What exactly is SUMMER RESEARCH?

[Ezekiel20]

Dear all

I am a 2nd yr med student from Sydney, Australia.

In my course, honours are awarded by completion of a project (ideally resulting in a publication) rather than exam results (we have a pass/fail system so there is no ranking).

The projects are supposed to take 10-12 weeks to complete.

However I am a bit confused as to how someone can do research for 10-12 weeks and come up with something worthy of being published in a peer-reviewed journal.

It also seems like a massive step from learning the basic physiology/pathology etc, to discovering new stuff that gets read by experts in their respective fields..

On this forum I've seen a number of posts that talk about 'summer research' that resulted in publications. I have a feeling that the level of research required for honours at my university may be similar to that of the summer research projects I hear about (given the time frame etc)..

Could you please give me some idea of how you went about your research, what it involved, and how much time it took?

Thanks in advance

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[Pinkertinkle]

You have to get pretty lucky to get a publication from a summer research project. Many students continue to do research during class to extend their project and accomplish something worthwhile.

 

[Northerner]

Usually students work closely with a faculty member, probably taking on a small tangent project of the faculty member's research program. A decent chunk of the short (8-12 weeks) time you have is spent getting acquainted with the protocol and learning the procedures, what-have-you. However, if your data is relatively clean at the end, you were able to churn out a decent sample size, and your PI is fair and well-published, there is a decent chance you will have a window of opportunity to publish from a summer research project. Obviously, all of these things depend on your area, your PI, your project, your school, etc.

 

[Law2Doc]

Usually students work closely with a faculty member, probably taking on a small tangent project of the faculty member's research program. A decent chunk of the short (8-12 weeks) time you have is spent getting acquainted with the protocol and learning the procedures, what-have-you. However, if your data is relatively clean at the end, you were able to churn out a decent sample size, and your PI is fair and well-published, there is a decent chance you will have a window of opportunity to publish from a summer research project. Obviously, all of these things depend on your area, your PI, your project, your school, etc.

Totally agree with this, although depending on what you are doing and how much research experience you have in your past, the protocol and procedures often can be dealt with early in the first week. I also note that certain projects tend to better lend themselves to rapid publication. Certainly a retrospective chart review type clinical research would allow you to accumulate statistically significant data set over a couple of months, based purely on the amount of time you want to put in. Or really any kind of study where you could add multiple subject/sample data to your sample size on a daily basis should allow you to get an adequate number before the summer is up.
As for the OP's comment about it being a massive step from physiology/pathology, yes it is, which is why you are most typically going to be working with a PI with expertise in the field, who often will give direction and suggests possible avenues of research, and will load you up with the applicable articles to read.

 

[Ezekiel20]

Thanks everyone for the input.

Anyone willing to share their experience of this type of brief research?