lab life
apalazzo | September 14, 2006Why am I making all this fuss over the latest stats on acceptance rate of general RO1 grants distributed by the National Institute of Health (NIH) ? This is the money that keeps the biomedical/life sciences alive in the US. The numbers indicate that fewer grants are aproved on the first submission. To get your grant funded, you have to resubmit more and more. The longer it takes to get your grant approved, the more your career is in jeopardy. Every time your grant request is turned down, it's another 3-4 months until you can resubmit it to the NIH. If you spend all your time writing and…
apalazzo | September 13, 2006... (or where did all the funding go???)
From The Scientific Activist, Mike the Mad Biologist (and Science Mag, where the article was published - I must have missed this). And now PZ Myers and Orac have commented as well.
Look at the drop in total first time RO1s and the drop in the rate of funding.
{Update} From the article:
We have collected data (6, 7) on the fate of "unamended" (unsolicited) R01 applications. The unamended R01 represents the original application and does not consider resubmissions. NIH classifies R01 applications into type-1 (new) and type-2 (renewals). Revision and…
apalazzo | September 7, 2006Here is the September Issue:
Besides the "What Makes you Sexy" feature, there is
- THE REDUCTION OF SEDUCTION
- EAT YOUR WAY TO BETTER DNA
- IN SICKNESS AND IN HEALTH (Making marriage work at the job can be challenging for couples as well as colleagues.)
What's next? "37 ways to turn on your PI" ???
(P.S. Just as I was about to post this "Geek" entry, I noticed that today's episode of ScienceBlogs was brought to you by the word "Nerd" ... WTF?)
apalazzo | September 4, 2006(Again from the archives)
After having written about the worst, why not write about the best things about science? Here goes:
1 - Discovery. One of the greatest feelings I've ever had as a researcher was peering down at the microscope and seeing something that I know has never been seen in the history of mankind. It's funny, the first thing you want to do is ... tell somebody. When my thesis advisor discovered that cells have different types of microtubules (a truly unexpected finding) it was the middle of the night. Apparently, he rushed off to explain the big discovery to the only other…
apalazzo | September 4, 2006From the archives, in honor of Labor Day.
1 - Being scooped. There is nothing worse than working your ass off for 4 years (much of it in the coldroom) when BANG! a paper comes out making all your work useless.
2 - Begging for money. When scientists are not working, eating, sleeping or at some seminar/conference, they are ... writing grants, fellowships ... aka begging. Their applications can be summarized as follows "I'm so great, my work is so important, look at how sexy my results are" but in reality they meant to say "if you don't give me this grant, my lab is going to sink into a deep…
apalazzo | August 25, 2006OK I live 30min away from the Longwood Medical Center by foot. Most days I walk to and from work but on rainy/blizzard days I take the M2 Shuttle, a free service provided by Harvard to ship people between the Medical Campus here at Longwood and the Main Campus in Cambridge. It's dependable and well used.
Now to save a couple of bucks, they're going to charge postdocs 2$ a ride. That's more than the cost of a T fare (T=subway in Boston)!
Why?
Doesn't Harvard want to help us get to work and be efficient? No way. After all, it's OK to crap on postdocs.
And to make matters worse it's not all…
apalazzo | August 10, 2006Others write about it.
So apparently some rant by a Physicist has been making the rounds (and it's not the first time). Lots of bloggers have commented on it.
Should students be discouraged from going into science? Do we have to many PhDs? Should we help science undergrads organize their careers? And yes, poor physicists can't even jump ship and get a job in industry (unless they start designing semiconductors) ...
But I refuse to participate! Enough whining! (Yes I know, by writing this entry I'm a hypocrite.)
So what do I have to say? Well anyone who reads this blog on a regular basis knows…
apalazzo | August 9, 2006In the world of science blogging, it would seem, that there ain't many cell biologists (as far as I can tell). What is a Cell Biologist? Well lets just say that one of the main tools of your trade is photographing fluorescent images of cells.
Here is another definition (from the Disciplines of the Life Sciences):
Cell Biologist:
Cell biologists are the psychiatrists of the cellular world. They observe cell "behavior" through a microscope. They give cells drugs. They probe cells with microinjector needles. They shine big lasers ... well it's not always clear what they do with their lasers. A…
apalazzo | August 9, 2006I got this funny/cynical email from a good friend. What do you think?
