Strike Oil: Get Published

[swifteagle43]

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How the hell do you get published? Do you just work under a professor long enough and ask to get published when he published? WTF?!

 

[Law2Doc]

The usual way to get onto a publication is to find a research assistant/volunteer position at a local academia-affiliated hospital. I would contact the volunteer office of the hospital and see if they have anything available, or if you have any hospital physician connections, that would be an even better route. There are always hospital faculty and residents working on research projects, and they are usually happy to have someone to do all the grunt work (i.e. entering data onto spreadsheets and other similarly unglamorous administrative stuff is typical). In return for your labor, you generally get listed on a publication (but of course not usually one of the first two or three names).

 

[PostalWookie]

There's no guaranteed way to get published, no mater what anyone tells you. I've been working in my current lab for almost 3 years, and we're just now sending out 2 papers (with me as second author), but there's never any guarantee that your PI will even put you on the paper. Back in high school, I did this summer project at another lab, and it got published, but even though I did all the work and project design and even the write-up, I ended up as like the 4th author. So it's pretty random. MY advise is not to go looking for a research experience with the intent of publishing, or you will likely be disappointed. Just think of a publication as a nice bonus if you do get one.

 

[Neuronix]

How the hell do you get published? Do you just work under a professor long enough and ask to get published when he published? WTF?!

It's luck. Adcoms know this. Work hard in a lab, and that's what adcoms will notice. I had no publications, and neither did most of my MD/PhD buddies at top programs.

 

[PublicEnemy]

very true. adcoms are impressed if you know a subject well, and can talk at length about the nature of the research you're involved with. find something you like, work there, learn something.

 

[swifteagle43]

So you actually have to become familiar with the research itself rather than the day to day number crunchin aspect?

 

[Haybrant]

So you actually have to become familiar with the research itself rather than the day to day number crunchin aspect?

it really depends on the nature of the lab; to the above poster you pretty much got screwed if you were 4th author; find a lab that is high-throughput; its not hard, just search pubmed.

 

[swifteagle43]

it really depends on the nature of the lab; to the above poster you pretty much got screwed if you were 4th author; find a lab that is high-throughput; its not hard, just search pubmed.

what is pubmed

 

[Ol'DocToxic]

I have quite a few publications: 7 peer-reviewed papers (3 of which I am 1st author), I wrote a book chapter and made 8 national meeting presentations. I'm not trying to brag, just making the case that I know what I am talking about. Furthermore, I have a PhD, and I worked as a postdoc.

About publications: The first thing you need to understand is that the publication cycle (i.e. how long it takes a lab to get a publication out) is on the order of years. My first publication as a first author took me almost 2 solid years of full time lab work as a grad student. Thus, it may not be realistic as an undergrad research assistant to work part time for 2 semesters and get on a paper. The next thing you need to understand is what activities warrant your inclusion as an author on a paper. One sure-fire way to be an author on the paper is to actually author some of the paper. As an undergrad, this usually means writing a part of the materials and methods section or even some of the results section. Another way is to contribute significantly to the experimental data on a paper. This one is a little trickier to determine if authorship is warranted. If you are taught an assay and just crank out data for a grad student or postdoc, you may not get authorship even if those data make it into a paper. However, if you really help develop an assay or work hard at perfecting an assay for a particular application or experimental system, then your chances of getting on the paper are much greater (and you are much more deserving of authorship). Finally, the only two names that really mean anything on a paper are the first and last authors. It doesn't matter if you are the 4th or 6th or 9th author.

The other thing you need to do to get on a paper is to let your research director (be it the PI or postdoc or grad student you are working under) KNOW that you are interested in getting published. Tell someone in the lab, who is in a position to make the decision of who gets on a paper and who does not, that you are willing to write certain sections or that you will do whatever work is needed to warrant your inclusion as an author. If you have made a significant contribution to a paper about to be submitted and you're not on it, politely make your case that you feel like you should be included as an author. More often than not, if you have a decent argument, you will be included. Believe me, no one is going to run up to you begging you to let them put your name on one of their papers. In fact, there is pressure to keep the number of authors on a paper as low as possible to limit the dilution of credit for the work shared by the authors.

Pubmed: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi

 

[G0S2]

what is pubmed

A database of everything published in the sciences and medicine. It is located at the National Library of Medicine at the NIH.


www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

You can search for articles by author, subject.......