for example "Neat Stuff, International Conference on" instead of "International Conference on Neat Stuff." For example:

  Ragsdale, Daniel J., et al. "Adaptation techniques for intrusion detection and intrusion response systems." Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, 2000 IEEE International Conference on. Vol. 4. IEEE, 2000.

Is there any reason for writing the reference this way?

There are a virtually unlimited number of conferences whose title is of the form:

  "[Society] [International] [Conference|Workshop|Symposium] on XYZ"

where "International" is optional and the optional "Society" is a big organization like IEEE, ACM, ACS, etc.

Since there's basically no information in the first part, the organizers and attendees of these conferences will tend to refer to them as the informative "XYZ", ignoring the preamble.  Citations often do the same (e.g., just "XYZ" as venue, and sometimes even just the initials), particularly in page-limited publications such as standard IEEE proceedings.

The "XYZ, IEEE International Conference on" form is then a hybrid compromise that some venues use to put the informative bit up front while still keeping the full title.


Is it rude to change universities/supervisors after already indicating research interest with a current supervisor? I am currently an undergraduate student studying in an area of mathematics and am planning to apply to do a masters research degree next year. I have been doing research with my supervisor who works in some topic say X and will be doing more research throughout the remainder of the year with him.

I am still very interested in topic X and consider this a large option for my masters, however, I have greater interests in another topic say Y. There is another university in our country that has a specialist research group in topic Y. I am looking into changing to this alternative university to study topic Y for my masters, however, I have had no conversations about my future research with people at either university.

Would it be considered rude for me to leave my supervisor now, who currently offers me a lot of support during my undergraduate, to pursue research in this other area of mathematics solely because I am more interested in this alternative topic? And what would be the correct way to go about this without burning any bridges with my current supervisor?

If Y is what you really want to do then go for it. There is no point in going down a career path just to please someone else.

Talk in person to your current supervisor once you have a written offer from the university that does Y. Explain to him that it is your dream to do Y and you hope to keep in contact with him even though you are leaving the university.

A good supervisor will understand - if not then he was not a good supervisor anyway. It's a win-win for you.


Arxiving accepted manuscript after publication in Elsevier/IEEE/etc The Elsevier policies state:

  Authors can share their accepted manuscript: by updating a preprint in arXiv or RePEc with the accepted manuscript

I haven’t arxived a preprint; the paper is published already; yet I’d still like to arxive the accepted version – does above sentence imply that I’m only allowed to update an existing Arxiv entry but not create a new one now?

IEEE policies have a similar phrasing:

  Electronic Preprints. Before submitting an article to an IEEE publication, authors frequently post their manuscripts to their own
  web site, their employers site, or to another server that invites
  constructive comment from colleagues.Upon submission of an article to
  IEEE, an author is required to transfer copyright in the article to
  IEEE, and the author must update any previously posted version of the
  article with a prominently displayed IEEE copyright notice. Upon
  publication of an article by the IEEE, the author must replace any
  previously posted electronic versions of the article with either (1)
  the full citation to the IEEE work with a Digital Object Identifier
  (DOI) or link to the article abstract in IEEE Xplore, or (2) the
  accepted version only (not the IEEE-published version), including the
  IEEE copyright notice and full citation, with a link to the final,
  published article in IEEE Xplore.

I do not have a definitive answer, but I have considered the matter and came to the conclusion that you can only update an already arXived preprint, not arXive it fresh after publication. Note that as far as Elsevier is concerned, this is a recent change, which happened when they revised their whole copyright agreement. Thus decade long habits may not apply anymore. Or maybe they do, because if there is one clear thing, it is that Elsevier's policy has been significantly obfuscated.

However, there are some countries (France shall join them soon) where by law, one can post their postprints on a repository after an embargo whatever the copyright agreement says. Many publishers also allow this (but embargoes are several years long for some Elsevier journals, if I remember well).


Should academic experience from other domains be included on a CV? As an undergrad, I was a double-major in neuroscience and music. Now, I'm working on putting together a CV for applications to master's programs in neuroscience. But, my thesis work was done in the music department and unrelated to neuroscience whatsoever. Should I include this on my CV, or would it be seen as irrelevant "padding" of my CV? (I'm not really concerned about shoring up my experience, as I've had several years of directly relevant work experience since I finished my bachelor's degree.)

