Can my supervisor steal my theoretical achievements, and publish a paper without me We have solved an important mathematic problem that has not been solved over 10 years. I want to publish a paper about this topic soon, but my supervisor impede me, and he is reasoning that the quality of paper is not good enough. I am concerned that he may publish a paper about the mathematic solution,  without mentioning me as an author, to claim that he is the first person to solve the mathematic problem. Is this action legal?

Collaborating with someone you don't trust is no fun.  I do not speak from direct experience -- I have certainly trusted and remained on positive terms with all of my collaborators.  Yet even under these favorable conditions there are (most) often some conflicts with one's collaborators: e.g. (i) they are dragging their feet / pushing you forward impatiently, (ii) including sloppy and inaccurate / pedantically correct and overly lengthy text, (iii) pushing for publication of a modest partial result / never being satisfied with what has already been obtained, (iv) shooting way too low / way too high in the choice of journal...and so forth.  If I thought that my collaborators truly did not have my best interests at heart...yikes.  This goes doubly when there is a significant differential of power / seniority among collaborators: there can be a fine line between giving your junior collaborator the benefit of your additional experience and insisting that they do things your way.

I'm very sorry to hear that you are worried that your advisor may try to steal your joint work.  If your question is really whether it is in any way ethically acceptable or appropriate for him to do so, the answer is easy: of course not.  However, that you ask shows either great inexperience / mild paranoia on your part or is a sign that the collaboration is dangerously in the "no fun" range.  I looked at your profile and saw that you are a PhD student at a quite reputable research university in the US.  Moreover based on your username I suspect that you are either one of two students with that name in a certain department (not the math department) at that university, each with the same advisor, a young faculty member with an impressive CV.  Obviously I can't promise anything, but in all of my experience a faculty member with a CAREER grant is not someone who would want or need to steal their student's work: not even close, and not on their worst day.  (As an aside, the fact that I suspect that I have identified your advisor whom you are one step away from accusing of stealing your joint work is not great, and you should think about being a bit more circumspect.)

I advise you to concentrate on improving the interpersonal aspects of your collaboration: try to understand your advisor better and vice versa, and try to shore up trust.  If you really can't do that, it's time to find a new advisor.  Though I don't know the situation, based on the fact that you've given no convincing evidence for your suspicions and some other clues, my guess is that you are rather new to research (at least of this kind or at this level) and that as you "learn the ropes" your suspicions will be assuaged.  If you have made a significant mathematical (note: not "mathematic"!) breakthrough, then indeed you should proceed carefully and patiently and not rush into publication.  If the paper is not well written -- according to standards that are difficult to meet or even fully grasp for most graduate students -- that can affect its reception and jeopardize its suitability for publication in a top journal.

Good luck.

If you are extremely worried that you work not receive credit. Look into your Universities Intellectual Properties contact. As a student you have agreed to the universities definition/beliefs on Intellectual Property/Original Authorship. If you used any advanced equipment provided by the University to solve, or invent, most universities take some credit in discoveries. If it was for a class project, then most likely your university receives some credit, if you presented this as a project paper, your university might get some credit. If your really concerned, take your scenario, and apply it to your Universities rules regarding said issue. Only you know if the advisor helped, or if this was a project paper, or a team effort. Also their are many things to show this solution was yours if he tries to publish. First revamp your draft, then shooting a email to the adviser asking he/she to give you feed back on the paper. Make it clear that this is your discovery, that He/she had nothing to do with it. Anyone that sees said email and attachment need to understand that your the original author just by skimming over it. Most importantly, make it subtle as well. Don't make it blatantly obvious as to what your goal is. Make sure the advisor can't pull you aside to task about the email. You want a response. This will be highly incriminating should original authorship belong to you alone. Follow this method with a backup. I would suggest taking this paper, and mailing it to a close family member. Ensure they do not break the seal when it arrives. It will receive a date stamp via the U.S. postal service. Then to prove it you have said mail brought forward and opened when needed. You can also open a date deposite box with most banks for around $15/month. Put a copy of your paper in there and don't go back. You can prove the document was written before any other published papers. The bank will have a log of when you first when in there upon setting up your box. Only accessing the box when you first created it shows that what ever you out there has been there since said date.


What is the difference between research and a thesis at the B.S./M.S. level? I will be a freshman majoring in Computer Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign next fall, and I'm interested in their B.S.-M.S. 5-year program. I ultimately want to get a Ph.D. in Computer Science so I can teach at a university. On the webpage documenting the B.S.-M.S. program it says:

  Students are strongly advised to seek faculty counsel about the 5-yr program to be sure they understand the pros and cons of pursuing a Masters degree via the 5-yr program. If their intention is to ultimately pursue a Ph.D., then it may be preferable to avoid the rapid pace of the 5-year program and instead invest time in research as an undergraduate. For admission to competitive Ph.D. programs, the expectation of publications and extensive research experience is higher for M.S. graduates. Therefore, as an alternative to the 5-year program, many top students may prefer to conduct research, possibly leading to a B.S. thesis, as a way to improve their admissions chances into top Ph.D. programs.

This paragraph left me confused, because the M.S. program requires a thesis to graduate. I was always under the impression that thesis ≈ research. Wouldn't it be better preparation to acquire experience in graduate coursework and produce a Master's thesis than to simply get a B.S. thesis? It seems to me that according to this paragraph, the only reason to get a B.S. thesis instead of an M.S. thesis is to increase admissions chances to Ph.D. programs, because more is expected of M.S. students.

So, my main question is, how is a thesis different than research experience? Why is it worse to obtain an M.S. thesis (through a 5-year program) rather than a B.S. thesis, given I will apply to Ph.D. programs?

A thesis is always research, but not all research is theses.

In a five-year Masters program, one would definitely do a thesis, but these programs often have very stiff course requirements, which leave little time for research except the thesis.  Given this, it is often the case that the only research that a student does is the thesis, and that only to the level of sufficiency to obtain the degree.  Many 5-year Masters Theses are thus no better than 4-year Bachelor's theses, but will indeed be held to a higher standard (e.g., as though one had gone through a separate 2-years Masters program).

Last-minute and "merely sufficient" research work of this sort will also be much less effective at building trust and relationships with a faculty member than a longer time working on research as an undergraduate, even at a "lower" level.  This significantly impacts one's ability to get a good letter of recommendation, which is another key for PhD admission.

I suspect this is why they recommend as they do, and think it's a good thing that they do so.

The best people to speak to would be advisers at your university.
Generally speaking, there are two kinds of Master's courses - Master's by coursework, and Master's by research.

In a Master's by coursework, you do classes in 3 semesters, and write your thesis in the fourth.
By comparison, a Master's by research, you do classes in 1 semester, and write your thesis in the remaining 3 semesters.

The above timings will likely vary between courses, universities and countries, and is based on my own Master's experiences, but you can see there is a big difference in how much time and focus is placed on the thesis.

A PhD program is all about research, and as part of the admission process, you need to show them your Master's thesis. Thus, if your thesis isn't that great because you didn't have much time to spend research, then you likely wouldn't get in.


Did I make a mistake in being too honest in the PhD interview? I had an interview on Tuesday on a PhD topic and during the interview I was a little nervous.
I regret saying that I don’t like machine learning since the PhD topic requires using machine-learning tools. I explained that I don’t like it since I took a machine-learning course at university, and the professor taught us the subject in an unpleasant and boring way. His teaching manner seriously wasn’t clear.
I also told them that I will give myself a chance and learn it again in a better way since they don’t require deep experience in it.
I shouldn’t have told them this information because it could be an easy reason to reject me.
I have asked the professor in the interview whether he liked my profile. His answer was that he still has other students to interview... I mean if he did like my profile he could have simply said yes.
I still have some hope because if he didn’t find me suitable he would have rejected me the next day. Instead, when I asked him when I would get an answer to my application he told me next week.
I’m feeling bad. I was overly honest, and sometimes was too informal with my speech and facial expressions.
Did I make a mistake in being too honest in the PhD interview?
Update: I have read an article the professors have sent me where they have used a machine learning tool. I made further search and I was able to understand it. I have been invited to another interview and I did so well. They were friendly with me and I kept my honesty in everything. I asked them more questions and they clarified that there are different methods in the PhD and machine learning is just one of them. I told them that I no longer have fear towards ML since I no longer find it complicated. At the end I explained my interest that meets the goal of the PhD program. They will give me the final answer after one or two weeks. Please wish me luck :) I am glad that I have used Academia site and I thank everyone for their comments and answers that I found beneficial.

