Research position question

[rabidpanda13]

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I am starting in an animal behavior lab this week and I am going in to meet with the professor who runs the lab on Friday to talk about what kinds of projects I want to work on and since I haven't really been exposed to anything like this before I was hoping to get some help from anyone who has. He asked me if I was interested in working on "experimental" based projects or "molecular" based projects. Anybody have any insight as to what these might entail so I have some idea? I mean I know the idea is to learn, but I figure the students who are science majors would already have some idea. Thanks!

 

[harrothere]

Molecular might be something "micro-scale" like protein interaction assays, blots, EM/Confocal microscopy, ELIZAs, pathology, etc.

Experiemental might be something more "macro-scale" like morris water mazes on mice, behavioral analysis (such as frequency of bellowing behavior of bison), optical masking, etc.

Which area interests you more?

 

[rabidpanda13]

I"m thinking the molecular area might interest me more but my exposure to all of this is very limited since I'm a nutrition major. I was just trying to get a feel for what both areas involved so when he asked me what you just did "Which area interests you?" I don't just stare at him like a *****.

 

[CoolWhipp]

Maybe what you could have said is I'm interested in getting exposure to both molecular and experimental based projects. This, usually, is never the wrong answer. If you are trying to act like you know what he was talking about and you are forced to choose between molecular or experimental (after having said that you are interested in doing both), then just randomly choose one. This way, you won't look "bad," when you actually had to choose one if you had to at that moment. As I am sure you are aware of this, you always want to research what you may be doing. Proteomic analyses can be quite boring, at least for me. When joining a new lab it is always a good idea to skim the PI's papers on pubmed. This will give you an idea about the kinds of techniques are used in the lab. It will also make you look better when you are learning something from your post-doc or PI. "Looking better" is key when you when asking for a LOR is in the relatively near future.

Good luck.

 

[kami333]

It really depends on what the research is on, but from my experience...

If "experimental" means animal models: better overall picture (at least for me since most of our stuff is done in vitro first) , less tedious (it's more interactive), less chance of developing tendinitis (less pipetting), more frustrating (animals behave less consistently than cells), more time consuming (setup/clean up/maintenance), less control over schedule (harder to control when they are of a certain age, pregnant, etc, ie I've spent Thanksgiving and Christmas in the lab due to mice), need more planning (can't grow a mice colony overnight), can be harder to learn procedures (but once learned can be applied across species), more involvment even at a basic level (even with ugrads)

"Molecular" projects: more tedious (especially if you do cultures), tendinitis (pipetting a 384well plate is serious business), easy place to put ugrad "muscle" (labs need someone to pour gels or run routine PCRs), quicker turn-around per experiment, easier data collection (in general), easier data analysis (in general), easier to fit around schedule, usually cheaper (good for both number of experiments and covering for screwups), more respected (debatable, but sometimes animal models get the shaft, they are usually the last experiment done before submitting a paper), techniques are fairly standard (makes switching labs easier)

obviously both have their good points and bad points, a lot depends on the project and your personality. Also consider whether you think you want to continue research in the future, if you don't I think you get "more" out of animal models in a shorter amount of time.