If your undergraduate program requires a Bachelor's Thesis, graduate school admissions committees might expect to see it on your CV. Completely omitting your thesis in your CV might raise questions.

Your ability to do independent work is also important, even in another field. If your thesis work is not related to your graduate school field, I would mention it but not focus on it. (i.e., include the title and one sentence summarizing what you did). If your Bachelor's Thesis is publicly accessible (and it is a good thesis), citing it in your CV cannot hurt.


I had an internship with the professor I'm applying for. Is it possible to ask for a recommendation letter? I talked to a professor in a top US university and he asked me to apply but he said finally admission committee decides. If I go to his lab for a summer internship, is it OK to ask for a recommendation letter?

The point is that I'm applying for his position so I thought maybe his own recommendation letter works well!

Yes! Definitely! I worked for my eventual PhD supervisor as an undergrad for a semester before I applied to grad school. He wrote me a recommendation letter, and I got in.


Are communicability and verifiability the only reasons to prohibit other true results? In order to publish a research paper in a particular domain, or the domain itself must satisfy the above two requirements: Communicable to and verifiable by other people. Isn't it?

In this context, I got a doubt that the content of research papers are limited by objectivity and results that cannot be either uncommunicable or unverifiable are considered off topic and are never encouraged in the either academic or the scientific community.

Isn't it limiting the scientific development that can reach such truths also?

First you need to remember that science is not the only form of research. Second, subjective results come in all sorts of flavors. If I ask one person person if they like A better than B, that is a subjective result. If I ask 1000 people, and do statistics, is that still a successful subjective result? Someone else could ask a new group of subjects the same question and verify my results.

Now consider an objective measure of a one time event (e.g., the amount of snow that fell during a storm). No one can verify the measurement, but it is still objective.


How to refer to a Research Training Scheme Place for PhD study as an achievement In Australia, students pursuing higher studies (typically a PhD) can complete it on a Research Training Scheme (RTS) place. The RTS is funded by the federal government (see here) but it is up to each university to select candidates who meet eligibility and other requirements. This is a substantial (financial) award that is based on merit and in my view one way of highlighting one's achievements. To the best of my knowledge, some universities have a competitive application process to select which candidate is awarded an RTS place (as the number of students may exceed the number of places available).

Question: How should this award be referred to in a letter or a CV?

One Sentence Description: Recipient of National Research Training Scheme (RTS) Grant for XX University, a program supported by the Australian Commonwealth, authorized by 'The Higher Education Support Act 2003' designed to improve quality of Ph.D. graduates. Received Award for XX years which allowed completion of XX Degree and Dissertation titled "XX".


I am leaving current PhD position to move to X university. Should I inform X university that I am currently a PhD student? I am currently a 2nd semester PhD student at Y university. My MS is from the same Y university and under the same supervisor. In last months of my MS, I told my supervisor that I want to change university after MS. He said that it's okay to look for better PhD positions but we should first finish the project that we have started. (We are working on a project which will be completed in next one or two months)

I was agree with him and decided to stay at Y university. Now, I have an interview call from X university.

My question is, what should I say when they ask me "Why do you want to leave your current PhD position?"

I don't see any reason not to just lay it out as you have here. "I think that the program here would better suit my needs and I think I'll get better research and career advice here."

People understand that other people want to change and move "up" when possible.

But I would also take some care that you fulfill your promise to your current advisor about finishing the research to the maximum level possible. You say it is a short-term commitment, so I think it wouldn't be overly burdensome to continue until it is done or until circumstances make it impossible to continue. In case you have to leave it, try to do what you can to leave it in a stable state in which others can, if necessary carry it on. That way your current advisor is more likely to remain a supporter in your future.

But your proposal and your actions seem perfectly normal and natural to me.


Switching Fields in Grad School Is it Possible to switch to Theoretical Physics from Chemical Engineering ? If so,  how can i do it ?

You will need to speak to the different departments on this. You may lose credit for the classes you have already taken in Chem. Engineering since the two fields are different. It is not "impossible", however, these two department might have different requirements for admissions, so you may not be admitted to the Theoretical Physics program. Again, best to speak to your adviser and the departments.