I want to make two points here, both are indirect answers to your question, but still open to interpretation with regard to your specific interview.

Interviews are less like taking an exam, and more like going on a date. It is possible to do everything right, and still not click. Equally, it is possible that you do many things wrong, but the other person is willing to take a chance on you, because they see something they like and willing to invest on. It is therefore not really worth it mulling over the details of the date in any meaningful sense, since you'll never really know what it was that did or didn't click. Having said that, just like a date, you would want to sound honest, but not arrogant, and generally not put the other person in an uncomfortable position for the sake of 'honesty' if you expect to establish some sort of relationship with them going forward.

There is always a way to rephrase a negative into a positive, and it typically pays off to do so. You come across as a more approachable, less negative person, who sees the good and the opportunity in things, as opposed to the negatives. It's generally a good way to go through life, too. So, in your case, you could have rephrased

"it was boring and it was the prof's fault but I'll look at it if I really have to"

into

"I am reasonably comfortable with the topic; however, I felt it was not given the time it deserved in uni, and my exposure to it so far has been more theoretical. Therefore I look forward to seeing an interesting application of this field in a real-life setting, and to improving my skills in this area: I'm very thankful for the training opportunities on offer in this job -- this is in fact one of the reasons that led me to apply here (blah blah, continue on positive spin)".

Regarding the second point, as a personal anecdote, I was taught this by my own PhD supervisor during my PhD. A large part of my PhD involved improving a field in which one of the most influential papers had many (in my opinion) naïve assumptions which weakened its conclusions. I approached this in my work from the point of view of "we build Y which doesn't suffer from the errors in X, who did bad things x,y,z". My supervisor thought this was unnecessarily harsh and had me rephrase it as "X pushed the field forward by proposing X. We improved on this idea by addressing improvements in areas x,y,z, which we believe make the general direction proposed by X even stronger".
Now, "technically", both versions say exactly the same thing, and both are 'honest'. However, imagine I wanted to invite Prof X to be my external examiner in my PhD viva at the end of my PhD. Which of the two formulations do you think would predispose them more positively towards my thesis?

What you like and dislike aren't really relevant to a job. You want to give off enthusiasm for the job, and you to do that you can talk about subject areas you are passionate about. But mostly you should talk about how you experience, expertise, and how you can perform in an area they talk about.
Yeah, it's a mistake to go into how you don't like it, and how it was taught. Because that's not relevant to you doing the job, a lot of people hate certain aspects of their job but they do it anyway because they need to.
Interviews are tough, and it is an important career skill to develop, so learn from it and don't sweat it to much.


Publishing a comment or contacting the authors privately? I have just read a recent paper in a well-respected journal. The work is technically sound and the results interesting. However, the authors comment their main results as unexpected and “extraordinary” (in the abstract and in the text), while it is an instance of a very generic and well-known phenomenon, which has been experimentally confirmed (and theoretically explained) in a large range of systems in the last decade. The author do not seem aware of the literature on this phenomenon.

Now, I am somewhat conflicted between two courses of action:

Raising the matter with them privately, making them aware of the literature they have missed so that they do not repeat the mistake, and telling them (nicely) that their claims of extraordinary behavior are not valid.
Doing the same thing, but through a formal “Comment” published in the same journal. This does not only bring the matter to their attention, but also to other readers of the journal. Right now, I favor this option, because I think it improves the scientific record.

The journal in question does publish comments, its policy on the matter is the following:

  These are a medium for the discussion and exchange of scientific opinions […] For publication of a Comment or a Reply, they must be judged by the referees to present new insights and be of interest to our readership.

Moreover, a Comment in the journal will necessarily include a “Reply to the Comment” by the original authors, as per journal policy.

So, how do I choose between contacting the authors in private, or submitting a formal “Comment” to the journal? What factors should guide my choice?

There is nothing stopping you from contacting the authors directly. In fact that might be polite. It may, however, be unfruitful. Submitting a comment is not considered less polite than contacting the authors directly first. Remember, the authors have, in your view, published poorly referenced/researched work (reviewers and editors are partly also to be blamed). By writing a letter/comment, you perform a scientific debate where you wish to correct a problem with said paper and that is clearly within the realm of what we can and should do as scientists without feeling impolite.

Before you do anything you should perhaps solicit colleagues to discuss the matter over. Since the results have been published, some form of publication discussing the problem must also appear in a publication. It is for this reason you should carefully discuss the matter, start writing a "letter to the editor" of the journal where it was published. The letter should contain the information that puts the "novelty" in perspective. Under such circumstances the authors will have the possibility of a rebuttal which typically is published at the same time as your letter, it is their opportunity to "defend" themselves. This is what typically is done.

Now several things might happen, for example, the authors get angry, the editor refuses to publish your letter. This is why you are better off not being alone behind anything you write. If the letter is refused, then publish it elsewhere. But, remember, the point of writing a letter is to set the faulty perspective of the paper in a more correct one so that the paper is not taking credit where not credit should be had. Do not stray from this endeavour.

I would advice you to be careful. Not citing other sources is quite common in the academia as a mean of making your result look more innovative, more important, and more appealing. Then, if you tell these researchers "Oooooh,  I know your dirty tricks!" (even if you do it in a polite way), they might feel offended and could probably take revenge when they come across one of your manuscripts as referees.

I understand your frustration since I often come across papers like the one you mention, written by reknown researchers and published in important journals, while they are basically reinventing the wheel. I have also come across papers where the authors do not cite their previous extremely related papers. C'est la vie.


Techniques for teaching reflection and critical analysis to unprepared students I have a group of undergraduate students who are best described as 'unprepared' meaning that they were not well prepared for life in university. They are, as a group, under-performers, although there are certainly stars contained within the group. One more point of complexity is that the students are studying in English, which is not their native language.

Reflection is something that has been identified as useful not just for performance while at university but also for encouraging life-long learning for the students. While strong students might take to reflection quite readily, critically analyzing the countless decisions that they have made on any given academic project, unprepared students seem to have a much more difficult time with this.

My question is, are there particularly effective techniques for teaching reflection to unprepared students (or academically weaker students)?

Almost certainly this is going to be a multi-stage, complicated process, with no simple answer. However, here's something relatively simple to start with, maybe.

I'd suggest starting with collaborative peer-evaluation. Create an assignment which has a peer-evaluation stage (with no reflection on the final grade). The peer-evaluation stage consists of sitting them down and working through each person's output as a group. Ideally, you'll act mostly as guard-rails for the discussion, keeping it on-topic and professional, while providing some initial thoughts.

The goal of the peer-discussion phase is to start getting them to think critically about the output, from both the perspective of a creator and a consumer.

After the discussion stage, then allow them to take the feedback and re-edit their work to improve it, grading only the final result.

I'm working on a similar question in a different population.  I developed a question rubric that they are using to learn analysis.  I am hoping this self-questioning becomes ingrained as a metacognitive skill.


Job Application - Non-Tenure Track and Tenure Track in One Ad I am working on an application for a job ad that lists available tenure-track and non-tenure track jobs in the same ad. I would want (and am qualified for) either position, but there are, of course, more non-tt positions. Is there an industry standard for how I should approach the cover letter. For example, should I:

Just choose one job to apply for.
Mention in my letter that I would like to be considered for
both/either.
Send in separate applications for both?

Any advice would be appreciated.

Schools sometimes double up their job ads in ways confusing to applicants. For instance, a school may identify a single position as "Instructor, Assistant, Associate, or Full Professor," or as "Instructor/Assistant Professor/Associate Professor," signalling that they would offer a title based on the chosen applicant's experience and credentials. Alternatively, they may have multiple positions open but file one job ad. (It could be a deliberate cluster hire, or just a matter of how the department filed the positions.)
What you're describing is a blend of both approaches - hiring for positions of multiple ranks in one institution in one ad. There is no industry standard for how applicants should handle this exact situation. Instead, I'd advise treating each position like a separate search. File applications for each position you would like that you are qualified for.
This is the recommendation of Karen Kelsky (The Professor Is In), for instance, if a department advertises two positions:

But anyway, my answer is yes. If you are a plausible candidate for both searches, apply for both. In most cases the search committees will be made up of different faculty members, and while files may be shared across searches, you can’t assume that they will be. So to make sure your file is read by all concerned parties, send it to both searches.

