What will happen to non open-access publications in the UK after 2014? The UK recently decided that from 2014, all research papers supported by public funds must be published in open-access journals.
For instance, the Research Councils UK announced a new policy stating that:

The new policy, which will apply to all qualifying publications being submitted for publication from 1 April 2013, states that peer reviewed research papers which result from research that is wholly or partially funded by the Research Councils:

must be published in journals which are compliant with Research Council policy on Open Access
must include details of the funding that supported the research, and a statement on how the underlying research materials such as data, samples or models can be accessed.

My question is the following: what could concretely happen if someone does not respect this policy? For instance, if someone publishes both in open-access and in paywall journals, does that mean that only those in open-access count in the report to the RCUK? Or does that mean that you can get "black-listed" if you publish in paywall journals?
EDIT: Directly related question: what happen if one publishes a paper in a paywall journal and publishes at the same time the pre-print on a freely accessible archive?

It seems slightly annoying, but not insurmountable. From the UK Research Council's Policy on Access, I quote,

The Research Councils define Open Access to mean unrestricted, on-line access to peer reviewed and published scholarly research papers. Specifically a user must be able to do the following free of any publisher-imposed access charge:

Read published research papers in an electronic format.
Search for and re-use (including download) the content [N.b.: footnote specifies including but not limited to the text, data, images, and figures] of published research papers both manually and using automated tools (such as those for text and data mining) provided that any such re-use is subject to proper attribution.

Open Access therefore allows unrestricted use of manual and automated text and data mining tools, as well as unrestricted re-use of content with proper attribution – as defined by the Creative Commons CC-BY license. The Research Councils acknowledge that some publications may need to amend their copyright
conditions if they are to meet this definition of Open Access.

Furthermore, about compliance by journals:

The Research Councils will continue to support a mixed approach to Open Access. The Research Councils will recognise a journal as being compliant with their policy on Open Access if:

The journal provides via its own website immediate and unrestricted access to the publisher’s final version of the paper (the Version of Record), and allows immediate deposit of the Version of Record in other repositories without restriction on re-use. This may involve payment of an ‘Article Processing Charge’ (APC) to the publisher. The CC-BY license should be used in this case. OR

Where a publisher does not offer option 1 above, the journal must allow deposit of Accepted Manuscripts that include all changes resulting from peer review (but not necessarily incorporating the publisher’s formatting) in other repositories, without restrictions on non-commercial re-use and within a defined period. In this option no ‘Article Processing Charge’ will be payable to the publisher. Research Councils will accept a delay of no more than six months between on-line publication and a research paper becoming Open Access, except in the case of research papers arising from research funded by the AHRC and the ESRC where the maximum embargo period is 12 months.

For individual grant recipients, the most important bit is probably the following:

RCUK have in the past provided support for APCs through both direct and indirect costs as part of grant funding. From 1st April 2013 and until further notice, RCUK will support the payment of APCs and other publication charges related to Research Council-funded research solely through block grants to UK Higher Education Institutions, approved independent research organisations and Research Council Institutes. Research grant applications will, therefore, no longer include provision for Open Access publication or other publication charges.
In all cases universities and research organisations upon receipt of funding should transfer these charges to
their institutional publication fund. A university or research organisation can then access these funds to pay
for APCs for any article resulting from research council funding.

and from the "guidance" document:

The Research Councils will be amending their conditions of award to reflect these new requirements and will be extending existing mechanisms which capture research grants outputs (such as the Research Outputs System) to include compliance monitoring on this policy.

To summarise: much as Daniel Shub anticipated, the policy allows for either a fully open access publication or publishing in a pay-walled journal which allows you to deposit the Accepted Manuscript in certain repositories, with an acceptable embargo delay. And enforcement of this will be much in the same way other conditions for grant dispersal are enforced. (They tell you what you can do with the money; if you don't follow the rules, they take the money back and/or not give you money ever again.)
The only thing to additionally note is the small caveat that pay-walled journals, to qualify for the second option of "open access" cannot charge article processing fees. (Which is not too unreasonable: a journal is to charge either the author or the reader but not both.)


Academic occupation options for foreign visitors to the USA? My wife is a student in the US. I am visiting her after I got a PhD degree several months ago in mechanical engineering in China.

My visit is about one or two years long. I plan to go back China to work after that. My question is: What can I do during my visit in the USA?

Maybe a post-doc is the best choice for me, but my research background seems not competitive enough. Moreover, I am a F2 visa holder, which means I cannot get a paid job.

If you want to work or study in a program, you must change your visa type. You can file for an adjustment of status once you have found a job that will sponsor a different visa type or matriculate into a program that will also sponsor a visa for you. Tread carefully in your job hunting as job-hunting itself may be interpreted as a violation of your status -- it would be good for you to consult with an immigration attorney (or barring that, your university's foreign student's office) before you initiate this.

Otherwise, you are unable to work or study formally. The things that you can do:

Use your spousal ID card to study in the library
Use your spousal ID card to audit classes for non-credit
Enjoy hobbies -- join a maker club and make giant fighting robots, learn to fly a kite, etc.
Take part in the activities organized by your university's foreign student/scholar office (there are many spouses in your same situation, so they tend to offer things to help pass the time)
Cook, clean, take care of the children, and otherwise be a fantastic spouse to your wife


Is it worth doing a self funded MPhil in Mechanical Engineering, from UK? I have an MTech in Mechanical Engineering from one of the good schools in India. I have been working in industry for the last 6 years in Finite Element Analysis. I have an offer for MPhil from the University of Newcastle, UK. However, this is totally self-funded. I would like to do a PhD, however funding options seem to be really limited.

Is self-funding a worthwhile route to consider? How valuable is an MPhil in industry?

From what I understand, UK MPhils are 1 year research based degrees, equivalent to or slightly above a masters. I am not that familiar with Indian degrees, but I am guessing an MTech is a masters level degree. You say that it is from a good Indian university, so I am pretty sure that if you have some research experience from your previous graduate studies, coupled with your work experience, that you can land a funded PhD position elsewhere. I think doing an MPhil (unfunded) at this time would be somewhat of a sideways step and a costly one at that.

I am aware funded PhD degrees for international students are pretty scarce in the UK. Most students I know who completed their PhD studies there did so with their own external funding (governmental, third party, etc.). I would suggest targeting other places (continental Europe, North America etc.)

Also from what I recall, an MPhil is seen as a stepping stone between an MSc and a PhD, so I am not sure how much meaning it has on its own. In general I think an MPhil is earned on the way to a PhD or awarded to students who for some reason are unable to complete the PhD.


Learning new things after coursework duration of PhD In STEM (In USA), the coursework duration of the PhD typically lasts about 1-2 years beyond that, students take 0 (or in certain cases, very few) courses in their subsequent PhD years. I work in applied math with a lot of applications in every field imaginable : Finance, Economics, Energy, Healthcare, Services etc.

During my coursework phase (owing to the breadth requirement), I was made to take courses in different departments and each time I attended a course in a new department I would think "Wow, this field could really benefit from extensions of my research". I would chalk out a few ideas and read up a few papers, find out that it's already done but be glad that I generated a new idea nonetheless.

Now, I am nearing the end of my coursework phase and I am wondering : How do I keep my ability to "see" applications in fields other than mine alive?

Global Question : After a student's coursework phase, how does he stay aware of applications of his research field besides the ones discussed in papers?

My advisor encourages me to attend as many seminar talks as possible (in all allied fields) which I do but it's not the same level of enjoyment.

First of all, unless there is a policy against it, you should feel free to enroll in subsequent courses even though you are done with your requirements.  The caveat is that this will take time, and your primary responsibility after finishing those requirements is to do research in your specific area to make progress on your PhD.

To a first approximation, a PhD program is designed to have you focus on one particular problem until you are the only person in the world that completely understands that problem.  That is not to say that you won't find research inspiration from those other seminars, and in fact you might find that you will tailor your research based on one (probably not more) of those other fields.  But, if you continue an academic career after you get your PhD, you'll have more flexibility to collaborate outside your particular field, and that is probably a better time to do it than right now.

To answer your specific question: you're on the right track by going to seminars, and if you can justify the time, taking subsequent classes is not out of the ordinary.  You could also get on mailing lists for other fields that interest you, and nothing is stopping you from becoming a member of professional organizations outside your immediate field (and, they're cheap when you're a student!).  You could also consider collaborating with folks from other departments on projects, bearing in mind that you'll need to be able to differentiate your contributions if you want to use that work in your dissertation.


How do we properly include and cite a set of equations from another paper? When writing a paper which applies some known method to a new problem, for completeness we may need to summarize that method, probably as a section on its own.

In the paper where it was first proposed, the method was described in a set of equations. In my case, I need to include some of these equations, because I need to refer to them in the subsequent part of my paper.

Currently I write something like the following:

  We apply the X method [citation], which we shall summarize below, to describe ...

and then comes the equations, interspersed with some texts, which are paraphrased from the originals.

