Productive things to do during a research year

[yuiness]

---

Members do not see this ad.

I'm currently doing a research year between 3rd and 4th year and am working in the lab of the division chief in the field that I would like to go in to. My project is pretty low-maintenance right now, and on many days, I only have 3-4 hours of real work. I've talked to my supervisors about the possibility of taking on additional projects, only to be met with vague statements of "maybe you can help with X in the future..." without any real follow-up, and despite my best efforts, I can't make myself sit and read journal articles for more than a few hours a day. Does anyone have any advice for how to use my excess time productively, either inside or outside the lab?

 

[loveoforganic2]

I was going to suggest writing a review since that should require pretty little involvement of your supervisor, but if you're not big on reading the literature, probably a bad idea

 

[yuiness]

I was going to suggest writing a review since that should require pretty little involvement of your supervisor, but if you're not big on reading the literature, probably a bad idea

Any advice on how to get started on doing something like this when I have no experience?

 

[loveoforganic2]

This is where you'd need some guidance from your mentor (I didn't mean that it would be completely free of his/her support, just relatively less so and without the requirement of lab resources/patients/IRB approval/funding/etc.).

http://www.asbmb.org/asbmbtoday/asbmbtoday.aspx?id=15161

Seems to have some decent info. The gist is that you want to identify a topic in the literature that's had several studies done touching on that topic, but hasn't had the results amalgamated (I don't mean doing a meta-analysis, just summarizing the results and implications of the various papers in a cohesive way). Put that together, identify where the research has been weak/lacking, possible areas for future research, etc. You could think of it as an expanded introduction section to an article, except you aren't going to only be arguing why you did your current project/why your current project is meaningful

Note that I've written a review, but not published. One thing I found very helpful in writing though was making an excel table of journal articles on one axis and topics I planned to address on the other axis. As you read, you can pop relevant snippets into the table. Makes it much easier to look at what information you have to write about

 

[Porfirio]

I'm currently doing a research year between 3rd and 4th year and am working in the lab of the division chief in the field that I would like to go in to. My project is pretty low-maintenance right now, and on many days, I only have 3-4 hours of real work. I've talked to my supervisors about the possibility of taking on additional projects, only to be met with vague statements of "maybe you can help with X in the future..." without any real follow-up, and despite my best efforts, I can't make myself sit and read journal articles for more than a few hours a day. Does anyone have any advice for how to use my excess time productively, either inside or outside the lab?

1 year in research is not really long enough to do anything meaningful (under most conditions). Enjoy the time off.

 

[iave9963]

Masturbate

😱

 

[duckie99]

welcome to research time OP. It's generally a pretty easy lifestyle. If you can't find ways to get involved with extra stuff from time to time I suggest working on yourself; lose weight, exercise, travel, enjoy life. Get your work done but this is likely the last real time you will have to do some of this stuff for a prolonged period of time.