So you should tailor cover letters and other materials to each position and its requirements.  If that means applying for an NTT position that emphasizes teaching and a TT position that emphasizes research, address teaching more in the NTT application and foreground research in the TT position. Let the respective committees behind the ad decide whether they want you.

Assuming that this is a university that does not have a billion-dollar endowment, if you state in your letter that you are willing to accept either tenure-track or non-tenure-track jobs, you are unlikely to get a tenure-track offer.
Apply for the lowest ranked position you will accept.
The job market is currently at its lowest point since 1945.  If that does not apply to your situation, then this advice might not apply.


What do you wish you knew as a student before you became a researcher? There are a number of lessons I learnt as an undergraduate which I wish somebody had told me much earlier.

Although each of you learnt different lessons with different notions of which way is the right, please share your findings and wisdom so that an eager reader would contemplate over your advice and would not regret avoiding later in life.

Research can be great, but I learned it can be so hard.

First, Google "should I do a phd" and then "should I do a PhD in ". There are tons of people who succeeded and failed in academia and writing about it, about what's it going to be in Academia, and so on. Two examples:

Nature's special on the point of a PhD
You and your research

Beyond that, here's a few things I've learned:

Being a researcher is a career job, not so unlike being a lawyer, a manager.

After all, a paper has to change the scientific knowledge on the
topic. You're going to teach respected scientists something they
didn't know and something they thought was wrong.
I hear that in life sciences, the career aspect can extend to people sabotaging
fellow researchers (that is, competitors).

Being more intelligent does not (necessarily) mean being a better researcher. If you're admitted to a decent program, you're more than smart enough for research. Managing your work (in all senses) can be more important, even though supervisors can help you with (part of) this in the beginning. But it's also about discipline and character:

Choosing a good question to work on (supervisors can help) - the question should matter (or you should make it matter, if you can).
Keeping an overview of what you're doing is important: otherwise, you might find an excellent solution to a problem which in the end is the wrong one.
Working enough on it (keeping focus among distractions of grad school can be hard).
How do you choose which way to approach a problem? Some approaches might not ever work, but others will only work if you keep at them long enough. So you need to be tenacious, and be able to change mind, depending on the moment. You need to delude yourself that you'll succeed until you do.

A good supervisor is extremely important. Nowadays it's extremely hard to start doing research "by yourself". On the one hand, there's too much written knowledge to navigate (literature). On the other hand, there are often unspoken assumptions which you won't learn from reviewers. It helps if he's available enough for you.
A supervisor must also fit you, character-wise. You mustn't be friends, but you need to function together, and neither you nor your supervisor study how to occupy your position.
Communication is extremely important. You're supposed to learn something and then tell your peers (and the world). And nowadays, if your peers don't get it, it's your problem (because your paper gets rejected). Hence, learning technical writing was very important for me.

Of course this is what I learned, which is influenced by my weak points, my experience and my field — I'm saying this because I'm sure somebody will disagree.
I'm a programming language researcher, so I invent and design stuff (programming language). And evaluating design is hard. So much that many ideas are not right or wrong per se - you can make it right or wrong by determined work (see also this). But other disciplines probably experience similar phenomena in different form.

This and related issues were also intensively discussed on ResearchGate, see e.g.

http://www.researchgate.net/post/What_do_you_wish_you_had_known_about_the_process_of_doing_research_that_you_did_not_know_before_you_started_it

http://www.researchgate.net/post/What_things_should_supervisors_tell_their_research_students


Are unpaid postdoc positions common? I contacted a group leader, and he strongly liked my CV. He encouraged me to join his group as a postdoc fellow, but he mentioned that the position he may offer is unpaid (so, I must cover my living expenses).

He mentioned that I can publish good papers in his group following my previous works. Then, I can get a good paid job. So, it is worth of accepting an unpaid job.

I'm wondering if it is common for postdoc fellows to accept unpaid positions?

What the group leader should have said is that s/he has no money, but you can join the lab if you have your own funding (i.e., a fellowship). For them to dangle papers in exchange for free work is unethical and potentially illegal, depending on where they are.

Edit: What follows is entirely my personal opinion. I am no lawyer so no idea about legality; feel free to let me know if you think my opinion is too harsh/wrong.

Any kind of free labour in a lab is unfair and discriminatory. It locks out those in society who aren't lucky enough to be able to give their time away for free. This includes undergraduate internships. If you're working for someone, then you should be paid for your time. Even if you are receiving training.

In contrast to the answers here, it's very common and many people here do this everyday. There's a term for it:

Visiting scientist or visiting scholar

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visiting_scholar)

Labs that don't have money can offer a visiting position to a post doc. Many people take the job, do it full-time for free.

Everyone who works as a visiting scientist is a free labour. By definition, the number of free post docs in the world is at least the total number of visiting scholar title holders.

Visiting scholar == free work == free post doc

It's legal in all countries. All academic institution like that. Thus, all other answers in this post are simply wrong.

Anyone with a visiting non-paid title is a free post-doc. Simple and plain. Please don't deny it.

Re: Most of the time, salary is contined by the home department, often through sabbatical.

Let's say university is paying you for your job. You get a new job at Mcdonald, but work for free as a "visitor". Are you going to say "I am not making burgers for free because my salary is contined by my home department."?


What is the difference between a thesis and a dissertation? I have seen some sites that distinguish a dissertation as what is written as the requirements of a doctoral degree.

Others that distinguish a thesis as a document written for the fulfillment of any degree (Bachelors, Masters or Doctoral) while a dissertation is a more general name for a document where someone is presenting findings.

I am curious if there is any more rigorous definition which distinguishes the two, but my more immediate question is this:

I am writing the document to fulfill a doctoral degree. Within the text of the document do I refer to it as a "Dissertation" or a "Thesis"?

For example: "A more thorough review of this analysis is presented in Chapter 5 of this ________."

Maybe the fact that the [thesis] is the tag used for all of these documents is an indication of the answer?

I've also seen this question on this site, but it doesn't seem to answer my question:
What are the main differences between undergraduate, master's, and doctoral theses?

"Work" is just as good as either. There's no need for precision or rigor here. All three would be acceptable.

To lift from the definition provided here:

  A Thesis is a scholarly written document of a smaller study on a
  particular topic in consistent with every details of Research
  Methodology. It's written usually for obtaining a Masters Degree.

  A Dissertation is a scholarly document of a larger study on a
  particular topic in consistent with every details of research
  Methodology. It's written usually to obtain a Doctoral Degree.


A PI gave me 2 days to accept his offer after I mentioned I still have another interview. Is this normal? Last week, I had a postdoc interview for a "senior" role. They call it senior because they've asked me to lead on a (perhaps the) research problem. For the interview, they asked me to prepare a 10 minutes presentation where I propose a research plan. My presentation focused on a particular case with a detailed plan. I proposed to work on a particular case simply because it's all I can do at the moment (in terms of my current knowledge and research experience from my Ph.D.).
They complimented my presentation and the fact that I have a clear plan. But they did say that they want someone to work on the research problem from a general perspective and then perhaps at the end, target a particular case. The researcher is also expected to show leadership during his research when working on the project. The issue is the general case will require a lot of reading. The interview was really good and I have answered all of their questions. But they didn't ask much to be honest (I guess it's because my presentation was technical and focused on the particular case and not the whole problem). But I wasn't expecting an offer because our research goals weren't the same.
Now that I gave some background to why I am hesitant, I will get to my question. The PI sent me an informal email just two days after the interview, saying that I did a good interview and I should expect good news. The next day, he did say that he's going to offer me the position (again informally) and that I need to accept so he can send a formal letter. I told him that I am interested but I have another interview next week in which I've confirmed my attendance. I said that we can start the formal procedure next week after my next interview. He basically said that you have 2 days (before my next interview) to accept otherwise he will move to the waiting list. It's my first time receiving an offer, is this normal? To give 2 days as a deadline knowing that I asked for more time for my second interview? Note that a 5 day-deadline is more than enough to have an idea about both postdoc positions!
Update
I want to thank you for answers. Really good points were mentioned that help see things from both sides (candidate's and the PI's point view). For this particular case, I decided to quickly decline the PI's offer informally.

This means one of two things:

The PI has a certain set of needs right now and wants them met. Your needs are irrelevant. This will be the case for the duration of your employment - they'll be a decent boss until they need something and then that thing will be more important than anything you've got going on. This is a reasonably common PI mindset and most of them will respond to pushback - if you're assertive and can manage their expectations and needs this could be an ok fit for you.