How do we give the proper attribution to the paper in which the method was first described, without giving the impression that some of the equations are our own? Is the above sufficient? Including [citation] before every equation seems awkward, since all of these equations are from a single paper.

It is generally sufficient to say explicitly that "in this section we will recall the method X from [citation]", and then simply do it. However, you may find it preferable not to quote equations and text from the original paper, but to adopt it according to the style, notation and message of your own manuscript.


Spousal-hire arrangements at a postdoc level In contract to available information for faculty positions, I would be interested to learn how to go for a spousal-hire arrangement at a postdoc level. In my view, there are three factors that might play a role (similarity of work, obviousness of the relationship, funding).

My specific question:

How would you approach as a rather obvious couple (based on overlap in the CV) an application to the same lab (due to the same sub-specialization)?

Two independet applications or single application?
Mentioning the partner or not?
Or applications seperated over time? I.e. one application and then asking for a spousal-hire arrangement during the actual hiring process?

I do not think that any of these are realistic strategies.  Sorry.

If you are in a field where there are many jobs, you may be able so separately obtain positions which are in the same city.

Spousal hire arrangements are used to recruit highly prestigious candidates to permanent faculty positions.  It would be unusual to have the resources to use that hiring strategy for a temporary postdoc position.


How important is it to note, in a citation, where a book/paper was published? Citation systems often specify writing down the location (e.g. London) that a book/paper was published, how important is this, and if it is important, then why is writing down the publisher/journal name not enough?

I've generally omitted the locations of publishers in the bibliographies that I prepare. (When co-authors assemble the bibliography, I go along with whatever they want, as long as it's consistent.) I haven't (yet) gotten any complaints from editors or publishers about the missing locations.

Looking at the situation as a reader of other people's papers, I don't recall ever being hindered from finding a publication because the publisher's location wasn't given, nor do I remember being helped by the location when it was given.


What to do when an advisor takes credit for a grant proposal? I've been writing a big grant proposal for the last few months and I am almost done. I asked my advisor to read it and give me advice on content, and he has yet to read it. He's always saying he'll "read it later" or "he's busy".

I finally got a meeting with him this past week and he says he will read it this weekend. As we're wrapping up, he says it will look good on my CV to have "contributed" to a grant that got funded.

Here's the problem though: I've written the entire grant proposal and done all the literature research for it. The only tangible contribution my advisor has made is to tell me which protein he wants to study. He's also an "absentee advisor" and I do all my own experimental design and troubleshooting. Actually,the post doc in our lab has been giving me all the help/advice.

How should I handle this situation? I realize I could just give him the credit, but how would this reflect on my future career opportunities?

As far as I know, a grant is given almost always to a PI (principal investigator, i.e. head of the lab). Sometimes postdocs can also be listed as PIs, but I don't remember seeing a grad student as a PI on a grant. So even if technically you wrote the grant proposal, the PI will receive the grant.

This means that he is the one that can write in his CV that he got the grant, and you can write that you wrote the proposal. You cannot write that you are the one that got the grant if you are not listed on it, regardless of whether you wrote the grant proposal.

In this sense, a grant is different than a research paper, where you get credit according to your contribution. A grant is given not as a prize for writing a good proposal, but as funding of specific future work executed by a specific person/lab. I am not sure what the guidelines are for grant proposal writing, but I would not be surprised if this is considered ok in terms of the guidelines. Of course I am assuming your advisor read it thoroughly and thought it is a good research plan.

Also, it is very possible that your PI actually did have a major contribution to getting the grant. The funding agency takes into considerations several factors such as the grant proposal but also the PI's record.

Having said all this, you should definitely write in your CV that you wrote a successful grant proposal by yourself (you can consult with your advisor on how to write this in the most impactful way).

Disclaimer: I don't have any details on the specific grant, so I may be completely mistaken...


What role do relevant (!) foreign languages play in grad admissions? Say I want to apply to a program like Comparative Literature or Classics, where it is required that during the program I will pick up at least X languages and will have to sit language exams etc. but it is not required in any way to already speak these languages at admission to the program.

Question:

Will stating that I already speak relevant language X (because it's my native language say) or have already studied language Y for two years (because I want to focus on writer A who wrote in language Y) be an advantage? And if so, how much of an advantage will this be?

I guess it is obvious that schools will care mostly about the quality of the candidate's research etc. but what role would knowing (relevant) foreign languages play here?

PS: Note that I am talking only about foreign languages relevant to the program here. So for example latin for a classics program, or german & french for a comparative literature program where someone wants to focus on precisely these languages.

In Art History, this depends greatly on the language and the area of study. For example, an individual who wants to study Italian Renaissance would likely benefit from knowing Italian, French and German. These are such common languages and the Art is so well studied, that knowing them in advance is likely of little value in regards to admissions. On the other hand, if you want to study ancient Hindi art, then demonstrating that you know Sanskrit could be valuable for admissions since the university may not routinely offer the language and you likely need to be able to read it to write a reasonable proposal.


Incentives to read for seminar/discussion course I'm preparing to teach an introductory course and to teach the content through assigned reading and viewing of A/V materials plus seminar-style discussion. This approach won't work if students don't do the homework. How can I design the course so that they're motivated to do the reading/watching/listening in preparation for discussion?

This is an undergraduate-level course in a continuing/adult education program at a large private university.

Any student that takes a course should be prepared to do all the course work in the way that the instructor lays out the course.

I had a science course in which I was told "In order to pass this course you will need to study 12 hours between each class" this was a twice a week class.

The entire course was pretty much homework based and do-it-at-home. The professor didn't need to motivate us to do that work because we knew that we could not easily pass without doing it and we paid a lot of money to take the course in the first place.

As a student and someone who is finishing up their first course that they are teaching: You can't force someone to do something to help pass the course. You can stress how important it is to do the homework and that it would be a waste of their money if they think they can do well without doing the homework. Remind them of the best practices to use when working on the homework and how long it should take. If you notice a student not being able to keep up talk to them about their homework habits.

In the course I mentioned above most students who did poorly had a lot of personal responsibilities such as a job or children. The amount of work required outside of class shouldn't be so heavy that people with other responsibilities than school just can't complete it all.


How do you acknowledge the useful comments left by the reviewers invited by a journal that rejected your paper? Sometimes a paper is rejected but you obtain some useful suggestions or remarks on improving your paper, directly or indirectly.

When you improve your paper per the suggestions to a certain degree with the intention to submit the paper to another journal, how do you acknowledge the good opinions from the anonymous reviewers?

In addition, is this academically necessary?

Many (most?) academic papers include a brief acknowledgment section somewhere (the location is not standard).  In this section it is frequent to acknowledge help by the referees.  One can equally well acknowledge comments by referees of previous versions of the paper.  For the sake of clarity it seems best to mention that one is thanking the referee of the previous version.  E.g. if I were refereeing the new version, reading

  We are grateful for the help provided by the referee.

is ambiguous: does this refer to a previous referee, or am I being thanked in advance for my help?  (That's not so good.)  Clearer would be something like

  This version of the paper takes into account helpful comments provided by the (or "a") referee of a previous version.

If the paper gets accepted in the second journal, one could change to something like

  We are grateful for helpful comments from multiple referees on several versions of the paper.

Is it academically necessary?  I'm not sure it's ever strictly necessary to acknowledge an anonymous referee -- it seems to me that a situation in which it's vitally necessary to acknowledge someone is a situation in which an anonymous acknowledgment would be insufficient.  (Moreover, the way I have always understood it is that referee comments are "being given" to the authors of the paper.) If you feel that a referee's contributions merit coauthorship, (take a deep breath first; this opens a can of worms) you should discuss that with the editor.  However, if you got direct intellectual help from the referee and not just helpful remarks -- i.e., if the referee contributed some part of the intellectual content of the paper -- then I would certainly recommend documenting that rather than assuming the credit for yourself.


Why don't all disciplines follow a double-blind review system? I'm new to the journal publishing world, and I can't but help wonder why the review process isn't completely blind?  By blind, I mean the reviewers don't know who performed the research or (more importantly) what university the research came from.  It seems that knowing the identity of the authors could influence the review such that the quality of the research no longer stands by itself. You should be able to read an article and, assuming that the experiment was conducted accurately and ethically, decide if it is a significant scientific advancement. Why are reviews not routinely double-blind?

In fields with a vibrant pre-print culture (e.g. Physics or Math), most papers are already publicly posted on the internet with the authors name attached before the paper is submitted and reviewed.  In that context, double-blind reviewing isn't even a sensible option.

Even without pre-prints the same is true of talks in some fields.  For many papers, many potential referees will have already seen a talk at a conference on the results in the paper.  This may be especially true of math where the process of writing up a paper in full detail is especially onerous, so it's common for people to be giving talks on topics while the paper is in preparation.


What are the obligations of a principal investigator? Obviously a Principal Investigator (PI) has many responsibilities toward his or her subordinates, including mentoring them, helping to direct their research, providing funding, and resolving difficulties.