International master programm in Physic at university of Rostock I am a physic student from Jordan, few days ago i got an admission to do my master in physics at university of Rostock, Germany.

Am I able to get a PhD position from other university when I finish my master study, i.e., will other German universities recognize my Master degree from Rostock university?

A master's degree from a German Universität (University) or Technische Hochschule (Institute of Technology) is directly recognized by other universities in Germany (and usually by most other universities around the world). The same cannot be said for a Fachhochschule (FH). Rostock is officially a university, so that shouldn't be a major concern.


What to do about a Master's thesis where most of the introduction is a literal translation of my own work? I have just discovered the introduction of an Engineering Master's thesis defended some months ago in my ancient university has been made mostly by "cut & paste" (and literally translate from English to Spanish) part of a book chapter I wrote some time ago. About 80-90% of 10 pages have been copied verbatim from my work.

It is true the author of this thesis cites my work when he copies text without any reference in the original. But since he fails to include such sentences (or any other copied and translated text) as quotes, it seems as if he originally wrote those sentences. The order of the sentences has been somewhat modified, but there is no paraphrasing.

I understand this constitutes plagiarism and I would like to do something about it. I do not intend to undertake legal action or to report this to the university (I do not think it has any normative on the subject, anyway). So, what could I do? Writing the author and explaining him the seriousness of what he did and why? Warning the advisors (whom I know well) about it? Your suggestions will be much appreciated.

About 80-90% of 10 pages have been copied verbatim from my work.

80 TO 90%?!
This is a significant amount of content. Even translated, I feel like it demonstrates purposeful intent to plagiarize (akin to using Word's auto-summarize feature to summarize an article), rather than paraphrasing an amount of text to show a point. Translating word for word, as per my APA link above, with proper citation, for a single point is one thing, but when the bulk of the introduction is someone else's work, this seems to me as academic misconduct rather than poor use of citations. I mean... EIGHT TO NINE PAGES. It is literally 8 pages worth of your work, translated, as his introduction. It might as well be YOUR introduction, given how much you've put in, and someone else translated it.
Translated books are still accredited to their original author, with a translator tagged. The way this sounds cited, he's basically taking credit for what you've written, citing you as the person who provided information for the idea, as opposed to the person who actually wrote it and facilitated by his translation.
Unless he's cited and mentioned that it's a direct quote translated after every sentence, this seems like willful plagiarism.
I would recommend you talk to the advisers about this issue now that you've demonstrated the scope of the issue. While you may not have a significant vested interest in the outcome of the situation, the advisers definitely will, and they will likely know how to handle the situation. Also, confronting the student in question is not a good idea. The university awards the degree to the student (and the degree's worth is determined by the integrity of how it is awarded), so it is probably in the best interest of the university as well to determine the action resulting from something like this.


Advice for a PhD... who is aiming for industry In recent years there has been much talk of difficulties in the academic job market, and of many PhDs transitioning out of academia into the private sector. From what I've observed, it seems that those PhDs that did get private jobs experienced pay and hours much better than what they would have gotten as academic post-docs. Of course, academic freedom, and opportunity to publish or teach are often not as good, but those are somewhat subjective factors.

However most PhD programs aren't really suited to this sort of thing. They are designed (sometimes explicitly) for producing future professors. There is emphasis on teaching, academic research (ie. stuff that you can publish and bring in the cites), writing grants (to agencies like the NSF), and all sorts of academic-y things. These skills don't really seem like they would sound very attractive to a private sector employer, who I assume have, contrary to academia, some regard for making money and less for things I've listed.

Of course there are two main things the PhD has that a company concerned with profit rather than publications would want:

Specialized domain knowledge
General reasoning and analytical skills

Everything else you could get from non-PhDs cheaper. These, luckily, are things that PhD is designed to teach anyhow. However, there are often many soft skills I see in job ads, which seem relevant, like:

Computer skills
Proficiency with programming languages
Experience with frameworks and libraries of commercial use (.NET, phone apps, web administration, ecommerce)
"Works well with others"
"Good communicator"
"Can assume leadership role"
"Can supervise team of junior workers on project"

These are things that, if you want to learn while doing a PhD, sometimes you need to go out of your way to do so. And even if you acquire a skill, how do you convince the employer that you actually have it, as opposed to just saying you do?

