Two research labs at the same time

[bae2017]

Hi all, sorry in advance for the wall of text.

I'm currently a sophomore in undergrad - I've been working in a clinical research lab at an Alzheimer's Center since the summer, mainly doing neuroimaging/data analysis stuff. Over the course of this year I've gotten more interested in AD pathology and have the opportunity to join a lab that does more basic biochemistry/cell biology research with regards to AD pathology...

Obviously the overwhelming feedback I've received is to do research in stuff that I'm interested in, but I'm pretty genuinely interested in both. I talked to my current PI about it and he really wants me to stay and work with him - based upon our progress so far, I will probably be 2nd/3rd author on 3-4 papers by the time I graduate in 2017. Both from an output and LOR point of view, this is an awesome lab.

The other lab I'm considering is very productive and I am very interested in the science, but would doing two labs at the same time be too much? Anybody have experience with this? A main concern I have is that I'm not really looking to apply for MD/PhD. Not that I don't enjoy research, but I want to maintain a clinical focus as an MD. Any advice is welcome, thanks in advance!

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[Shirafune]

If MD/PhD is not your goal, I would forgo extensive bench training. I would just try to be more productive in your clinical research lab in your current lab if you are seeking more research or other areas of your application, seeing how much you enjoy it. That being said, I think bench training is amazing, but has a tough learning curve, compared to clinical research (correct me if I'm wrong; I do not have experience in clinical research).

To be realistic, if you want to be productive in a basic sciences lab, you probably need to put in 15 - 20 hours/week during the academic year and more in the summer. For you, I think you would benefit from a summer of bench work (you decide on the intensity), just to have the exposure.

All in all, working in two labs at the same time (especially during the academic year) would consume too much time if MD/PhD is not your primary goal anyways.

 

[NeuResurgens]

Stay in one lab. I tried to join two and it wasn't good. Luckily the professor for my first (and current) lab was cool about it and forgave it as a Naive mistake, but I think that the other guy thinks I'm fickle and uncommitted.

 

[bae2017]

What if my main goals are the top research medical schools?

 

[NeuResurgens]

What if my main goals are the top research medical schools?

In this case I'd say just excel in the lab you are in. Publish, go to conferences and present.. You don't need to have research with multiple professors unless you're going MD/PhD. If you really are interested in working with the other guy though, what you can do is approach your current professor with a project proposal which would integrate the work of the two labs, and ask him if he'd like to collaborate with the other professor. If you could publish jointly with both of them, that would look awesome.

 

[Shirafune]

In this case I'd say just excel in the lab you are in. Publish, go to conferences and present.. You don't need to have research with multiple professors unless you're going MD/PhD. If you really are interested in working with the other guy though, what you can do is approach your current professor with a project proposal which would integrate the work of the two labs, and ask him if he'd like to collaborate with the other professor. If you could publish jointly with both of them, that would look awesome.

I second this collaborative proposal business. Do you have prior bench research experience? It would be a lot more work trying to get this collab paper out if you are going to be one of the chief people without much bench experience...

 

[NeuResurgens]

I second this collaborative proposal business. Do you have prior bench research experience? It would be a lot more work trying to get this collab paper out if you are going to be one of the chief people without much bench experience...

Agreed, I forgot to mention that you should be at least somewhat experienced before attempting this.

 

[Shirafune]

What if my main goals are the top research medical schools?

Just a note to this. Top research med schools just want their candidates to be well trained in the scientific process so that they may become successful academic physicians. It doesn't matter what kind of biomedical research you participate in, clinical or bench, so long as you have training in research as a generalized discipline.

 

[bae2017]

Absolutely 0 bench/wet lab experience. I only recently decided on pre-med this year, which is why I opted for this current position (I had some prior experience with stats/data analysis). Not that I regret my decision, but I think it would be awesome to get that experience.

The collab paper sounds like an amazing idea... Difficult to execute though. I am planning on doing independent research for credit through my University in my junior summer/throughout my senior year. A year of Research Assistant work in the lab I'm interested in would probably prepare me for this, correct?

 

[NeuResurgens]

Absolutely 0 bench/wet lab experience. I only recently decided on pre-med this year, which is why I opted for this current position (I had some prior experience with stats/data analysis). Not that I regret my decision, but I think it would be awesome to get that experience.

The collab paper sounds like an amazing idea... Difficult to execute though. I am planning on doing independent research for credit through my University in my junior summer/throughout my senior year. A year of Research Assistant work in the lab I'm interested in would probably prepare me for this, correct?

Most likely yes if you are an active participant. Take time to ask your professor questions, thoroughly learn the process of formulating scientific inquiries and then developing techniques to test them. Demonstrate commitment to the work your professor is doing in his research. I'd say that while you're doing this you should think long and hard about how the two professor's work relates to each other and what you could test by integrating them. After about a year and a half, you could approach your professor about a new project. Be aware of the current demands on his lab, however. Try to discern when the right time to propose a new project would actually be, because he's not as likely to want to take it on if you're already in the middle of a big study.

 

[tiedyeddog]

stick with the one you're currently in. Adcoms don't care if it is basic vs clinical. Or, do whatever gets you the most pubs.