But, in practice, it is often possible for a PI to avoid many of these responsibilities and "get away with it". By this I mean that failing to address these responsibilities has little effect on the PI's own career.

For example, it is often understood that a PI should have some input when PhD students are writing manuscripts. A PI with a large lab may have a policy of leaving students to fend for themselves in this regard. With some intelligent selection at the hiring stage, this PI may ensure that most of his or her students are already capable of writing papers with no assistance. The few that slip through will fail to have a productive PhD, but this will not directly impact the PIs career all that much.

Similarly, a PI may be unable to come up with good research ideas, but this can be compensated for by actively seeking out graduate students who do have good ideas. Since it is rare to explicitly state in science who had the idea for a project, the PIs CV will still look good thanks to the papers the students end up publishing.

However, an example of an obligation is applying for grants. If a PI is ineffective at securing grants, it is very unlikely that their career will not suffer. Students and junior lab personnel simply don't have the knowledge or experience needed to put together a good application, and while post-docs can secure their own funding, the majority of funds in a typical lab is brought in by the PI. If the PI decides to not bother himself with obtaining funding, the lab will become financially hamstrung, research will suffer, and even to a casual outside observer it will be obvious that the scientific output of the research group is appreciably constrained.

My question is, which responsibilities cannot be avoided by a PI without necessarily producing severe negative consequences? If after a cursory examination, a PI's career seems to be going well, which responsibilities can we be certain have not been neglected?

My question is, which responsibilities cannot be avoided by a PI without necessarily producing severe negative consequences? If after a cursory examination, a PI's career seems to be going well, which responsibilities can we be certain that they have not neglected?

In my (extensive) experience with large labs, the only responsibilities that a senior professor can never delegate are networking, certain types of review work (e.g., reviewing for well-respected grants) and certain committee / administration / board work. Basically everything else seems to be fair game.

I find it interesting that your prime example are grant proposals - in many groups in my field, writing grant proposals is mostly a postdoc responsibility, so that is certainly not a duty that is never delegated. However, that might be an european speciality.

I would say your question is actually standing on ill assumptions. You assume that successful profs. are distinguished from no successful ones via the things that they still do themselves. In practice, this is generally not correct. In my experience, most large labs work well because the prof. has a track record of acquiring good people to do things for her/him, not because (s)he does so much her/himself. Further, successful profs. are able to establish mutually beneficial relations with those good people. That is, if you want long-lasting success, you cannot expect e.g., your postdocs to just write grant proposals for you all day because you told them to. You need to find a model how it is actually in their best interest to do so. All successful profs. I know are supremely good at binding strong people to them via the power of mutual interests.

Now, all of this is not to say that a prof. has to delegate everything, or that any given professor even wants to. I know many successful professors that would never delegate some aspects of their job (for instance teaching), either because of a sense of responsibility or because they just honestly like doing certain things themselves. This is just to say that I have seen almost anything being delegated in different large groups.


How do I pick good keywords for literature alerts? F'x has made a very informative post here about staying up to date with current research.

My question concerns the "publication alert" part of it. To be clear: I am asking about setting up an online service, such NCBI PubMed, to send you a notification (for instance, email) whenever a paper matching certain search criteria is published.

The objective is to get a decent number of notifications, but not so many that you are swamped and unable to actually pay attention to them. Also, the notifications that you do get should be prioritized the most important papers.

The biggest problem I am having is coming up with effective keywords. If I try to make myself come up with general keywords (such as those that might be given in the article's own "keywords" section), it seems that I end up with keywords so general that I would get thousands of notifications every week.

Alternatively, I could try to come up with very specific keywords, but how do I select those? What if they are too specific, and an important paper gets published without using my particular obscure keyword?

Surely people are not born with a natural talent for thinking of good keywords. So how can I train this skill?

Furthermore, is there a systematic method to deduce good keywords given a body of "gold standard" relevant literature? (I mean things such as statistical analysis of the text)

I know that it can be worthwhile to focus on certain "big player" authors. But if in a field with thousands of authors (eg. cancer), how does a new researcher map out who is important and who is not? Furthermore, the biggest players are probably PIs of huge labs, who already publish a very large volume of papers, so we are again at odds with the "not too many notifications" problem.

Another possibility is looking at citation metrics to identify the most important papers, as Google Scholar does. But clearly, this is not effective for new papers - who will cite a paper published last week?

One of the biggest problems is that there are, in fact, waaay to many relevant papers coming out; that's because there are lots of articles published each month in many different fields.

The approach I found most useful was threefold:

Set up author-specific alerts for the big names in your field. Read both those articles and the citations. They know the literature and will cite stuff you should be familiar with.
Set up alerts to see when someone cites a seminal paper. In my research, there were certain seminal papers that everyone participating in my tiny subfield would always quote. Find those and set up alerts when someone cites that.
Read the most popular article(s) of the month (most downloaded/shared/read in your journal of choice) to stay on top of interesting stuff that's going on.


How to properly cite when using most of the text verbatim I'm currently teaching a calculus course and I want to create a project in which we analyse different population growth models using the tools we've learned so far. With this in mind I found a great article where both the history and technical aspects of the subject are very well explained. I want to create a PDF where I can write down verbatim most of this text and even some figures (which are part of other papers), just adding exercises and remarks as we move forward.

The question then is, how can I do this without incurring into plagiarism? Two ideas come to mind:

1) Clarify at the beginning of the text that everything, except the exercises, is written down exactly as in the reference.

2) In addition to the above clarification, use a box or quotes whenever a part of the paper is cited. I think this probably is the best course of action, but it's certainly impractical.

Does anyone have a better idea?

It isn't plagiarism if you don't represent it as your own work. If it is cited, it isn't plagiarism. However, copying complete articles is fraught and comes up against copyright restrictions which can result in either legal action or lawsuit. You should talk to someone locally about what is allowed and what is not. Librarians are good at that as is the legal department, if available, at your institution. As to how to cite, either of your options seems fine. They both indicate that you are quoting, not just paraphrasing.

Just be sure you are covered or willing to take the risk of possible censure.

Contacting the article's author may give you additional guidance and possibly permission.


How to write formally about skipping one year of highschool on CV I’m writing a CV to apply to graduate schools right now. I’ve ran into problems translating some things in the CV.
How do I write the fact that I skipped one year of highschool formally? Should I just write -2016~2017: Highschool (skipped one year)? Or does this seem too informal?

High school attendance is not mentioned on an academic CV.


Is the editor-in-chief's advice sincere? After submitting my paper to a reputable journal, the editor-in-chief sent me the following e-mail:

I am writing to let you know that I have briefly read your paper. It appears
that your submission is better suited to (and will be better appreciated by) the
IEEE Transactions on X, or Y. I am, therefore, recommending that you submit it there.

Both recommendations are also reputable journals and since the work is inter-disciplinary, such a reply does not surprise me very much.

However, I wonder if I can interpret this also as a kind of quality evaluation for my work, because after all she recommended high-impact-factor journals?
Or am I reading to much into this and the only message is that this is off-topic for the particular journal.

In other words, is this a common type of response or do editors base their responses also on the quality of the work (e.g. recommending lower ranked journals, conferences or straight forward not to publish anywhere)?

I would not interpret the message as a statement about quality. If the editor felt your article was below par for the journal you will most likely get such a message.

That journals reject papers because they are not suitable is not uncommon. In this case, as you say, the alternatives are also good quality publications and so it seems like good advice. The fact that the editor recommends these journals could actually mean that your paper is seen as suitable for publication in them and thus can be taken as a positive evaluation, however, not a guarantee for success.

I will finish by saying your editor does the job well. The alternative of accepting a paper for review although it may not be suitable for the journal could lead to a drawn out process leading to rejection and loss of much time.


Can outside observers discern graduate student agency from a CV or papers? Sort of a gripe post but here it goes....
Not all PhD experiences are the same. I am not advocating that they should, but I feel your perceived competence and capability is highly dependent of the nature of the project you worked on during your time as a graduate student. My issue is that some individuals get a project handed off to them as oppose to really drive a work efforts from nothing. Joining a lab where the PI says you will work on X, where much of the systems and tools are in place, will take less effort to get published and hit higher impact journals. Contrast this with a scenario where the student generates the project.
In subsequent interviews both individuals will claim the work as their own but clearly one did more than the other. Do subsequent evaluators ( interviewing for post-doc or industry ) care about this can they discern the amount of autonomy of different degree experiences.
How can one present themselves to showcase their agency and creativity to highlight how they originated a line of inquiry as oppose to advance the ball?