So suppose you were a PhD student, but your goal upon graduation was not to start at a postdoc and aim for a college professorship, but do get a job in the private sector. This can be an industrial R&D job very similar to your PhD research, or it can be a supervisory role in an area related to your expertise (eg. fish biologist works at fishery), or it can be unrelated except for using the same skills (eg. physicist working in finance). What would you do differently during your PhD from your faculty-bound peers?

Does it make sense to sort of "flavor" your PhD work with things relevant to the private sector, so you can go into your job search having developed these tangential skills more than the average PhD would? Or is it better to just focus on research, and hope that employers will appreciate your academic success, and see your potential if you applied yourself to their business instead?

Someone will inevitably ask for what field, let's say biomedical -> biotech, software development, finance or healthcare. However, I encourage you to answer in a general way, that would apply to many disciplines; I think such an answer would be more useful.

In general, the optimal thing for a PhD student aiming for the private sector is to quit the PhD as soon as he or she can get a relevant job.  There are exceptions if the private sector job involves actual research, and some private sector jobs require the specialized knowledge of an MS or MA degree.

Beyond the basics and the necessary theoretical knowledge, the soft skills and the relevant technical skills are much more easily picked up while working in industry, since you get daily practice in the specifically relevant skills.  In addition, one generally gets paid much better in the private sector than as a PhD student.


How long should your answers be for a postdoc interview? I have a postdoc interview, I found a video that talks about the most common postdoc questions where the person says "the general rule of thumb is that all your answers should start and stop within 30 seconds", he also suggested to summarize your answers to 3-5 sentences. He insisted on this especially for the "tell me about yourself" question, is this really the "general rule of thumb" of postdoc answers? Because I have tried this for the first question and I found myself talking for 1 minute or so.
Edit:
For the sake of clarity, how long should your answer be for the "Tell me about yourself" question? If I am supposed to summarize my answer to 5 sentences, I feel that I will leave out a lot of details !

Try to behave as you always should try to behave: In a socially sensible and sensitive way.
Try to see if people want to ask another question, or whether they are happy with you to continue. Ask whether/offer that you can add more details, state that you will be happy to discuss X further ("I have also worked for a while on X, I will be happy to provide more details if you are interested"), and so on. Maybe make a short break/take a breath, and see if someone jumps with another question they have been waiting to ask since 30 seconds, or if they are waiting for you to continue. Attaching this to times seems silly.
Generally, it is better to err on the side of being a bit too talkative, as long as you watch out for (non-verbal) signals (i.e. people trying to find a point to interrupt, etc.): If you read the signals, you can easily stop.  On the other hand, having people in interviews who wouldn't say a word about themselves and just answer questions with "yes" and "no" is a pain, and also most likely not the profile of someone you want to hire (after all, postdocs should actively collaborate, supervise students, etc.).
Just keep in mind: People have (hopefully) read your CV.  If they say "tell us about yourself", they want to know things beyond what is in the CV, or at least get some hooks where to start asking questions about things which go beyond the CV.


I am applying to a Philosophy Master degree which I have little experience on, what should I do with my CV and cover letter? I did Economics for my Undergrad but I switched to Philosophy for my Taught master degree. I absolutely love Philosophy but I only have a Merit for it, so I didn't think I would be competent enough for a PhD so I have been working in banking for about 1.5 yr instead.

But now I want to apply to another Taught Master degree which focuses on Logic, with the goal of applying to a PhD eventually, since I feel that I need a Master to boost up my knowledge/exposure in Philosophy and Logic before jumping to PhD.

The problem is I have very little I can talk about in my cover letter and CV...

When I look at the others' CV I see a long list of awards, publications...etc. In contrast, I have hardly any exposure to Philosophy from my Undergrad except a course in ethics, and one in intro to logic.

From my Master I have 5 paper assignments + 1 dissertation with no in-depth research to talk about (since my dissertation really just explained two opposing theories in my own words without much original input from my own, I simply did not have enough ideas about Philosophy back then to develop my own ideas).