The PI is cynically abusive to staff. This is a test. They want anyone assertive to get filtered out at this stage, because you'd just quit later in the face of abuse anyway. This is a shibboleth to identify postdocs who can be used and discarded. There is no way to make this job work for you. This PI is rarer but tends to be hiring a lot (for obvious reasons) and so you'll see them more than you would expect on the job market.

It's better to not work for either kind of PI if you can avoid it.

You're thinking from your perspective, with information you have.
There might be another candidate available, as good as you, but you seemed (bit) more promising AND they want to fill position ASAP. 2 days is not much, but not 2 hours as well. If you came to interview, you should have been ready to accept it. If not, why waste yours and others time, especially if they clearly indicated before, that they'll think they'll give you an offer.
Imo, it's more of a "take it or leave it" offer. You (and a lot of people here) might think it's "insensitive" or "too quickly", but if you've been on the other side of the table, You'll get my point- either candidate wants to work with you or no. No one needs doubter, "window shoppers" or CV builders, who'll probably leave the very moment the better opportunity arises.
You can try stalling of course (by say, asking for written offer or saying you'd like to have another call and schedule something for 1 week later or ...), but don't think it'll change for you much, because apparently they either want you to accept or move on and you need to make that decision now, not in 2 weeks from now, when there will be second answer available.


Conference/workshop does not provide for 'poster logistics' - is that normal? I'm supposed to present a poster in an well-rated Computer Science conference, or rather in a workshop within that conference. This is the first time this workshop will have posters (the larger conference has had them for a while). However, I've not received any information about the logistics of getting the poster printed and delivered - just a general note, after my inquiring about it, saying that I'm at liberty to design it any way I like and in any dimensions I like. In a previous conference at which I presented a poster we were told to submit a PDF of dimensions X x Y by a certain time, and that was that - the poster was printed and set up someplace. The opposite case seems strage, ridiculous even: For 10 or 20 (or 100) people, coming in from different countries, to each have to arrange for the printing of a poster and either bring it from overseas in a special container or to have to coordinate with  print shops in a city they don't know.

The conference is held in a couple of weeks and I'm getting worried... of course I've contacted the workshop organizers about this, but - was I wrong to expect this to be taken care of? Is there some kind of other option of arranging this which I'm missing?

I'm answering from an HCI-related subfield of CS:

What you describe - attendees print and bring their posters themselves - is completely normal.

While I do not rule out it exists even in my specific field, I have never encountered a conference that would print posters for you. Any time I have participated in, or just looked at the CfP for a poster session, attendees were merely told the available board size (and thus, the maximum allowable size for the poster) and asked to prepare their poster in time for the poster session.

Typically, attendees then have the poster printed at their home institution (and get compensated by the institution as a part of the conference attendance cost). This has the nice side-effect that, at least in smaller places, you might already get in touch with a few conference attendees at the airport, because you notice the people walking around with poster tubes. At some point before the poster session (depending on the conference, already at the beginning of the conference), attendees will take a few minutes to affix their posters at the boards they have been assigned (or just at any boards, if the poster space works in a first-come first-serve manner).

The poster belongs to the attendee/their employer and they are free to do with it after the poster session what they like. A possible procedure that has been followed by many people I have been in touch with is to take the poster back to one's home institution and place it on some wall in or near one's office.

A word on your impression:

  The opposite case seems strage, ridiculous even: For 10 or 20 people, coming in from different countries, to each have to arrange for the printing of a poster and either bring it from overseas in a special container or to have to coordinate with print shops in a city they don't know.

In a way, that's true. But then, note that poster printing (well, any graphics printing) comes with a certain deal of variety and "risks". Colours might be messed up, the size/margins might be unfitting ... add to that that different regions of the world are used to (and thus base their poster templates on) different paper formats. Thus, it is desirable to see the poster when there is still some time to make some corrections.

As for the special container - any university institute I have encountered owns several of these, for exactly this purpose. Note that if you want to bring back the poster (as described in my text above), you need such a container anyway for the way back, so there would be no point in carrying the container there without anything in it.

I'm adding an answer of my own based on the reply I got from the workshop chairs and information I gathered from other sources.

First - as others suggest, it is indeed at least very common for conferences not to print posters themselves. It's apparently just as common for there to be absolutely no support from the organizers for poster printing.

But what was just as interesting was the following:

Up until not so many years ago, there were no/very few posters in the conference + workshops overall. More and more tracks and workshops of the conference started "amassing" poster sessions - but apparently it has not dawned on many people that this is now a "many posters conference" (I estimate over 100). In fact, the reply to my question about the possibility of the conference doing the printing was, that there are no resources allocated for it, but that it "would be a great because XYZ". So, apparently nobody has brought up the possibility of the conference organization including the centralized printing of posters.

So my bottom line is:

Sometimes, the option of "conference prints" has simply not been considered; and thus is the default rather than the norm. We can make a convincing case in its favor - especially in large conferences - and make it more common as well.


Do we know what proportion of scientific reproducibility issues are fraud-related? A few days ago there was an article on the LSE blog about scientific reproducibility which made little sense to me until I realised they were equating 'low reproducibility' with 'scientific fraud':

http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2016/07/21/could-blockchain-provide-the-technical-fix-to-solve-sciences-reproducibility-crisis/

I've tended to assume that most reproducibility issues are poor reporting of experiments, poor recording of external factors, poor statistical analysis inflating p-values etc but I realise that I don't have much evidence to back that up apart from personal experience. Are there any studies that report the relative proportion of irreproducible experimental results resulting from fraud versus poor experimental/statistical/reporting standards?

I very much doubt we "know' this in the empirical sense, as:

As a scientific problem, the "reproducibility crisis" is fairly new, and we're still developing the methods to really understand it.
It's very hard to distinguish fraud from error except in the most egregious cases. You can say, for example, that there's clearly some bias in a body of work in a field, but it's hard to say that any particular paper is clearly biased.

For example, is a convergence error that you chose to ignore because it was "pretty close" to the convergence criteria you set for a statistical model an error, or fraud? How about using Bayesian priors that turn out to be stronger than was probably justified? How do you distinguish fraud in the form of "nudging" a result over the line into significance from a largely insignificant effect being estimated with error that sometimes crosses the null.

Frankly, there's not even, IMO, a solid definition of "irreproducible". Is that "Finds a statistically significant result"? "Effect estimates are on the same side of the null"? "Our clinical/policy conclusions would be the same"?

Lacking even that, I'd assert it would be particularly difficult to attempt to assess fraud vs. error in any systematic fashion.

It would also be an exceedingly difficult study to run, as you'd need the cooperation of a bunch of people who comitted fraud.

I consider advanced science as it's done today (a few separate teams tackling a particular issue with often very expensive equipment and/or materials) having great prospect for fraud by its very Nature. Consider, for example, science at the times of Copernicus and Galileo and science today. One can tell you it wasn't much of a cost to build a primitive telescope or laboratory then and anyone with more means could be scientist with a relatively low cost. Can you say the same for science today? How many people can spend the cash to build and equip (the costly part here) modern laboratory in anything compared to the same costs a century or two ago (or even a few decades ago)? (Exclude the millionaires-also consider some legal issues coming with modern and advanced laboratories.)

The more expensive and more profiled research gets the less people are actually available there to tell you the intentional fraud from the real sloppiness. As the research gets ever more profiled and more expensive to reproduce even the people who can argue the validness of a certain result are getting fewer and fewer, so how can anybody judge was it intentional or not? It's next to impossible. And it will probably get worse with time.

So, the study you suggest amounts to more than impossible. High research costs, lack of enough specialized personnel, greater abundance of claims to be falsified and not the least-doubtful interest in verifying them all amount to its impossibility with the advance of research efforts and costs. The more science is moving into an ever more profiled and costly activity, the more the very idea of falsifying every single claim someone makes into a paper is becoming implausible. And if you can't even spare the resources to clarify all mistakes how can you determine are they intentional or not? There may be some cases here and there where enough resources may be spent to clarify certain issues but you can't make a serious study out of those, right? Consider the amount of cases you are actually studying to the amount of possible cases of fraud. How can you get any statistically meaningful results if you are just picking up cases where you can determine the fraud was a real issue versus cases there may have been fraud? What standards will you use to discern this group from the group where you put errors made by sloppy research methods? What about a control of "impeccable research" (Is there even such a thing in any modern science?)? How can anybody devise "firm" criteria for putting anything in any of these categories when the effort to discern a false claim versus the number of possible claims is overwhelming. Just like nobody can pursue the validity of any claim due to the high costs and the lack of experienced enough personnel, so one can't make any "statistic" (except highly cease-sensitive and "narrow" field one) of the number of claims versus the number of fraud cases which could has any chances of being reliable?