I think that what it is possible to do in doctoral studies varies a lot by field. In some fields, if a student were required to come up with their own problem it would be nearly impossible to get started until many many years had passed. In others, it is much more natural for students to propose feasible projects. But even in those fields in which it is difficult, there are a few students able to do it and have their idea accepted by the advisor. The latter may be a stiff hurdle in many cases.
But, to answer the question, I think it may be a mistake for the individual to try to do this themself. It is likely to come across as bragging that can't easily be validated. On the other hand, if others are willing to make such a claim about your "agency" it will serve you well, especially if it comes from a well-respected researcher, perhaps your advisor.
Whether this can be discerned from the CV or not is less important IMO, than how it sounds to the reader. If you say (implicitly) "I'm smarter than you..." it isn't likely to help your career.
And for the most explicit answer to your question, it depends on the reader. A very sophisticated reader may realize that a problem solved is truly fresh and provides new directions for research. But most won't be able to do that sort of analysis, I think.
And, I think this only matters at the beginning of your career, which makes the advisors statements both helpful and sufficient. After you have been "in the game" for a while it will be obvious if you have "agency" or not.
And even if the advisor proposes (or insists on) the problem to be solved, it can still be very challenging to complete it successfully. I worked on three problems leading up to my degree. The first was too easy to be significant. The second was to hard to make any progress. The last was both significant and successful. But still hard enough.


Will professors get dismissed for not actively doing research? According to Wikipedia:

  A tenured professor or curator has an appointment that lasts until retirement age, except for dismissal with just cause. A common justification for existence of such a privileged position is the principle of academic freedom, which holds that it is beneficial for state, society and academy in the long run if scholars are free to examine, hold, and advance controversial views.

I know this "just cause" includes academic misconducts and crimes, but my question is about a mild case:

I have heard that professors and associate professors have certain research requirements. If a professor or associate professor stops to be active in his research (for instance, publishing very few or even no papers for years) after he gets tenured (but let's assume he still does a fair job in teaching and outreach), will he be dismissed from the university?

If there are no such examples, then what is the binding power of research requirements upon professors and associate professors?

What is the binding power of research requirements upon professors and associate professors?

Without some specific agreement to the contrary, tenure means you can't be fired for doing insufficiently good research.  Some tenured positions involve post-tenure review, which can weaken the notion of tenure by expanding the cases in which you could be disciplined or even fired, but this is not the default.

On the other hand, there are tons of other ways to enforce requirements.  If a professor is not doing good research, they may be asked to take on extra teaching or service (which is reasonable: if they aren't spending time productively on research, then they should spend it on something else).  In more extreme cases, they might never get a raise again, in which case their salary is gradually eaten away by inflation if they aren't near retirement.  If the chair specifically wants to punish someone, they can assign them the classes or committees nobody else wants, give them the least desirable office, etc.  In short, there are lots of ways a tenured position can become unpleasant, which gives the administration more leverage than one might guess from the definition of tenure.


Joining a group for PhD, how do I judge the atmosphere before I sign? I am looking to start a PhD project soon and I have almost decided on the group in which I will apply. But I know that I am a very sensitive person when it comes to any work atmosphere. I have to feel comfortable where I don't work alone in the corner of a room for 4 years.

What are telltale signs of the academic work atmosphere? When I visit the group with the professor, will he let me ask questions to students already there? What should I ask and to whom?

First off, if the professor is reluctant to have you talk to members of the group, this is a huge red flag.
When you visit, ask if you can sit in on lab meetings or seminars (some group setting) and observe the dynamic. Does everyone seem engaged and happy to be there? Is the mood collaborative and friendly, or authoritarian? Basically, put yourself there and ask yourself if you'd be comfortable.
Ask the professor about their advising style and philosophy. Some like to be very involved, some want their students to be independent. Make sure their answer works for you.
Most important one, in my opinion: contact a few of the other students independently, tell them you are coming to visit, and offer to take them out for a coffee or beer. This is an opportunity to ask them, in a relaxed non-work setting, about what they like and don't like about working in the lab. Do not tell the professor what the students are thinking, in any case.


Job applications reviewed "until the position is filled" (i.e. soft deadline): What does that really mean? I noticed that many ads say "Review of applications will begin on Day X, and continue until the position is filled". I wonder how this kind of search works. Assume the search committee received a certain number of applications on Day X. Usually none of the applications is from a superstar that you definitively want to hire, but let's say between five and ten are good enough for you to hire one of them. What would the search committee do? Would they contact the candidates, arrange interviews and hire the best one there? Or would they still wait for a month or two just to see if a superstar would apply after all?

"Review of applications will begin on Day X, and continue until the position is filled" is also translated as:

We want you to get your application in on time, but if you're totes amazeballs and late we'll overlook it.

The motivation is the same as what was mentioned. If you say that there's a hard deadline for submissions, and then Dr. Awesome Sauce applies a day later and gets hired, you're opening yourself up to a lawsuit from all the Dr. Not-So-Awesomes.

Practically, academic hiring works on a calendar, and universities compete with each other. For example, in computer science it's rare to be making a first offer well into May unless you're at the University of I'm-So-Cool and know that you can afford to be last. And even then it doesn't always work. So practically speaking there's a deadline of sometime in March to make decisions on offers and start wooing your preferred candidates.

This means that you can't realistically process a new application any later than early-mid February (because it takes time to collect references and organize a trip)


Am I rational to be hopeless to have an academic career after my mental recovery? I used to be a PhD student in one of the top research institutes in Germany. Then I realized I have a mental illness and my mother insisted that I go to a psychologist. He told me that I have a moderate level mental illness and prescribed me some medications.
I started taking them and felt very happy but I also lost my ability to focus and was not able to work anymore. I lost my position and went to another doctor and realized the initial prescribed medication was too much. I changed my medication but I still could not focus and was very slow to work.
It took me two years to find another PhD position in a not very good university. During the PhD, I tried to replace the medications with sports and I was mostly successful.
Now I am at the end of my PhD and have become more sober. I have realized that my peers have become assistant professors or senior researchers and this makes me very disappointed. I also have realized that my supervisor is not very good and does not have many connections for postdoc positions.
I still wish I had not listened to my mother and had tried to treat myself without medication. I feel like all my dreams to have an academic career are destroyed. Do you think these feeling are rational?

(this answer is based not on my personal experience, but I know a number of people struggling with depression, some of them also in academia, and some quite close to me)
I don't think it's rational to decide that your academic career is hopeless. You are on a PhD track after all. You are still in a position where you can do good work, make people notice you, and ultimately get a good career going. Especially in Germany my feeling is that where you do your PhD is not very indicative of how well your career will be going afterwards - I know professors graduating from the smallest universities that I have never heard about in other contexts, and I know plenty of graduates from TU Munich that went nowhere after graduation.
What you need to do - and I am aware that this every difficult - is to let go of what happened in the past and focus on the future. How can you bring yourself into the best position? If your advisor does not have too many contacts you will need to work on these contacts yourself (honestly, this is nothing particularly unusual - this is the situation that at least 2/3 of PhD candidates find themselves in, not every advisor is an international superstar). If you can't get a postdoc via reference, keep your eyes open for posted positions. Go to conferences, meet people, make people be aware that you are or will be on the job market. And even if your academic career plans indeed do not work out, there will still be plenty of other opportunities for a PhD holder to pursue. Don't get married to one specific career path, and don't tie your self-worth to whether you make one specific thing work or not.

That said, the elephant in the room is that you also need to take care of yourself. Self-treating a depression with "sports" is dangerous - maybe what you are actually doing is distracting yourself without actually working on the underlying problems, and this has a tendency to only work for so long. I strongly recommend you to give therapy another shot. You don't necessarily have to agree to take medication (although, as I said in a comment above, not all anti-depressants make you tired, but it is true that pretty much all of them potentially come with some problematic side-effects), but some therapy or treatment is long-term really the only way forward. That said, you are perfectly in the right to be picky when choosing what psychologist / psychiatrist(s) to work with - many are frankly very bad at their job, and even the better ones may be a bad fit for you personally.
Again, your focus needs to be looking forward how to improve your life, not looking backwards at what went wrong before. This isn't easy for anybody, and I know that depression only makes it harder to focus on a positive outlook rather than things that went badly in the past. A lot of this has to do with acceptance - accepting that you have in fact a medical condition, and that you will need to do and deal with some things that people without that condition don't have to bother with (and some of them may indeed be impacting your ability to perform in a workplace). We accept this to be the case with non-mental medical conditions, and it's also true for depression.
Ultimately, you need to remember that long-term your health is more important than your career. You can certainly still have both, but if you decide to ignore your health because of your career there is a good chance that 10 years from now you have neither.


How do mathematicians conduct research? I am curious as to how mathematicians conduct research. I hope some of you can help me solve this little mystery.

To me, mathematics is a branch where you either get it or you don't. If you see the solution, then you've solved the problem, otherwise you will have to tackle it bit by bit. Exactly how this is done is elusive to me.

Unlike physicists, chemists, engineers or even sociologists, I can't see where a mathematician (other than statisticians) gather their data from. Also, unlike the other professions mentioned above, it is not apparent that mathematicians perform any experiments.

Additionally, a huge amount of work has already been laid down by other mathematicians, I wonder if there is a lot of "copy and pasting" as we see in software engineering (think of using other people's code)

So my question is, where do mathematicians get their research topics from and how do they go about conducting research? What is considered acceptable progress in mathematics?

As far as pure mathematics, you are quite right: there are neither data nor experiments.