In the jungle of research, a small white rabbit stumbles upon a wolf.
"What's a bunny doing here? " says the famished wolf.
"I am doing an important piece of research work for my thesis, " says the rabbit.
"And what is that?"
"It's all about the superiority of rabbits on wolves."
"Hin hin."
"Don't you believe me? Come in my place."
And no one ever heard about the wolf anymore.
Sometimes after that the rabbit meets a Tiger in the jungle of research.
Asked what he is doing in such a perilous place, the rabbit says: "A thesis…
apalazzo | August 4, 2006My baymate and I started a little discussion about lab fashion. Why? Well I'm a pretty ardent wearer of sandals, I'll wear them until late fall if I have to. I'll wear them with jeans too. But under no circumstances will I wear sandals with socks.
We then listed all the faculty who combine these clothing items on a regular basis (sorry, the list is confidential).
This brings me to my question to all you out there is: why wear sandals with socks? (And why does the sandals with socks phenotype correlate with being in research?)
Now while we were on the topic we asked a deeper, in some sense…
apalazzo | August 3, 2006Another "We support the postdocs" editorial at Nature Cell Biology:
The days when one could imagine starting a laboratory following a short postdoctoral position, or even with no postdoctoral training at all, are long gone. Nowadays, extensive postdoctoral training is essential not only if you are pursuing an academic career, but also for a research career in industry or biotechnology.
Although the pool of postdocs has expanded significantly in the past two decades, an increase in the number of academic positions, and other research opportunities that they can subsequently move to, has not…
apalazzo | August 2, 2006As I've written before, things are happening in California. I also learned that postdocs at University of Connecticut Healthcare Center (UCHC) joined (formed?) a union, University Health Professionals (UHP), in 2004. From the PRO/UAW site (PRO=Postdoctoral Researchers Organize):
A recent article in Science's Next Wave outlines many of the improvements won by unionized Postdocs at the University of Connecticut Healthcare Center (UCHC) though collective bargaining. In the first contract, Postdocs won significant wage increases--as much as $10,000 in some cases, annual cost of living…
apalazzo | July 31, 2006Yes, things are on the move (since we last checked) in California.
Get more info here.
(Yes I'm a month behind - but someone just told me about it ...)Nope, they filed 7/25/2006.
apalazzo | July 26, 2006And people think I'm down about the current situation.
In the last issue of Cell, Robert A. Weinberg is calling the current batch of postdocs The Lost Generation.
The abstract:
The funding policies of the NIH have made it increasingly difficult for young researchers to procure research funds. This threatens to drive a whole generation of young people away from careers in basic biomedical research.
First Paul Nurse, now Weinberg, I hope they are paying attention!
The numbers are striking. Over the past generation, the age at which American biomedical researchers with PhD degrees succeed in…
apalazzo | July 25, 2006So today I was "shopping" online for cDNA clones from Open Biosystems (about 70-100$/cDNA clone) when I see this:
In case you can't read it here is a blowup:
So on the Open Biosystems website, some guy is blogging about podcasts and his daily commute? It would seem that everyone (and every website) has a blog.
apalazzo | July 24, 2006Overheard at the lab today:
"Only hookers work on weekends"
which was then followed by "and late nights."
Yes this is what we've been reduced to ...
(P.S. Does this make my PI a pimp?)
apalazzo | July 24, 2006So a theme of my blog has been the conflicts between being a scientist and having a life. In my immediate environment, I'm surrounded by postdocs in their early to mid-30s, struggling to get their career going and thinking about starting a family. In some respects I'm lucky -- I'm male, and my wife is not an academic. I will never face the stress of pregnancy + facing the trials and tribulations of academia. But that is not to say that being a father and a postdoc/junior faculty will be easy. We are planning to have children eventually, however the longer we delay the hard it will be. This…
apalazzo | July 20, 2006A couple of weeks ago I posted an entry on NIH funding rates, and how the increase in funding over the 90s led to an increase in the number of postdocs.
I went digging around for the numbers, and found this power point from the National Academies of Science Engineering and Medicine.
So here are some stats for all those interested:
The number of postdocs in the biomedical sciences has almost doubled between 1990 and 2000, following the increase in NIH funding.
And interestingly, most of these extra postdocs are foreigners (like me).
So it seems like the increase in postdocs could only be…