I have indeed been self-studying logic/discrete maths on my own while I have a 9-6, sometimes 9-7 job. This is perhaps my biggest pros since I think it does take determination, but it seems cheeky to elaborate on it and also difficult to develop as a point. I also haven't been making a good progress on it since I can only do about 1 hr of studying every night...

All in all I don't think my CV would last more than 1 page, so I am desperate for any idea to expand on it. Could anyone please help? Thank you so much!

A taught master's degree are given in programs where the majority of the 'work' that you do is coursework rather than research.

In those cases, the assumption is that you are seeking more background in the field -- which implies that you don't have enough background in the field. I think that you'll find that if you get in, most of your cohort will have similar ... how shall we say it... diverse backgrounds.

I would write your statement just as you did, that you don't have much background but that you are seeking a PhD in the field and see the taught master's as a stepping stone towards that.


How troublesome is it for a professor to replace a document posted on D2L? On many occasions I've had professors that will post assignment instruction documents on "Desire 2 Learn" or D2L, realize they made a mistake on those instructions, and tell us students either in class or via school email that they had made a mistake and what to do about it.

I have never once seen them simply replace the document itself.

I am not here to complain. I have heard that D2L is difficult to handle, and I've seen many professors get confused by it. I am just curious if D2L makes it difficult to replace files that have been posted, or if there might be some other reason why they don't bother updating their documents.

It is not that hard to change a file in D2L.
Click a small sign (looks like v) right side of the file name, choose “ change file”.   That’s it.

I guess your professor worries what if there is a student(s) who already printed the document out and never go back to D2L since he/she has a printout.

Indeed, D2L has an option “notify students” when the instructor change a file in D2L. Just one click is required to sent notifications to students that the file is updated.


Importance of undergraduate institution in grad-school admissions (math) I am a applied math major, and very much want to enter graduate school for applied math.  I spent my freshman year of undergrad at a very highly ranked (top 10 or 15 depending on ranking) university, with an equally good applied math program.  I unfortunately had to transfer out due to financial circumstances, and I am now attending a large state school, although it is research 1 and has an equally ranked (top 10/15) applied math program.

At this new institution I will be able to concurrently get a BS and MS in applied math with a minor in computer science, which is more than I would have been able to achieve at the original institution I was attending.  With that said, I am worried that upon my transfer to a generally lower ranked university I severely damaged my chances of getting into a good graduate school for applied math.

Is it generally the case that graduate school admissions committees will give more attention to applicants applying from better institutions?  The applied math program I am currently in at the state school sends students to grad schools in the ivy league every year (and as mentioned is highly ranked), however I am wondering if it is significantly more difficult to gain acceptance into such grad schools coming from a generally lower ranked school.

I predict that you will be fine. The admission to a grad/doctoral program depends much (much) more on what you do than on the ranking of the institution you attend. Rankings can be deceiving and no one sorts candidates by the rankings of, for example, news magazines.

If you do well and impress people so that you get good letters of recommendation then you will be in contention.

That said, the competition for slots in top programs is very fierce.

The effect of mere college rankings would be small. But the effect of good grades in hard courses with good letters is large.

In particular, an A student from a state school (almost any of them) would be in better shape than a C student from a school in anyone's top five.

Work hard. Take advantage of opportunities. Work closely with a few professors.


Why are there so many awards in academia in the US compared with academia in France? I spent a bit of time in France and in the USA. I observed that there are many more awards given to students and academics in the US than there are in France. Is that observation correct, and if so what accounts for it?

Examples:

Grade awards in the US:

University of Chicago Student Marshal
Dean’s List

Student research awards in the US:

Charles W. and Jennifer C. Johnson Prize
Jin Au Kong Thesis Award
George M. Sprowls PhD thesis award
William A. Martin Memorial Master's Thesis Award

Teaching awards in the US:

MIT Inspirational Teacher Award
Everett Moore Baker Memorial Award
Gordon Y Billard Award
Graduate Student Council Teaching Awards

I have half french kids and I have spent a lot of my life in France and in the Midwest.  The answer is easy - culture.

Americans love recognizing everything.  Participation awards, so many awards that anyone that is pretty good at something will surely get one.  My 4th grader at the time got a ribbon for 4th place in a race and his French grandmother said, "Why?"  She didn't even understand it.