Drastically oversimplified, a mathematics research project goes like this:

Develop, or select from the existing literature, a mathematical statement ("conjecture") that you think will be of interest to other mathematicians, and whose truth or falsity is not known.  (For example, "There are infinitely many pairs of prime numbers that differ by 2.")  This is your problem.
Construct a mathematical proof (or disproof) of this statement.  See below.   This is the solution of the problem.
Write a paper explaining your proof, and submit it to a journal.  Peer reviewers will decide whether your problem is interesting and whether your solution is logically correct.  If so, it can be published, and the conjecture is now a theorem.

The following discussion will make much more sense to anyone who has tried to write mathematical proofs at any level, but I'll try an analogy.  A mathematical proof is often described as a chain of logical deductions, starting from something that is known (or generally agreed) to be true, and ending with the statement you are trying to prove.  Each link must be a logical consequence of the one before it.

For a very simple problem, a proof might have only one link: in that case one can often see the solution immediately.  This would normally not be interesting enough to publish on its own, though mathematics papers typically contain several such results ("lemmas") used as intermediate steps on the way to something more interesting.

So one is left to, as you say, "tackle it bit by bit".  You construct the chain a link at a time.  Maybe you start at the beginning (something that is already known to be true) and try to build toward the statement you want to prove.  Maybe you go the other way: from the desired statement, work backward toward something that is known.  Maybe you try to build free-standing lengths of chain in the middle and hope that you will later manage to link them together.  You need a certain amount of experience and intuition to guess which direction you should direct your chain to eventually get it where it needs to go.  There are generally lots of false starts and dead ends before you complete the chain. (If, indeed, you ever do.  Maybe you just get completely stuck, abandon the project, and find a new one to work on.  I suspect this happens to the vast majority of mathematics research projects that are ever started.)

Of course, you want to take advantage of work already done by other people: using their theorems to justify steps in your proof.  In an abstract sense, you are taking their chain and splicing it into your own.  But in mathematics, as in software design, copy-and-paste is a poor methodology for code reuse.  You don't repeat their proof; you just cite their paper and use their theorem.  In the software analogy, you link your program against their library.

You might also find a published theorem that doesn't prove exactly the piece you need, but whose proof can be adapted.  So this sometimes turns into the equivalent of copying and pasting someone else's code (giving them due credit, of course) but changing a few lines where needed.  More often the changes are more extensive and your version ends up looking like a reimplementation from scratch, which now supports the necessary extra features.

"Acceptable progress" is quite subjective and usually based on how interesting or useful your theorem is, compared to the existing body of knowledge.  In some cases, a theorem that looks like a very slight improvement on something previously known can be a huge breakthrough.  In other cases, a theorem could have all sorts of new results, but maybe they are not useful for proving further theorems that anyone finds interesting, and so nobody cares.

Now, through this whole process, here is what an outside observer actually sees you doing:

Search for books and papers.
Read them.
Stare into space for a while.
Scribble inscrutable symbols on a chalkboard.  (The symbols themselves are usually meaningful to other mathematicians, but at any given moment, the context in which they make sense may exist only in your head.)
Scribble similar inscrutable symbols on paper.
Use LaTeX to produce beautifully-typeset inscrutable symbols interspersed with incomprehensible technical terms, connected by lots of "therefore"s and "hence"s.
Loop until done.
Submit said beautifully-typeset gibberish to a journal.
Apply for funding.
Attend a conference, where you speak unintelligibly about your gibberish, and listen to others do the same about theirs.
Loop until emeritus, or perhaps until dead (in the sense of Erdős).


Is there an actual, physical event associated with predatory conferences? I occasionally receive emails inviting me to present in a predatory conference. These are usually easy to identify, given that they call me a "Dr" or a "Prof" (only a PhD student at the moment), never heard of them (6th conference on something.. What were the first 5?), weird English, bizarre locations, organised by an organisation outside the field, etc.

When you're publishing a predatory journal I guess it's not too hard to actually publish the journal eventually. Just put some PDFs on a website. What about conferences? Organising a conference is harder: you have to arrange a venue, audio/video gear, food and a bunch of other things. Let's say that I do end up submitting and paying the abstract fees. Is there an actual conference happening somewhere?

EDIT - let me focus this a bit..

Is it possible that one signs up to such a conference, arrives, and then there is nothing on site?
Are the (sometimes famous) keynote speakers aware they they are listed? Do they show up to the conference?

If there is an actual conference, and people end up attending it, what is predatory about it? Eventually, it's a meeting of people discussing science about a particular topic.

So far as I can tell, and have read online, predatory conferences typically are associated with an actual event.

To my mind, this seems to be a key difference between "predatory" and "fraudulent."  If a conference takes your money and no event is organized, then there is clearly false advertising and grounds for legal action, perhaps even criminal charges.  If a conference takes your money and organizes a horrible, worthless, CV-staining joke of an event, on the other hand, there is no regulatory body that you can complain to: scientific quality is considered to be a matter of judgement, and there is no way to easily distinguish between an honest-but-poor-quality conference and a intentionally predatory conference.


How to write a really short letter of intent? My letter of intent for an MSc program is only 1000 characters (which is about 160 words). I was planning to begin with a short story about how I became interested in the field, how my academic background has prepared me, my current research interests, and my future goals. All of that is about 400-500 words (I already wrote it out). I will be evaluated on how well my interests align with the school’s and my supervisor’s. So should I only include my research interests? So there really wouldn’t be any introductry line... I would just get into it?

Carefully address the question as phrased by the institution.  Different schools may describe what they want as a letter of intent in slightly different ways that may help you understand what they're looking for.

Broadly speaking, a letter of intent is not about your past.  It should explain your intentions for the future.  (Stuff about your past is probably better in a personal statement, if you're asked for one.) A letter of intent should answer the question, what will you do if you come here?

In any sort of admissions or employment situation, whenever you're asked about the future, a good answer usually includes some specificity about your objectives, something testable, what you'd like to work on, how you think you might proceed toward your goals, etc.  Hope that's helpful.


Can I edit my name on a submitted paper if I changed my name during the review process? I am in PhD and about to change my name. I already have a number of publications.

If your paper has not been slated for publication yet, you can probably change your name on it.  I would contact the editor about making the change immediately.  Depending on the system the journal uses, this may simply require the editor to edit your name in single file; or it may entail quite a bit more work, so you want to given the editor and production staff as much time as possible to make the correction.

You will probably not need to provide proof that you have changed your name.  Name changes are not particularly uncommon; they happen when people get married or divorced, and less frequently (but uncontroversially) for other reasons as well.  If you have decided that it is definitely in your professional interest to change the name under which you publish, that is unquestionably your prerogative.


What should I do with award certificates? I recently won the "Best Student Paper" award at a moderately significant conference in my field (subfield of CS).
This came with a Trophy and a Certificate.
The trophy  I will put in the corner of my the lab, and use for motivation.
But I don't know what to do with the certificate.

What should I be doing with the certificate?
Do I need to save it to prove to someone later my paper did actually get the award? Surely they can look it up online.

I am generally opposed to the hoarding of documents -- I strive to minimise the number of physical possessions I have.

So I was kinda thinking of just using it as scrap paper...

Give it to a relative (parent, spouse?). My mother has a "wall of Sergio" in the house where she displays different types of significant awards, letters, etc. I think it's a little weird, but giving them these awards is a nice way to let them have a handy reminder of what you're up to at the time, and parents certainly appreciate it sometimes. My mother and I came from not very much at all, so she is so happy to hear I am doing something with my life -- maybe your family may feel the same.


Does making Youtube videos improve your CV? Is the creation of youtube content/lectures in your field worth showing off on an Academic CV?

In the most extreme case: if someone who is considering hiring for a teaching position in a university/college is looking at two candidates who are identical in qualifications except for one candidate having a youtube channel which teaches topics in his/her field (with somewhat decent content) would that candidate be considered more "qualified" (in the broadest sense of the word).

Universities are usually interested in the degree to which their teachers can gain wide recognition for their teaching, and thereby spread the reputation of their institution.  If you are able to publicise your teaching work to a wide audience, this enhances the reputation of the institution you are in, and so the university has an interest in that outcome.  Universities like their academics to be in the public-eye, since this adds to brand-recognition of the university, and shows that their academics are influential in the public sphere.  Hence, any activity which gains you wider recognition for your teaching or intellectual work is going to be something worth putting on a CV.

A useful case-in-point for the potential career value of academic YouTube videos is the case of Prof Jordan Peterson at the University of Toronto.  Peterson was a successful academic in a Canadian university, but was not widely known outside his field until he began producing YouTube videos of his lectures and his general thoughts on social issues.  Coupled with him taking on some controversial topics, his use of direct communication to the public created a great deal of interest in his work, which has led to him being widely featured in conferences, interviews, etc.  Two years ago I hadn't heard of Peterson;   six months ago he was described in the New York Times (albeit second-hand, with agreement) as "the most influential public intellectual in the Western world right now".  This is an extreme case, and it is also influenced by the social topics that Peterson discusses, but I think it is fair to say that if he had not produced YouTube videos, his work would not have spread as widely.   So yes, YouTube videos of your teaching can make a difference.