 

[Shirafune]

Absolutely 0 bench/wet lab experience. I only recently decided on pre-med this year, which is why I opted for this current position (I had some prior experience with stats/data analysis). Not that I regret my decision, but I think it would be awesome to get that experience.

The collab paper sounds like an amazing idea... Difficult to execute though. I am planning on doing independent research for credit through my University in my junior summer/throughout my senior year. A year of Research Assistant work in the lab I'm interested in would probably prepare me for this, correct?

Tentatively, I just wouldn't bother with the basic research lab. It would take at least a year of training from scratch for you to be able to work independently and come up with future experimentation. You will be a junior by the time you are ready to start your own project, let alone tackle a monstrous collaborative paper. These clinical-bench papers will obviously take more time than a basic sciences paper...

If you are really enthusiastic about such a project, I think an intensive bench work summer in that lab would be a good start. And hopefully the basic sciences lab has another student (preferably a trained undergraduate who can dedicate a lot of time to it) that can help take care of the bench experiments. The bench training is more or less for your own benefit and understanding more than anything. Still, I think this idea is not worth the time, given how much commitment and project uncertainty there is...

 

[Lucca]

Do not do more than one lab at a time. "Good" research is not "a lot" of research. Good research is focused, is given a lot of time, care, effort and attention, is mostly independent and answers a question people care about. If you want to impress people, devote a lot of time to a single project where you can present or publish your results.

However, since you have zero research experience I would recommend joining a lab whose work you find interesting (I don't really know what the discussion above about clinical vs. basic is about, that is so beyond the scope of this conversation) and then spend enough time working on a project to figure out if research is even a good fit for you to begin with. If you despise research with all of your heart and soul then that might be the first clue that the research-heavy schools might not be the best fit for you. In terms of MD-only the real goal is to learn about the scientific process and your education in the lab - not to mention, the rest of your application - will suffer if you work in multiple labs at the same time. I don't think there's a big difference between doing wet lab work or not if the topic interests you but Shirafune is correct in that it will take time to learn the ropes.

 

[bae2017]

However, since you have zero research experience I would recommend joining a lab whose work you find interesting (I don't really know what the discussion above about clinical vs. basic is about, that is so beyond the scope of this conversation) and then spend enough time working on a project to figure out if research is even a good fit for you to begin with. If you despise research with all of your heart and soul then that might be the first clue that the research-heavy schools might not be the best fit for you. In terms of MD only the real goal is to learn about the scientific process and your education in the lab - not to mention, the rest of your application - will suffer if you work in multiple labs at the same time.

Sorry, to clarify, I've already been working in a clinical research lab for ~9 months. The question I'm posing is if it would be worth it to join a basic science lab that I am interested in. From what I'm hearing, the potential rewards are not worth the potential time spent acclimating to a new lab. Makes sense.

To throw a couple more variables into the mix:
The PI who runs the basic science lab also teaches a neurobiology course to undergrads, which I could take. An aspect of my plan was to work as an RA in his lab, take his course, work diligently, and boom! LOR!
I also am interested in studying biochem - there's a great deal of content overlap between biochem and some of the other extracurriculars that are near and dear to my heart, but the current clinical lab I'm working at has ~essentially~ nothing to do with biochemistry. One of my reasons for joining a more basic science lab would be to more effectively integrate my activities and interests.

Loving the responses so far! Thoughts?

 

[Lucca]

Sorry, to clarify, I've already been working in clinical research lab for ~9 months. The question I'm posing is if it would be worth it to join a basic science lab that I am interested in. From what I'm hearing, the potential rewards are not worth the cost of the potential time spent acclimating to a new lab. Makes sense.

To add a throw a couple more variables into the mix:
The PI who runs the basic science lab also teaches a neurobiology course to undergrads, which I could take. An aspect of my plan was to work as an RA in his lab, take his course, work diligently, and boom! LOR!
I also am interested in studying biochem - there's a great deal of content overlap between biochem and some of the other extracurriculars that are near and dear to my heart, but the current clinical lab I'm working at has ~essentially~ nothing to do with biochemistry. One of my reasons for joining a more basic science lab would be to more effectively integrate my activities and interests.

Loving the responses so far! Thoughts?

I understand. I would pick between one route or the other but not pursue both. It would simply be too much to handle at once and you would be worse off overall if over- commitment caused the quality of your work to go down.

 

[ZedsDed]

tl;dr Quality over quantity. Adcoms would rather see something of value come from your efforts (i.e. publications.)

 

[ruedjgtc]

Stay in the lab that you have the largest role in, if you're lucky it's also the one you enjoy the most. Being in an interesting lab sounds cool to you friends, but doing something interesting/having responsibility sounds cool to medical schools. Also, labs like when you commit to them, so quitting one puts you in the position to bring up having more time for a larger role at the one you stay at.

Including post grad, I stayed in one lab for several years, it was rewarding. During that time we had several premeds cycle in and out to rack up hours. I'm sure they were busy, but they would often just kill our productivity because we'd never get the work/time back that we put into them — overextending yourself will make you useless to both labs unless you're a science savant.