P.S.As far as the issue of reproducibility is concerned I like to give one particular example. It's a bit hilarious but nevertheless I believe is on the right spot here :)

Consider the possibility there was some "large scale scientific conspiracy (e.g. a case of fraud)" concerning the results from the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. Now, let's say that every single participant in the experiments done there was part of some "grand scientific kabal" designed to mislead humanity about the very nature of our Universe. (I met people on the Internet who actually believe in this claim. :) Then, how can one be certain there is no fraud in the claims made by the scientists participating in the LHC experiments if there isn't any other such devices in the whole world? I tried to actually argue with "scientific kabal believers" such thing is impossible because there are simply too many people from too many countries doing research there and too many are watching the facility to serve as some "fraud facility" to lie to the poor people, but then I go back the argument that until one can build an LHC identical to the one at CERN in their backyard no one could be certain its results aren't fraud! Hilarious, isn't it? But, then I was dismayed how can one actually argue with someone putting up arguments like that? The funny thing is I couldn't. How can you convince a skeptic like that? And if you can't convince someone for such a big and visible experiment like the LHC how can you convince him other much less prominent experiments aren't fraud, too? But, then, if you can see fraud everywhere how can you discern it from mere sloppiness? What if you have doubts at the status of the very experts that have to do the discerning in itself? Then, what are you options?

The way I see it one can doubt endlessly in anything and everyone, then how can such an extreme skeptic ever achieve firm standards for anything which s/he can't get his/her hands on? And with the state current science is in this is practically impossible. Then, one should never be able to tell when there is a legitimate case of fraud and when things just weren't thought out well enough.


Is dyslexia regarded as a severe disability for academic applications? For the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program (NSF GRFP) application they ask:

Other serious disability related to a physical, mental, or emotional
condition is included in my disability
(Please specify. Cannot exceed 255 characters.)

Here I listed dyslexia and the academic accommodations I receive. Is this appropriate? What do they mean by "Severe Disability".
My case is particularly harsh. In my Statement of Purpose I briefly talk about my history of overcoming this as well as how learned to capitalize on my other strengths to compensate for this deficiency. This is particularly important to me, but might not be something that should be mentioned.
This could apply to other academic applications. Is this something that should be mentioned on a PhD application, or is it best to avoid this topic?

Dyslexia is widely recognized as a disability.
Deciding if dyslexia is "severe" is a matter of opinion.  Only one person has a well-informed opinion about the severity of your dyslexia: you.  If you think it is severe, no reasonable person will question it.
Your strategy of mentioning your disability in the context of how you were successful overcoming it is a good strategy.

I believe there is not one answer that suits all circumstances, as different bodies will ask the question about disabilities for different purposes. You need to be clear in each particular case what information they are needing from you and how that information will be used in their internal processes. Having that clarity will enable you to tailor the information to the needs of the organisation's selection processes.
In the particular example you gave, the NSF declares that they particularly seek to promote a diverse base for their awards:

NSF actively encourages women, members of underrepresented minority groups, persons with disabilities, veterans, and undergraduate seniors to apply.

So you would need to give information that would enable them to determine that you are part of an underrepresented group and  how you have worked to overcome your disability.
In other applications, such as a PhD application, they may ask the information to ensure they have made adequate provision for your interview, or allowed adequate consideration of the writing of your personal statement, or that they have appropriate provision in their research laboratories for you (such as in the case of more severe physical disability). Or equally in a PhD program they may be seeking to implement a positive recruitment program.
Some applicants believe that their application will be prejudiced by giving information on their disability and take the decision to omit that level of detail. I cannot say that this does not happen, but being informed as to the purpose of asking the question gives an applicant more confidence in supplying the level of detail that would enable their application to be well received.
Addressing the topic of dyslexia in particular, there is an increasing base of argument that dyslexia can give an advantage in certain aspects of intellectual and creative activities but again you probably have no way of determining if that opinion is held by the organising you are applying to or not.


Is pseudonymous publication ethical? From this MathOverflow question:

  William Sealy Gosset published a result under the pseudonym Student. (Because his employer, the Guinness brewing company, did not allow their employees to publish for fear of divulging trade secrets.)

Why isn't publishing under a pseudonym a breach of academic ethics? It seems that the common idea is that publishing under a pseudonym is ethical, unless they are deliberately used with intention to defraud or deceive. But, given that we don't know who a pseudonymous author is, how can his peers have any trust in that (or even check it)?

The worth of scientific work is in the content, not in who wrote it. Therefore, I think publishing under a pseudonym is not necessarily unethical. In the example the OP presented the author was prevented from publishing if he used his own name. If the research was sound and reproducible, I would be fine with this. In practice I would like to know who wrote the paper.

There are various views of the usage of pseudonym. I'd say a prevalent one in Europe is that its part of the special protection of authors in the sense of freedom of speech. I do not know how this is handled in the US or otherwhere, but in many European countries there is a constitutional right of protection of pseudonyms (which implies the right of publishing under a pseudonym if desired for any reason).


What to do with someone that cheated their way through university and a PhD program? A person I know cheated through most of their science classes while an undergrad.  They literally had someone else take the exams, write reports, and do most of the homework.  They then took their stellar GPA and not so stellar GRE score and got admitted to a not so great PhD program.

A new significant other at grad school wrote a lot of their papers.  This person ingratiated themselves with the head of the department – they are a schmooze king.  They gained favor by doing physical work that very few of the other grad students would do. Their doctoral thesis was weak and the defense round wasn't difficult.  They were awarded their PhD.  Mind you, they still can't explain to me nearly anything about basic chemistry,  organic chemistry or biochemistry concepts.  I'm talking like sn1, sn2, benzene rings, buffers, etc...

This person now has a job with a pharmaceutical company doing anything but real science.  They're basically a pharmaceutical rep out selling drugs to various physicians in a territory.

Do I tell their employer?  Do I tell the university?  Do I let it go?  I have no way to prove anything.  I'm sure none of those people that took the tests in their place will come forward and tell the truth.  This has gotten away with fraud.

He literally had someone else take the exams for him

If you wanted to speak out, that was really the right time, not so many years later when damage is done and every accusation is virtually unprovable.

  His doctoral thesis was weak and the defense round wasn't difficult.

There are many weak PhD theses around, and it's up to the universities and to the defense committees to decide which level of weakness is acceptable before rejecting a candidate (gosh, if we were to object to any "weak" degree...).

  Do I tell his employer? Do I tell the university? Do I let it go?

You let it go because, as you said, you've nothing to prove your accusations (and the university would have no interest in undertaking an investigation after such a long time without any evidence to start with). And he is now in industry, and it's up to his employer to decide whether to promote or demote him according to his work performance and to decide whether the PhD title is just a vacuous document in his hands.

Different is the case where, for instance, you can prove that a student cheated by plagiarising other works. Here, there is evidence that can be used to revoke a degree, as it happened in some cases.

First, at this point you could only tell his employers. Imho this would be commendable. But I'm bitterly afraid that pharma companies do not expect anything good in terms of morality from their reps, so you'll probably only help in promoting him.


Referencing mistake in masters dissertation I handed in my masters dissertation a few weeks ago and I’ve now discovered a referencing mistake in my literature review. A medical publication I’d been citing has had a number of updates over the years and instead of citing the earlier year (2009) I’ve cited 2018. I could kick myself. I’m very anxious about this and not sure if I should just wait it out or speak to my advisor? I had mentioned to him that I couldn’t stop re reading it (before I realised about the year thing and he told me stop it and I wish I had listened. I realise that nothing can be done to rectify it and I’m willing to accept I’ll lose marks if found but I’m worried something more serious will happen. I’m so mortified and hoped to apply for a PhD next year ( I was on track for a first) I honestly can’t believe I’ve made such a careless mistake. Marks are due out at the end of Nov.