Strange experience in R&D / Research assistant post. Is this a red flag? I have recently obtained an undergraduate degree in Computer Science with excellent performance and shortly afterwards got a research assistant post for a two-year industry-university collaboration project with the professors I worked with. The perks of this job are a modest salary for two years and an opportunity to get a postgraduate degree in a project-related area which will be partly covered by this post. I would be doing R&D work for the rest of my two years.

Upon joining, my professors and myself spent many days trying to formulate a research idea that makes sense in the project's context. We finally proposed an idea and loosely specified its details to our project partners and we got their approval. Work started immediately.

To our surprise, our industry partners revealed that they went ahead and implemented a massive chunk of work that was assigned to my team on their own accord. They were faster and produced higher quality work. It was later revealed to us that our partners had attempted similar endeavours in the past and had a lot of groundwork ready.

One may question the communication strategy of all involved stakeholders. We have been operating with regular meetings and on-site visits as frequent as once every week in which we exchange progress and ideas but we did not exchange any artefacts.

There is actually quite a small amount of work left from my team, but it seems that our partners did a lot of work overlapping with ours. Now that we are at the end of our project and we have to communicate with our funding agents, we must detail some results in a report and that would be the end of the project.

I feel useless and a fraud. I did a lot of R&D work on projects that are very niche and not likely to find any adoption in practice. Also, some work is incomplete. I did many sleepless nights and unpaid overtime hours on the essential parts of this project but industry partners finished the same work quickly and without my contribution, thus possibly invalidating my work in a sense. This also makes me wonder if it is justified that I feel an element of disrespect and mistrust. But worst of all, I feel scared. Many of our interactions are undocumented - it is time to produce reports for our funding agents and I can't help but wonder if my or my professor's reputation are at risk and whether funding will be questioned.

How can I act diplomatically in this context and defend funding? Everyone worked very hard. How can I maintain good relationships? Is this normal in research projects or is this form of research not for me? Is it time to quit?

First of all, your supervisor should be principally responsible for accounting for funding. The brunt of reporting the results for funding purposes is not on your shoulders. (This does not mean that you will not be asked to help in the reporting process).

Because it is hard for us to know what the parameters of your position and funding are, it is relatively difficult to gauge what types of results you were supposed to get and/or report on. Surely you documented the work that you did on the project? Can your own/your professor's actual work not be reported on? Simply report what you did to the funding agency. Joint ventures can be messy and academia and industry focus on different work strategies and outcomes. Report to the funding agency what your end did on the project. That is what they will be looking for. You either produced results and work or you did not. That is what the funding agency will likely care about.

Based on my topical understanding of your situation, it sounds like you participated in a joint venture with an industry partner and they developed a solution independently from you. Are they contesting that you helped? Are they part of your funding? Not knowing these aspects of the arrangement and outcomes, it is difficult for me to provide specific guidance on any issues that may arise from such an arrangement.

As a piece of holistic advise for future research with industry partners, make sure that there are actual detailed contracts produced before engaging in any joint research. (This may not be your duty as a research assistant, of course). If you professor does not have any sort of contract, communications, or documentation of your joint work with the industry partner then he muffed pretty badly here. (Although, again, as an RA, this in not your job and you should not really be blamed for possible failures on the part of your supervisor).

Ultimately, this situation sounds like it may be your professor's job to lead the way in handling legal and reporting outcomes. No quality professor will throw the legalities and finances of a joint venture project at the feet of a research assistant.


Master's degree in science is generally not free in US, CANADA, UK, OZ, NZ? (Tuition) I had the impression that in general, PhD programs are the only really "free" ones in higher education in those typically high cost English-speaking countries that they charge no tuition, pay you to do research, teach, do scut work etc., give stipend, maybe free housing.  On the other hand, masters degree program would charge big tuition, less assistantship opportunities, likely no stipend? Even in Science. Is that right?

In the US, PhD students typically have their tuition paid by the federal grant that also pays them a salary or waived by their universities. It is not exactly free, but it may be paid on your behalf.

My understanding is that also typically any student paid on a grant as a graduate research assistant has their tuition paid. This covers master's and PhD students. I don't recall if this is my institution's policy or NSF's, but it is pretty common.

These are both common situations, but neither is guaranteed. The vast majority PhD students in STEM have their tuition covered somehow and also get work as GRAs or TAs or have some sort of fellowship or stipend. There are lots of models. Universities don't want to take on a long-term (4-6+ years) commitment to get a PhD student through to their dissertation while running the risk they might have to leave or work an unrelated job to cover costs. Master's students are less commitment (2ish years), but there are opportunities for them, too.

The vast majority of GRA seekers that cold email me looking for positions are master's students without a job looking to get their tuition covered and make a half-time salary. PhD students mostly don't have to do this because they get some sort of package when they are admitted.


Are Governement Open File Reports "published" online later published as journal articles considered a duplicate publication? If a large agency technical report is published online, would a condensed journal article be considered a duplicate publication? Or would this be similar to publishing a chapter from a thesis as a journal article.

Whether this is duplicate publication likely depends strongly on the nature of the report, the extract, and the journal's policy.  Let us set aside journal policy for the moment, and discuss the general principle from a scientific honesty perspective.

One of the key reasons to disapprove of duplicate publication is because it inflates the apparent value of a piece of work to the author (by adding to their CV) without significantly increasing the value to the scientific community (since the article is already out there).  So: what is the value that will be added by extracting this portion of the report?

With a thesis, my typical interpretation is that a chapter extract adds the benefits of peer review and condensation of a complex and often sprawling source material into a more accessible form with a clear and focused message.  Now let's apply this same analysis to a report: some technical reports have a strong internal community review process before publication, in which case the benefit of peer review is unclear; others are thrown together in a much more hasty and ad hoc fashion, in which case peer review has a much clearer value.  Likewise, if your material is already a neatly focused and separable subsection, then the value of an extract is less clear than if it is scattered throughout.

There may be other reasons that an extract publication would be significantly different as well: for example, regulations on the report process might have prohibited certain lines of discussion, or there may be new data that can be added.

The bottom line is this:

Consider the value added for the scientific community by creating an extract; if it is significant, then creating an extract is reasonable to do.
In interacting with editors, be completely clear and transparent about what you have done and why you think it's valuable, and while some editors may disagree and reject your paper, you will not face any accusations of improper behavior.


How should I confront an under-performing coauthor? I'm working on a study with a coauthor; the ratio of the work distribution is about 90/10, me. On the one hand, this person was the one to approach me about collaborating on a project, and suggested a specific venue for presenting it. Yet since that initial invitation, I've been the one to come up with the topic of study, the methodology, compiling the resources we'd need for data collection, and to date have done more of the data collection so far. I've basically called all the shots in this study, and have had all the ideas (I always ask for their thoughts, but they basically agree with everything I say). I've indirectly brought this up once, indicating we were pressed for time and pointing to everything I had to do without pointing out how little they were doing. They offered to help pick up the slack, but then never followed through.

At this point, I think I need to be more direct about the issue; I don't want to be mean, but I also want to make clear that a) I'm carrying too much of the burden; it doesn't need to be 50/50, but what we have going on right now is really unfair to me; b) if they're unwilling/unable to shoulder more of the work, then I don't think we should continue on this project together.

I always struggle with directness, as I feel like I'm being rude. Any suggestions on how to nip this particular situation in the bud?

EDIT/UPDATE: I've since emailed my co-author. They responded in what feels like passive aggressive gas-lighting. Basically, the gist of their response was (this is not a direct quote), "it seems like you're the one who's overwhelmed and I'm questioning your commitment to this project. If it's too much for you or you have other priorities, we can take a step back...but I for one am ready to work."

I'm not even sure how to respond to this. They did offer one explanation for why I haven't seen any work on their part (they said they were working on it in a separate document instead of our shared document), which is fine and I can accept that, but turning the tables and going "it's not me, it's you" is really bothering me. I don't want to escalate this or seem like I'm making a big deal if it isn't one (yes, despite naming this gas-lighting, I can't seem to escape its effects), but I also don't want to stand for that kind of behavior. Any further suggestions on how to respond to this coauthor would be appreciated.

You certainly need to sort this out. Would you like to stay on good terms with this colleague going forward? I'm going to assume the answer is yes, and I would certainly encourage that.

Being direct is indeed the best approach, and it can be rudely done or considerately. Perhaps the person is having personal problems at the moment? You do not know what is causing the problem, but it is not necessary to assume that the person is just an unreliable jerk. They might be, but you can give them a chance to explain the situation.

Since you are doing all the work, and the two of your are peers, you are really in the driver's seat. But you do have to talk--not about promises for the future at this point but explanations for the past non-performance.

