- Joined
- Dec 6, 2013
- Messages
- 4
- Reaction score
- 0
I found a professor willing to let me work in his lab, but this is only his 3rd year at the school.
Pros, from what I can tell, are that he is very open to having undergraduates publishing and doing their own projects. Right off the bat he said that his goal is to help me develop a project with presentable and publication ready data. He suggested that I go and read some papers and come back with my own project idea... <---kind of daunting, but also cool that he is letting me do this. He is very accessible and I have no doubts that I can easily form a good relationship with him.
Cons, I'm not too sure about for this specific lab, but may include funding issues and inexperience in general: his PhD and post-doc was in Chemical Engineering, but this is a Biology-focused lab, which I thought was a little strange. I've attended several lab meetings and his knowledge in biology/bioengineering doesn't seem that extensive. Maybe I'm just being over-critical. Also he's un-tenured (but on the tenure-track), so his letter of rec might not hold much weight compared to a more well-known professor.
I'm curious to see if any of you have also joined brand new labs, and how your experiences went. It seems like a good opportunity, especially since the PI is so open to letting me publish, and I would be able to have my own project right off the bat, but at the same time I am concerned about the productivity and risks of a lab that's starting from the ground up. Also, I would have 2 years in this lab before I apply for medical school. On the other side, more established labs come with their own trade-offs: less face-time with the PI, less opportunity for independence/intellectual input, but they're more well-oiled machines.
For those of you that have worked in either new labs or older, "big-shot" labs, I would love to hear your opinions!
Pros, from what I can tell, are that he is very open to having undergraduates publishing and doing their own projects. Right off the bat he said that his goal is to help me develop a project with presentable and publication ready data. He suggested that I go and read some papers and come back with my own project idea... <---kind of daunting, but also cool that he is letting me do this. He is very accessible and I have no doubts that I can easily form a good relationship with him.
Cons, I'm not too sure about for this specific lab, but may include funding issues and inexperience in general: his PhD and post-doc was in Chemical Engineering, but this is a Biology-focused lab, which I thought was a little strange. I've attended several lab meetings and his knowledge in biology/bioengineering doesn't seem that extensive. Maybe I'm just being over-critical. Also he's un-tenured (but on the tenure-track), so his letter of rec might not hold much weight compared to a more well-known professor.
I'm curious to see if any of you have also joined brand new labs, and how your experiences went. It seems like a good opportunity, especially since the PI is so open to letting me publish, and I would be able to have my own project right off the bat, but at the same time I am concerned about the productivity and risks of a lab that's starting from the ground up. Also, I would have 2 years in this lab before I apply for medical school. On the other side, more established labs come with their own trade-offs: less face-time with the PI, less opportunity for independence/intellectual input, but they're more well-oiled machines.
For those of you that have worked in either new labs or older, "big-shot" labs, I would love to hear your opinions!