I don't have enough reputation to comment but we are all human and we make mistakes, you could ask your advisor about submitting an erratum but it is generally done only for peer-reviewed publications.
Personally, I wouldn't worry too much about a typo in my citations. Unless the entire conclusions of a section really depended on the results from this particular reference.

Your school may have a procedure for submitting updates/corrections to your dissertation.  This will probably require contacting the committee who reviewed the original work, and also the library that archives copies of the dissertation.
This citation error, however, is pretty minor, and while you reference a newer copy instead of the old, most researchers may figure it out from context.


How to get (a payed?) feedback with discussion? I try to publish a text without success. In peer-review most replies are "does not fit our journal", even though some journals gave me full referee's report (with negative opinion). I understand it is impossible to discuss all "low-level" works which exist (maybe the mine is one of them...which I do not believe). Yet I would like to discuss and defend my work. "Defense" is in peer-review process impossible, referee gives his opinion and the story ends. Linking my work on the relevant stackexchange forum did not help either: few negative comments were discontinued after I replied.

Question: Is there maybe a payed option to have the work discussed with the engagement of the referee to get and give responses? Is there a way to get discussion by paying (even on potentially low-level work)?

How to get (a payed?) feedback with discussion?

It is extremely country specific and strongly cultural.

I can explain how I would do in your shoes in France. You need to adapt my hints to your country.

I would first attend several university  PhD level seminars (or at research institutions like CNRS, CEA - I am employed at CEA, LIST but soon retiring - , INRIA, INSERM or Grandes Écoles like Polytechnique or ENS Ulm or ENS Paris Saclay -from which I graduated-). Or even Collège de France ones. BTW, Grandes Écoles and Collège de France are very French, you are unlikely to find equivalents in other countries.

At seminars with a small audience of less than 30 persons, you are allowed (at least in France) to attend them freely (no need to pay) and to ask clever (and politely) questions. You'll use Google or the Web to find such seminars.

Any scientific researcher is very happy to get oral feedback, as long as you respect his work (even if your opinions are different). That is part of the science game since at least Newton.

Then you have established some direct contact. Discuss with them your ideas. They might be interested. If they are, send them by email your draft and ask for feedback.

BTW, you should attend peer-reviewed conferences in your field of expertise. If in Europe, consider being part of some H2020 or HorizonEurope submission. Being inside a putative consortium submitting some research grant proposals will teach you many related skills. But you need to accept and contribute to your part (or even a bit more) of the submission efforts, and research grant submissions are generally highly selective (less than 10% of proposals get funded).

Read hundreds of scientific papers (in journals or peer-reviewed conferences) related to your field and scientific interests. Be sure to have a good bibliography of citations in your own text. A priori, several dozens of references (e.g. using BibTeX for your LaTeX paper).

At last, if you can afford that, consider starting some PhD. Your advisor will teach you most of these soft skills, including scientific writing skills, because that is part of his/her job.

My answer to another question on this forum also contain some useful hints.

PS. A poorly known fact is that on the average, every scientific publication has less than 2 or 3 readers. As Higgs explained in his Nobel prize talk, the "publish or perish" mindset of current academia is globally counter-productive: most of the research papers I am reading these years give a sense of déjà vu.

If your field is physics, geophysics, biology, volcanology, or neuroscience, you could talk to Sabine Hossenfelder.


Project may be benefitting a professor's personal company I'm currently taking an elective course on renewable energy that is open to undergraduate seniors and graduate students. Our class project is to design a solar power system for a community in a developing country (including simulations with HOMER and HelioScope) and write a final report targeted for government officials in the country.
A professor from another university has been advising us on this project over Zoom (at the invitation of the course professor), providing us with background information on the community we're designing the system. My group believes the advising professor has a vested interest in the success of this project after we found a recent contract awarded by the government in the developing country to a consulting company to build a solar power system similar to the one we're designing.
There is no direct link between the advising professor and the company since there is very little publicly available information about it, but:

The company is called _____ Technologies, where the blank is the nickname used by the advising professor.
The company has two offices listed on their website, one within ~15 miles from the university the professor teaches at and the other in the developing country we're designing the system for.
The system we're designing has the same capacity and is intended for the same location as the system specified by the contract awarded to the company.

Throughout the entire semester we have been reminded that our final reports for this project may be selected to be read by government officials in the developing country. There hasn't been any disclosure regarding a personal stake by the advising professor, and the course professor introduced him a subject matter expert who is helping out by providing advice regarding the project.
How should we approach this? The advising professor is a friend of our course professor, and we don't know if our course professor is aware of the contract.

Assuming the professor's intentions are indeed as presumed, I think this is a problem for two reasons:

The students did not consent to being used as workforce.
Regardless of the extent of their contribution to the final product, the forced use of any uncompensated workforce means somebody who is qualified to get hired and do the job  will not be getting hired, removing jobs from the market.

From a legal point of view, the professor may have every right to do what he is doing. If not, that is a problem on its own, and has been addressed in @Spark's answer. Otherwise, all the secrecy surrounding the matter was not necessary, and had he been more transparent, I highly doubt that any of the students would refuse to do the assignment.
For reasons of my own, this reminds me of the consent crisis surrounding pelvic exams performed by medical trainees on women under anesthesia. Perhaps since decades, it was considered ok for medical students and trainees to do such pelvic examinations. However, when the recipients found out about it, they felt exploited. Same here. There is a very fine line here: most women actually tend do provide consent to such practices if discussed prior to the procedure, but when found out about it afterwards, most find it shocking. The professor could have been more transparent, which would have had the additional benefit of helping the students feel not violated.
As an example supporting my latter point: in the United States, most universities typically have policies to limit the voluntary presence and participation of visiting scholars from other countries in research activities. This is because there are plenty of talented individuals from other countries who are ready to pay out of pocket to come to the US to progress their careers. It is easy for a primary investigator to run their lab relying on this freely acquired talent and preserve their grant money for other things. However, this prevents everybody (US citizens and foreigners alike) from actually getting paid research positions in labs. Policies as such aim to prevent this from happening and is for the benefit of everyone.
As far as you are concerned, some of you who graduate from your class may be potential employees for the professor in question, and if he keeps getting things done with free talent like yourselves, well, he will be needing you less. Future employment may be a very valid concern to approach your professors with.

No special approach is required.  This is an excellent educational opportunity.


Did my professor properly accommodate my disability? In August, I had surgery and shortly thereafter started chemotherapy. Despite being sick, I was only enrolled in 8 credit hours and felt I would be able to handle it. (I did very well in my other classes.)

There was a period shortly after the start of the semester where I got sick from the medication and had a really rough time with homework. I filed for accommodations with the disability coordinator at the school.

I turned in a take-home exam a day late and two homework assignments late. There was no penalty on the exam, but one assignment was reduced by 75% (it was not graded, I just received a flat 25%) and the other was reduced by 50%. I was also yelled at by the professor and had to beg him to take the exam (I was actually in tears saying, "I'm begging you" even though university policy mandated he accept the exam.)

I withdrew from the chemotherapy as a result and my coursework grades significantly improved. However, due to some assignments and an exam being cut from the syllabus, I was unable to recover my grade from the early bit of the semester.

He argues that he felt I was apathetic to the assignments, I did not alert him of my disability, and that he accommodated me by grading the assignments. However, I contacted him early on several times regarding this, but I didn't learn until later that he doesn't read emails (per university policy.)

The disability coordinator made the professor aware and made several attempts to contact him when he was unresponsive to her emails and phone calls. He eventually responded to a letter he received via campus mail. In addition, I attempted to contact him via email. He eventually approached me and expressed that he felt I was apathetic about the assignments.

If my assignments had been graded, I highly doubt I would have received 100% on them. I do feel I performed on par with the others I turned in.

As a side note, he accepted late work with no penalty from other students, but their work was less late than mine.

I contacted the Dean of Students, but unfortunately, the best option is to appeal the grade. The chair contacted the professor multiple times, but the professor maintains he was fair.

My question: Did my professor properly accommodate me? I don't feel as such, but he feels he did. How do I know if he did?

What do I do going forward? It's a really small school and he’s telling everyone how frustrated he his about my complaint, so I feel like even with having submitted a complaint that I've burned a lot of bridges there. I'm a senior and my last course would be with this same professor.

I'm sorry you were ill.  "Extra time" usually means that one has additional time to complete an exam.  For example a student with accommodation might have to take a final exam on the same day as her colleagues, but might have three hours instead of two to complete the exam.