You might ask the person what they want, since their actions to date suggest a lack of interest in the project or some problem interfering with their ability to work on it.  That's a considerate way of giving them an opportunity to explain the situation. You are not being mean or accusing them of anything. And you will soon enough find out whether or not the person really does have a short-term problem or is actually unreliable. Then you will know what to do.


The necessity of having an honours undergrad degree for Msc applications (Canada) I am a soon to be graduated undergrad student doing research on potential universities for grad school. I specifically want to do a Msc in Stats, with a course-based or research project stream, no thesis.

I have noticed many (usually more prestigious) Canadian universities require an honours undergrad degree in addition to the GPA requirement. However, some (not all) have noted exceptions for research independent of an honours thesis (which I have) or other special considerations. I realize the best way to approach this may be to just contact potential schools directly, however I would appreciate if anyone can shed some light on the necessity/usefulness of an honours degree for grad school applications.

Usually, Canadian Universities ask for a 4-year Bachelor's degree as a minimum requirement. This is usually called B.Sc. Major option.
Quote from Carleton, Computer Science:

Will a Major Degree Prevent Me From Going On to Do Graduate Studies?
Not necessarily.  Many universities indicate that they require an
Honours degree or equivalent to get into a Master’s program, so the
Honours degree is better if you intend to apply for a Masters or Ph.D.
in computer science.   However, a student with high grades from a
Major degree will likely be considered for graduate work.

So, B.Sc. Honours compared to B.Sc. Major is intended (partially) to prepare you better for a graduate school. It usually involves some research component and stricter selection of the required courses. Another quote from McGill:

Honours programs typically involve an even higher degree of
specialization than majors, include supervised research, and require
students to maintain a high academic standard. An honours program
provides solid preparation for graduate school.

So, do you have to have Honours to enter graduate school? No. Would it have helped? Probably, yes. Not necessarily. I would say that even if the program that you are anxious to apply to requires B.Sc. Honours, you might approach them and convince that you can succeed in the graduate studies by good GPA, relevant course selection, impressive letter of intent, exceptional recommendation letters, etc.
Also, there would be plenty of programs that certainly do not ask for Honours degree as their minimum requirement. Say:

M.Sc. Statistics from the University of Manitoba
M.Sc. Statistics from the University of British Columbia


How to deal with professors who don't follow the text I'm a first year math grad student. As an undergrad, all my professors followed the given text book closely, making lecture easy to prepare for and very predictable. As a grad student, my professors seem to cover material mostly in the book, but in a different order, with different notation, or different content entirely.
The result is that I have essentially no way to prepare for classes. I can only show up to lecture and hope I can keep up. If I want to review, I can only read their handwritten notes. My understanding is really suffering because I can't reinforce the content by seeing it repeatedly and clearly. I know it's unreasonable to expect professors to merely regurgitate a textbook, but this is how I'm accustomed to learning. What can I do to learn material better in these situations?
Edit: Thank you for the replies. The consensus seems to be that lectures shouldn't reinforce the text. They should provide a bigger picture, a linking of ideas from the expert's point of view, and understanding details is the job of the student on their own time. This makes total sense.
I think my issue comes from spending valuable time studying the book, then having the professor totally skip that topic and go to another, never to mention the thing I spent hours studying. My effort is wasted, and I have to expend double the effort to understand what is covered. It seems like the answer is to just learn what I can and not see that effort as wasted.

If your undergraduate lectures were perfectly predictable, following the book exactly, and you showed up perfectly prepared to each one, then they were actually completely useless. You could have just stayed home and read the book yourself!
At the graduate level, the best practice is to ask the professor for good references, both at the start of the course, and whenever unfamiliar topics come up. You shouldn't expect immediate full understanding from going to lecture; graduate subjects are too deep for that. Treat lecture as an informal invitation to the subject. It's your job to turn that into understanding, by reading from references, doing problems, and asking questions.
Of course, this isn't an excuse for lazy or disorganized teaching. When a professor doesn't follow a book, they could be doing you a great service, by presenting a carefully thought out, alternative view of the subject which will complement existing books. (That's where many textbooks come from in the first place!) But in other cases, they could simply not care much about teaching, and not have any direction in mind.
I've been in classes of both types, and if you're stuck in the latter, it's absolutely essential to get good references to solidify your understanding. In these cases, don't count on the professor to supply them -- if they aren't paying much attention, they're likely to recommend books they used decades ago which are well out of date, or subpar books that they've only heard of, not read. Ask other students, and try resources like StackExchange. You can find good resources for any graduate course in any subject in this way.

I think my issue comes from spending valuable time studying the book, then having the professor totally skip that topic and go to another, never to mention the thing I spent hours studying. My effort is wasted, and I have to expend double the effort to understand what is covered.

If you're planning on doing research later, then effort spent learning core material in standard graduate-level books is never wasted. You can't know in advance what's going to be useful for your research, and often it will turn out to be the core material -- which is why it's the core in the first place. Many times, I've been stuck on a research problem only to find that the right way of thinking about it was in a book chapter I skipped long ago.


Code of conduct when proposing to open a new lab in a field new at the University I have no idea what is code of conduct when proposing a new lab and hope you can help me out.
I am looking for a Tenure Track, just finishing my PostDoc, having a good track in an emerging field and looking forward to opening a new group.
I know that at University X there is a program dedicated to opening a new labs and hiring good PIs for that, however, at this University my field is not present at all. I would love to set up a new group there, but have no idea how to approach them and propose it?
Technically the program works like they open a position from time to time, yet then it is already specified, the field, requirements, keywords, etc. Just casual job offer.
So I need to approach them before they open a position, but what is a proper way to do that?
Colleague of mine benefited from the same program, yet he contacted a senior researcher from similar field, who advocated internally for the new lab. I do not have such option, since my field is not even close to the ones already at the Uni (However it would strongly synergise with other Labs and for sure is a prospective and active field).
Shall I already contact with a CV, or first with idea for a lab?
Shall I be transparent and first convince them for a lab before proposing myself as a candidate?
Shall I first call, or mail?
I do not want a faux-pas or being misunderstood, how would you take it?

If I understand this correctly, you are asking if you should contact a university telling them (a), that they definitely need their first lab in field X that they currently have no lab in, or (b), what (a) says plus I’m applying for this to-be-created new position! Neither approach would have any hope in any country or field I’m familiar with.
Your question seems to be prompted by a colleague of yours being hired into a newly created lab (in an already present field) through personal connections. This combines connections with the new lab being in a field that already exists, and so does not really compare.
By and large, you can only apply to specific job openings, no matter how good your fit would be in a place. As you are in a new field, there might be neighboring fields with sufficient overlap that you can apply to openings in them as well. But the case at hand strikes me as fruitless.


Why should I add co-authors on Google Scholar? Google Scholar wants me to add areas of interest, photo, and co-authors. I understand why I may want to add the first two, but why add co-authors? All the publications already list the actual co-authors. Is it an attempt to turn the site into more of a social network? Is it an excuse for Google to spam them ("X added you as a co-author!")? What is the benefit for the profile owner?

For example, I have some papers with dozens of authors. Should I "upgrade" them to "co-authors"? I have no idea who some of these people are, but maybe the goal is to get as many as possible. On the other hand, if I don't add someone I actually know, will they be offended?

In general, I find the Google Scholar profile pages to be elegant and useful.

Some people choose not to add co-authors to their profile pages. You might not see any benefit. You might not want to play favourites (i.e., who is enough of a co-author to be listed; what if I forget to add someone, would they be mildly offended).

In general, random people will google you and land on your google scholar profile page. Seeing who your main co-authors are might be useful to such people to give them an understanding of where your work is situated and who you are working with. They can then also more easily explore the academic work of your co-authors.


Are there any online community investigations of PhD thesis plagiarism outside Germany? In Germany there is a wiki-like webpage that investigates PhD theses for plagiarism: http://de.vroniplag.wikia.com/

On this webpage PhD theses that are suspected of plagiarism are investigated by an online community. Anybody can contribute in an anonymous way. For the thesis manuscripts that are investigated there is an indication of plagiarized text for each page.

My question is: are there any such initiatives in other countries?
And would that make sense?

I am not aware of initiatives in other countries. However, while VroniPlag started out with examinations of German doctoral theses, it is no longer limited to those. Today, it investigates suspected plagiarism in PhD theses written in Spain, Ireland, Denmark, the Czech Republic, Austria, and Italy. To the extent that this is a continuing trend, VroniPlag already is an international project.

So the answer to the question in your title (which differs from that in the body), whether online community investigations of PhD thesis plagiarism outside Germany exist, is yes.


Benefits of doing Part III at Cambridge (Pure Math) for US PhD applications I applied to various US Pure Mathematics PhD programs for entry this fall and the responses from my top preferences were not favorable, though some of my lower preferences were. I also have an offer to do "Part III" at the University of Cambridge, which is a 1 year masters degree via coursework (although there is an essay component worth about 1/6th of the assessment). I'm considering the option of accepting this, and then re-applying to the US schools with the hope that my application has improved and I get accepted into one of my higher preferences.