In France if you win something you are really at the top of your game and its a big deal.  They generally don't placate to keeping self-esteem high, even with children.   Things are more regulated, committees generally mean something and there isn't a lot of duplication.  Now I see this slowly changing in France over the years and it becoming more westernized.

Your answer is just, different culture.  England is a bit the same as America except they seem to have accreditation companies and societies that also allow you to "pay" for an award.


Publishing in a SSCI indexed journal for Computer Science Researcher I am working in an interdisciplinary area and most of my area specific journals are available in journal which are indexed by SSCI instead of SCI. But some people told that for computer science resaerchers SCI is preferred one. What should I do ? I have an option where I could publish in SCI journal which have much less IF as comapred to that of available SSCI indexed journals

This strongly depends on each particular country's bureaucracy, and on your planned career path. Unfortunately I don't think there is a single answer, but rather you will need to look at the requirements of the specific grants you will be requesting, specific positions you will be applying for, etc.

For example, I'm in a similar position as you and located in Spain. I need to publish in SCI journals for my promotion and tenure applications, because here if you are at a science department SCI is king and the rest counts practically zero for those purposes. However, when applying for a project grant I have been successful going to a non-CS panel and highlighting my publications in non-CS venues, and when applying for EU funding I have been successful highlighting good conference papers in my subfield (which is really where the most relevant publications are) and not even mentioning SCI. Americans in my field go straight to conferences and not even bother with SCI, Chinese do publish in SCI because it seems to be a requirement there, some offers for positions I have seen in northern Europe just list a mix of SCI journals, non-SCI journals and conferences that are relevant, etc.


Is asking an editor for soft copy of his book acceptable? A colleague of mine has recently edited a book whose subject I find very interesting (I know several of the authors personally as well). Unfortunately, like most things published in academia, the copies available from the publisher are quite expensive (and I would have to pay with my own personal money). Is it OK to message him and ask for a soft copy?

I'm not sure as to what is the usual publishers' practice in that case. Would I decrease my colleague's revenue if I don't buy and thus asking for a copy would be considered rude? Or maybe by the time of publication the editor has usually already received her remuneration?

Asking directly for a free copy, unless you have a close friendship or working relationship with the editor, will sound rude.  (And if you do have such a close friendship, there's a strong chance you purchased a copy, or you may have even been gifted it.)

What I have done is an extension of a model I use for friends who publish music or books.  I never expect to get anything free or at a discount, as supporting their work is important to me, and most of the time each work sold has direct implications on the royalties, etc, that they receive.  So instead, I ask them which way of purchasing (directly from them, digital download from a given store, physical copy from a retailer, etc) gets them the most, that way I can also recommend the same method to friends who may want to purchase it.

In academia, I apply the same model, but there's one (not so) small difference: oftentimes, the author/editor has already received all or virtually all that they will get from the book publication, so they don't care if anyone gets a free copy.  When I ask, even for books I intend to purchase because they are worthwhile to have in my personal physical collection, I have occasionally been offered a digital copy of the book at no cost.

In reality, this isn't too different than with articles — many of us will happily send out a copy of our articles to someone on request because rarely (never) does anyone make money each time an article is paid for.  That and citations.

But, if you go this route, note that you should be fully prepared to actually pay if they offer to personally sell you a copy.  It would be at least as rude to reject such an offer after you've effectively said you wanted a copy and were willing to pay $x, and when offered it less than $x, you backed out for cost.


Co-authorship for grammatical editing Can someone who makes some corrections on paper grammatically be considered as a co-author?

My personal opinion is no, editing at that level is not sufficient.

One can peruse guidelines for your field. Taking Nature as one fairly broad journal, they state:

  Each author is expected to have made substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data; or the creation of new software used in the work; or have drafted the work or substantively revised it

Editing for grammar does not rise to that level for me. And, I can say that over time I have edited a large number of papers for grammar and usage, and never would have asked for authorship. A separate set of eyes looking solely at word usage, spelling, and sentence clarity, while broadly useful, is not at the heart of the work. (Heck, the journal may suggest edits, but would not ask for authorship.)

Such, shall we say, copy editing is quite different from having deep conversations on how to do something and what it really means. While these sorts of interactions can come up, particularly in the early draft stages, they are not about editing, but about analysis and interpretation, not grammar.