At the two institutions where I've taught, there's a very formal process for notifying professors of accommodations, in which the professor actually signs for having received a copy of the accommodation letter.  I can't tell whether that was at work in your case.

The disability coordinator at your school is the one person who should know exactly what accommodations you were offered.  Your next step should be to see the disability coordinator, explain what happened, and ask whether you were treated according to the agreed accommodation.  If you were not, then either the disability coordinator will work through this or you can use the disability coordinator's statement in your grade appeal.

If you were granted the accommodations the school prescribed, probably you should file that grade appeal anyway, but do not be too hopeful.

I wish you the best of luck in your academic career and in your health.  I haven't read "How to pass organic chemistry" yet, but I will.

Mas:

I'm on your tune on this one.  We have a lot of whining students here.  But chemo is a big deal.  Yeah, you probably got a rum deal.  Normally, I am in the man up, suck it up camp, but I would push a little for yourself here.  Sometimes you need to stick up for yourself.

(Not as extreme, but I had a similar experience when my old man passed out of the blue...asked for time off during exams to go to the funeral and got static on it.  Only took 3 days and watched him get put into the ground in Arlington Cemetary. Was a little bizarre as my little sister ended up getting all her exams cancelled at a normal school.  I just asked for a 3 day pass.  But when I put my foot down, the commandant backed me up.  Really was bizarre I had to.  Your chemo is even more extreme.)

Of course what matters at the end is your health, not grades.  The "withdrew from chemo" sounds odd.


My adviser wants to use my code for a spin-off, but I want to use it for my own company I am a PhD Student in computer science.
During my my first 2 years I developed an algorithm that seems to work fine in a certain field of applications.

My adviser recently told me that he is starting a spin-off with a colleague of a different department and that he plans, in a couple of years to use my algorithm in it.

Now, considering that:

I am not interested in joining my adviser spin off as an employee
My advisor can understand the outcomes but not the 100% of the logic of the algorithm
In the future I want to make my own company based on that algorithm

I am quite worried.

How fair (and common) is that an advisor plans to use the code of one of his to students to make money (none of which will finish in my pockets)?

The fact that he will use my algorithms, will limit in any way me to use them in the future for the same scope (in a different field)?

May talk to him be a good way to solve this problem?

I don't know how to deal with this fact.

Actually, I do not really understand your general strategy: If the code is published under MIT license and the details of the algorithm are published, then pretty much anybody can use this code or algorithm for his/her own company (as far as I understand the license, I am not a lawyer). So it is perfectly fine for your supervisor to use this code. It is also perfectly fine for you to use this code in any company you found (again, as far as I understand the license details).

Probably, a scientific algorithm will only be a tiny part of software that you want to sell or for which you want to consult. So I would not worry too much.

File a patent first, and then submit your paper for review.

If your algorithm is published before the patent filing, you can't patent the code and use it for profit; this is the case unless your algorithm has been public for less than 12 months.  In the USA, there is a 12 month grace period between public disclosures and patent filings. I believe, but do not quote me on this, that the EU has no grace period post public disclosures.

I had a professor publically disclose a material/scheme/application that myself and a few others conceived.  The intellectual property was lost because of this motion.


Why do people in academia tend to write their email address with "(dot)", "(at)", instead of ".", "@"? This may be a silly question, but why do people in academia tend to write their emails as jhon(dot)doe(at)gmail(dot)com?

To avoid email harvesting spam-bots. (As if someone can't write a Perl script to make the appropriate substitutions.)

Because those people (in academia or elsewhere) didn't learn proper ways to protect their e-mail addresses from spam bots.

Edit: I'm not sure how can I expand this without repeating Peter Schneider's comment. It is naive to believe that email collecting script would not be able to do basic regex substitution which defeats the use of (dot) instead of .. People writing their e-mails this way just make them less readable for people, not for bots.


How can I improve my paper with mostly original contents and only two references? I'm collaborating with another person on a public-key cryptosystem that we intend to publish. I could only think of two references (one to the 1976 Diffie-Hellman paper, and one to SHA-3 FIPS-202), even though most of the contents are completely original.
I put my content onto Grammarly Premium and it only found 2% of so-called plagiarism - so called because the source of plagiarism is actually a low-quality prank question on a Q&A site that contains a series of digits 9 and asks its sum, that happen to collide with our experiment data.
What can I do to improve our paper?

Citations aren't just about avoiding plagiarism. They are more about embedding your work into a scientific context. Every paper should explain in an introduction section

why this work is relevant, and
how this work differs from previous approaches.

It is extremely rare that an approach is so novel that there is no meaningful prior work that can be referenced – many papers just apply an existing concept A to an  existing problem B and analyze whether this is useful, or extend an existing approach to have some desirable properties. If you can't reference such prior work, that is usually an indication that you don't understand the state of the art in your field. Such papers are unlikely to contribute to the field, and are very likely to be rejected by journals or conferences.
Most of the citations are usually in the introduction section of a paper, which is where related work is discussed. In contrast, it is somewhat normal that there are fewer references in the section where you describe your novel approach. You would still reference existing building blocks and methods of your approach. E.g. an experimental paper in CS might reference relevant software libraries that were used.
I am not an experienced author and know how hard it is to break into a field. It's difficult to get an overview of the state of the art in your field. However, this is a crucial part of writing a good paper – otherwise, it is quite likely that you're either doing something that has already been done, or that you're flaunting the methodological conventions of the field. For example, there might be existing testing methods or benchmark problems that every serious paper in that field should use. (If those existing methods were unsuitable, a paper about that could be useful as well!)

If the work is truly yours, and if you understand the state of the art and how we got to the present in the field and the work doesn't, in fact, plagiarize, then you should submit it. Reviewers will give you feedback on it.
But, a warning. Plagiarism won't necessarily be caught by an AI system, since it is about ideas, rather than their explicit expression. So, a paper could be completely plagiarized if it presents the ideas of others as if it were those of the authors, while using none of the phrasing and few of the words of the work plagiarized.
If you know the state of the art and who is the originator of the various ideas then it is easy to know whether what you write is original. And it is possible to unknowingly express the ideas of others as your own if you don't understand what came before. But that is just sloppy scholarship. And reviewers will catch it quickly.
But, assuming the best case, there is no reason not to submit your paper. The reviewers will give any necessary advice for improvement.

While you need to have read, and understood, the literature relevant to your work, not every paper needs to recapitulate the history. If you are writing a thesis, then you need to include much of that, but for a professional audience it isn't necessary. If you are writing for novices, then you need to say more, of course, but people in the field are, themselves, knowledgeable already about the history and the current state.


Must a tutorial TA resolve any questions from the students? I know it is TA's responsibility to help students understand the course material. But there are always some students don't like to think independently, or maybe just not smart enough. Is it ok for TA to tell students that "I can't help you. You should figure it out by youself." for some lame questions? Would this put TA into dereliction of duty?

My job as an instructor is to help the students learn, and I try to do so to the best of my abilities.

If a student is asking very basic questions (don't call them lame ever), help them to get up to speed pointing at some reading. You should pay attention to this, since for every student that asks questions, there may be several silent ones, and it may be an indication that the cohort is missing some knowledge your course is assuming.
If they ask questions for which they know the answer, but are unsure, teach them how to validate and verify their answers.
If they ask every little step of the way, the Socratic method is an option: ask questions back, make them work for the answers. But make them helpful: use them to guide the student towards the answer.
The students that just ask very many questions, just get lower priority, since I have to take care of the whole group, but I do still help them.
Questions that are off topic can be either gently shot down and redirected, or quickly point them at some references. If you find the question particularly interesting, you can offer to give more details after class. Make sure they don't get lost in the sidetracks, though.

In general, the goal should be to try to make yourself redundant by teaching them how to not need you you. This is never going to actually happen, but it is a worthy sky to look up to.

No.  You should refer the student to the professor if s/he doesn't feel satisfied with your explanation.  On the other hand, if you don't feel satisfied with your explanation, then please delve deeper into the material on your own time; you may seek help from fellow grad students and/or from professors.

Don't hesitate to tell the student you don't have a good answer off the top of your head, but you will look into it.


Benefit of a 1-year MSc in Comp Sci in the UK I hope this is the appropriate stacksite to ask this question.

I have a BSc in Computer Software Development and would very much like to study another year for an MSc in Computer Science. I had the choice of an MEng but decided to take the separate MSc.