  My question is: How do US Mathematics departments view the Part III
  program, and if I do it then will it have a good/bad/no effect on my
  subsequent application?

Some things to consider: The Part III program is intended as preparation for a PhD degree, unlike many Masters degrees that are intended as terminal degrees. Is this well known?

An essay is part of the course - it usually involves giving a unified exposition of several recent papers on a certain topic. Though the content of the essay can be quite advanced, it often does not contain much original research.

The course is from October '14  to June '15, while applications to US schools are due around December '14. This means I will not have had enough contact with Cambridge faculty to get a letter of reference from them. The marks for all the subjects taken are released around June '15, so I won't be able to include any of those marks in my application either. However in the time between now and October I will continue work with my undergraduate supervisor, which should improve my main letter of reference at least a little. My field is algebraic geometry, and my supervisor has said that it would be better for me to go through Hartshorne in the next ~6 months rather than forcing myself to research just yet. So I won't be getting any original research done by the time I apply again.

I think Part III is quite common amongst US students nowadays, and is thus well-known to graduate admissions committees.  Probably the effect on your application will be good, since if nothing else it shows you are serious about studying mathematics; a school can also reasonably expect you to be considerably better prepared coming after a year at Part III than when you finished your BA.  So if one of your issues was a weak curriculum as a BA student (as opposed to poor grades or weak letters), then Part III could help quite a bit.  On the other hand, I wouldn't count on a dramatic change in your graduate school admissions, in part because as you note, you won't have your grades or a strong recommendation from Part III in hand when you apply for graduate schools the next time around. I wouldn't worry about the fact that Part III is not research based; obviously doing research before starting graduate school is great, but most graduate schools in the US are not really expecting you to have done much in the way of it beforehand, or to be even close to ready to start when you enter.

I think if money is no object, then Part III is probably as good as anything else you might do for having a strong graduate application in the coming cycle.  EDIT: I should probably also say that a matter of substance (as opposed to application strategy), Part III is probably on average better than spending a year as a grad student at a random respectable grad program in the US, since it will bring you into contact with a wide variety of other students and ideas.

However, I think you should weigh that next to the possibility of starting graduate school at one of your lower preferences, and then trying to transfer after a year, or when you get a master's degree.  There's no guarantee this will work, but the same can be said of Part III.  If you've been offered funded admission at a respectable school in the US, and would have to pay your own way at Part III, I would look hard at whether you think it's worth the money.

EDIT: I wouldn't count on the "glamour" of Cambridge itself to have a strong effect.  I honestly don't know how selective Part III is (maybe someone who knows can comment.), so I wouldn't rely on assuming that admissions committees will consider it as such.  There's some psychological "band-wagon" effect where getting one prestigious position reinforces getting others, but it won't work if the substance isn't there. Getting a BA from Harvard or MIT is helpful for getting into graduate school (if you have a strong record) because an admissions committee is more confident that getting an A in math class at Harvard really means something, and that a professor at Harvard has a lot of experience with talented undergraduates and thus can speak with some certainty about what it takes to succeed in graduate school.  So, if you went to Part III, got good scores on your exams and got a strong recommendation from a professor there, that could strengthen your application a lot as a "second opinion" reinforcing the recommendations and grades you have from your BA.  However, as discussed, those would only be available for the fall 2016 admission cycle, not 2015.  One possibility is to see about accepting one of your safety schools with a deferment to go to Cambridge, going to Part II in 2014-5, going to the safety school in 2015 and applying for transfer in 2016 or 2017 if you're unhappy there.

One piece of information we're lacking is what your "lower preferences" are (don't put too much stock in USNW rankings, but they help to be concrete in a discussion like this).  It makes a big difference whether we're talking about a school in the rank ~25 (like UCSD), ~50 (like UVA) or ~100 (for example, South Carolina).  In the former case, I'd say it's a waste of time to try to try to move up unless you go and are miserable, whereas in the latter it makes a certain kind of sense.

LATER EDIT: Incidentally, yes, given that your undergraduate grades are already "baked in," the main things you can still hope to change are your letters, and also your GRE scores if those were bad.


Asking questions/sending note to the three authors of a paper in economics, three personalized letters? A famous paper has three coauthors. I wrote a note regarding that paper and want to get some feedback from them. Shall I send the note and my questions in one email to the three authors together (with two of them in cc line or also in "to" line), or is it more respectful to send three different personalized letters?
If I am sending three personalized letters to each of them, shall I tell them that I also send the letter to the two other authors?
One obvious answer for natural science disciplines is to send one email to the corresponding author only. However, most economic papers have equal coauthors and many economic papers have no corresponding authors or three corresponding authors with email addresses specified. In contrast, the natural science papers usually only have one corresponding.

My solution would be to send one mail. Personalization seems a wasted effort as you don't know the people, I assume. It even seems a bit presumptuous.
But put all three authors on the TO: line, not some there and some on the CC:, line. The latter feels like you are picking a lead author and they may not agree with that.
With twenty authors, the corresponding author solution would be fine, but with only a few, send it to all.


Disputed territorial claims in academic submissions This year I was asked to blind-review a paper which showed a map of China in the disputed Nine-Dash Line borders. I have seen the Nature Editorial from 2011 which discusses and criticizes this phenomenon (and suggests that there is a directive from the Chinese government to show the Nine-Dash line). The map in question showed graphically the values of a certain measured quantity for each of China's provinces. It may be of little surprise that the coloring does not reproduce very well for the tiny disputed islands. But this kind of display does give a reason to show borders.

Is it appropriate to insert a comment to this effect in a referee report, or can editors be assumed to be well aware of this issue already (or even be annoyed about an unnecessary reminder which may suggest, though not fairly so in many cases, a biased referee)?

Definitely point this out. The whole point of soliciting a review is to identify issues in the paper. You should not assume the editor knows the map on page 7 is inappropriate, just like you shouldn’t assume they are aware that step 5 of the methodology is unsound. The editor may choose to ignore your comment, but that is up to them. They should not be annoyed by a legitimate comment like this.

There is no justification for using scientific articles to advance territorial claims. If a political map is included, it should be clear when borders are disputed -- it's factually inaccurate to only present one claim. And one also questions why a political map is needed in the paper.


Is going to graduate school the same place I went to undergrad okay? Is it okay to get my bachelor's and master's degrees at the same school?  I intend to go into industry in computer science.

OK = will not substantially harm future prospects.

Getting a doctoral degree is not planned.

Edit: I might need to take out loans to go to a different school.

Hiring managers in industry will care more about the reputation of your master's degree than about where you earned your bachelor's degree.

If your undergraduate degree is from a medium-to-small school, you will probably have the same professors if you take your master's there.  In other words, you will have learned much of what they have to teach you when you finish your undergraduate degree.  So, for maximum learning, consider a master's from a different school that has a good reputation in industry.


In a manuscript, how do you know when you need to source the brand and location for materials? I'm writing my first manuscript and haven't received a lot of guidance on it. The journal that I plan on submitting to has an "Instructions for Authors" page, but I've scoured it and there is no information about sourcing the brand for your materials in the methods. I've looked at several articles from their most recent issue, and some but not all the materials were sourced.

Here's an example:

"...containing an aliquot of RT mixture (SsoAdvancedTM SYBR Green Supermix, Bio-Rad Laboratories Inc.)..."

How do I know which materials I should be sourcing in my manuscript? It doesn't say anywhere on the journal's information website, yet so far all the articles I've seen have done it.

(Also, why is this necessary? Shouldn't it be a given that if I'm using some industrial solution then it should be the same independent of the brand I use?)

It should be the case that material are not dependent on brand and location, but in many cases, especially the biological sciences, they are.  This is wrong and bad, but is also simply the state of the science at present, in areas that have not yet had standards and mechanisms for certifying those standards.  For example, something as apparently "simple" as DNA synthesis has no established quality control standards, so when somebody uses DNA supplied by an industrial supplier, which supplier can really make a difference!  The same is notoriously true for reagents as well---to the point where people will often put down not just the brand but the batch number.

So, how do you know when you need to reference the brand name?  There are two answers to this which are, unfortunately, somewhat contradictory:

Scientifically, you need to put it down whenever the expected variance in materials from supplier to supplier is might make a significant difference in the results that are observed.  If you don't know whether it will make a difference, you need to put it down.  Note that this is also strongly dependent on the size of the effect that you are measuring: if you predict and observe a function with high precision and minimal variance, then the materials are much less likely to matter than if you are observing a 10% variation in a noisy system and had to apply a significance test to determine that the result actually existed.
From a cultural perspective, you need to put the brand name down anywhere that reviewers in your field will expect to see a brand name, whether or not it is appropriate.  You can learn this by looking at papers, but it won't necessarily tell you what the scientific truth is, because there are often unsupported assumptions embedded in this cultural practice.

The conservative approach, of course, is to give brand for the union of both, and that's a reasonable strategy.  As methods progress, however, we should move toward the point where the mechanisms and experimental methods are well enough established that the effects of the incidental experimental circumstances can be minimized...