Research on Mice

[tealover567]

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[ashylarry23]

cool story bro

 

[theseeker4]

How good does research on mice at a world famous lab look for medical school? Will it make that big a difference if I have already done my clinical volunteering? Assume this will be a 2 year engagement with a letter of rec. It will be researching neurobiology which I can relate to an illness that one of my family members has. Maybe that is a stretch? How highly do adcoms look upon this? Thanks.

Research is in a completely different category from clinical experience. Neither one makes up for the other (though some experiences are both clinical and research at the same time). Schools want to see clinical experience and they want to see research, whether you have clinical experience already doesn't really matter when considering whether to get research experience.


Research looks good whether it is clinical, biosciences, chemistry, etc. Pre med school research is all about being exposed to the process of scientific research, so exactly what the project is isn't all that important. There is also no need to try to stretch what the lab is working on to have some personal deep meaning to you; as long as you can discuss the research and its implications for future work, that is all you need to be able to do.

What is important is that you have meaningful contributions to the project. If your job is to clean glassware all day and the only time you even see the scientists working on the project is when you give them their flasks back, you should find another lab. If you are actually involved in the meaningful bench work, involved in discussions about the experiments, responsible for compiling and interpreting data, that is a good job to keep. If you are actually given responsibility for designing your own experiments or are listed as an author on a publication, that is a huge bonus, but expect to have to prove yourself before they give you any of those opportunities.