I've heard mixed opinions on the subject but considering the climate I personally think it would be a good idea to gain a post-graduate degree. I've heard from Master students who were able to open many more opportunities from gaining an MSc - such as successfully entering the Game Industry which I know is very competitive. Although I'm not one for Game related modules, I chose more software engineering, database, and programming modules instead of rendering and games design modules throughout my BSc.

I will be getting into a considerable amount of additional debt to fund this year, but I feel like I'd be much more employable so the debt wouldn't really be a problem.

What do you think? Any advice or input would be greatly appreciated. I am 23 and an Englishman, just to put things into perspective.

You didn't mention if you want to do an MS in the UK or the US. If the former, I have no experience of how it works over there.

In general, an MS in CS does improve your chances of getting a decent job, but a lot depends on where you're getting an MS. In the US, the masters program is often viewed as a way to generate revenue via tuition, so your main benefit from the program is if it's very good at placing students. Obviously an MS from a place like Stanford or Berkeley will help you immensely because of the proximity of many tech options. But if you don't go to a place that has a good track record with placement, then the degree itself, while opening some doors, will not have provided you with maximum benefit for the price you're paying.

Also, make sure you go to a place that has strong ties to industry in the areas you're interested in. Since you mentioned games, many universities (including mine!) have specialized MS programs in game design (and we have fairly strong ties to local industry in the game world). That might be too specialized for you, but you get the general drift

I was always taught that a year in industry is worth LOTS more than a MSc. 2 years industry experience will bring your salary to £35,000 - £45,000 range, whereas MSc guarantees very little.

If you did a BSc with a year in industry then I would forget a master's all together and just resume looking for work. Only apply for MSc if you cannot find a job.

Also consider that you can study yourself from home, and actually pick topics which are actually used in industry. My popular example is that in university they teach SQL which is old as OO-SQL is out, but in industry it's normal to use NoSQL. So will extra education from a university help with your career...?

After all, have you ever seen a job which requires a master's degree? I have not!

EDIT: First edit was removed. Here is another point: does a computer science course actually teach skills you will need in industry, as it is such a generic course? I would often recommend master's degree, but I do not see how it helps you get a job when it teaches stuff which is outdated or not used in industry...

They teach Java at uni, yet in industry you'll most likely be using a framework like Spring which you either will not be taught at uni, or you will do barely a few weeks.


What happens if my PhD interest has changed after a year? I have had an admission for Spring semester (2019) with funding for PhD in Physics at a USA university. In my application, I mentioned that my area of interest is biophysics and experimental condensed matter physics. However, if my area of interest got changed (Assume for high energy physics or Astrophysics etc.), what happens then? Do the first two years for all PhD Physics students are the same in USA universities?

Since you've been admitted to what's presumably either a single institution, or a small number of institutions, it's probably more useful to try to figure out how things are handled there than what is typical. I would suggest scouring department websites, and maybe contacting your graduate coordinator, or graduate student representatives first.

That said, if you care for generalities, here are a couple. First thing to note is that the stated research interest is unlikely to be binding. If you can find an advisor to work with, that's all that matters, regardless of field. Changing interests is fairly common, but perhaps not between two extremes. However, the selection of admitted students tends to depend on the available funding, which varies with field. Thus, being able to switch to e.g. astrophysics isn't necessarily easy in practice, particularly if it's a small department. (Now, if you come in with your own funding you can do whatever you want, at least as far as the department is concerned. Of course, whoever granted you that funding might think differently...)

Second, there tends to be a number of mandatory courses for all students, and also field-dependent mandatory courses, and elective ones. (Obviously, biophysics and high energy require very different courses.) Due to these electives, and being able to take classes in different orders, the first two years would not be the same for everyone, but time isn't necessarily wasted if you change interests either. Further, a lot of students find their advisor during/after the first year, and would start their research during the summer semester and second year.

Yet, as I said, that's just a quick rundown of the typical situation. You'd most likely be better served looking up the rules and options for your specific situation.

In Math or CS this would probably be no problem at all as you haven't yet chosen an advisor. In Physics or Chemistry, however, in fields that require a lot of lab work, you may possibly already be assigned to a lab. If that is the case you might have some difficulty switching after you start.

I think your best course of action is to raise this issue with the institution to see where you are precisely and what your options are.

While I think it likely that without an MS you have some flexibility at entry, only the specific department can give you the proper advice. Talk to them.


What does “senior graduate student” mean in this context? I am an Indian student enrolled in an integrated master’s-of-science program and currently in my fifth (final) year of the program. So should I be called a senior graduate student or senior undergraduate student?

[Edit]: I read this https://www.numfocus.org/programs/john-hunter-technology-fellowship/ on the first line of second paragraph.
I quote that here:

  The program consists of a 6 month project-based training program for postdoctoral scientists or senior graduate students.

Also the eligibility is:

  Eligibility: Eligible applicants are postdoctoral scientists or senior PhD students, or have equivalent experience in physics, mathematics, engineering, statistics, or a related science.

Am I eligible? I am an Applied Mathematics student (maths major).

When talking about undergraduate studies, "senior" has a specific meaning in the US system, i.e. a student in their last year of a bachelor's degree.  But there isn't a specific meaning in the context of graduate studies; here "senior" just has the generic meaning of "more advanced, more experienced".  Of course, this is relative.

In the context you mention, referring to "postdoctoral scientists or senior PhD students", it seems clear to me that they mean a PhD student who is, at least, in the second half of their studies.  US PhD programs usually involve 2-3 years of advanced coursework, followed by dissertation research.  This program seems to be intended for students in the research stage, and it will likely expect that the students have a base of advanced knowledge in the relevant subfield.

From your description, I don't think you are eligible for this program.

In the USA, "senior graduate student" is not a formal title.  It refers to the graduate student who has been in the research group the longest.

Someone in your situation would be referred to as a "masters student."


Citing multiple Github repositories with a single citation I have reached the maximum paper length and already shortened everything as possible. I use 4 different github repositories, which I mention in my paper. Unfortunately, there is absolutely no room left to add a citation for each repository.

What options are there to solve this problem?

Would it be a good idea to create a new own repository that references the 4 different repositories and only cite my own repository?

There are really only two solutions to this problem, and which is appropriate depends on the customs of your field:

Name the repositories (and possibly give their URLs), but do not formally cite them. In some fields this will be unacceptable, others it's up to the author, and in yet while others it is considered unacceptable to cite a non-peer-reviewed source like a repository (I have had journals force me to de-formalize software citations before!).
Shrink something else to make space for the repository citations. You may think this is not possible, but I promise you that you can get the few lines you need without significantly affecting content through minor tweaks in wording, layout, and such (including in reference contents!)

URLs (including those for Github repositories) needn't be cited, they can (and commonly should) be included as footnotes.


Which Universities admit CS graduates for their theoretical physics course? Hello am currently an undergraduate student. My major is CSE. But I am very much interested to do my masters and then PhD in theoretical physics/mathematical physics. Is there any university that admits CS graduates for these courses?
I have looked up some universities that offer these courses.
Queen Mary University, University of Edinburgh and Durham University sounds perfect to me (I can meet their minimum requirements).
But I am not sure whether they admit CS graduates or not. I have not got any reply from them yet.
Would you suggest some Universities both in the UK and US that do? Would any university admit me directly for PhD (without masters)? Will having research paper help?
I could not find any university in the US that offer this course for masters.

I can't speak for the UK, which has a different educational system altogether, but in the US, most programs would find a CS graduate "acceptable" for a physics doctorate. This assumes a good record overall, of course, and probably a few physics courses in which you did well. In the US, a CS student probably has a few such courses, though not advanced ones.

But to actually be admitted you have to be better than "acceptable".

In the US, the graduate program has quite a few courses available, primarily to prepare the student for comprehensive exams. But the normal path would be into a doctoral program, perhaps with an MS along the way.

I would guess that in the UK the university would expect an applicant to be further along in the major subject, but others would need to verify.

In my experience, you would have to be very unusual to make this jump.  Of course it's possible.  I have seen it more from chemistry to physics or math to physics for students who knew they just sort of picked wrong to start.  Even then the road was not easy.  (But consider Lars Onsanger was a chemE bachelors.  However, he was also Lars Onsanger!)

In general, CS students are much less mathematically strong than physics students, so you would have to show this is not true. It's not even about specific courses (although that helps), but about a strong ability with "engineering mathematics" (Bessel functions out the yingyang, long derivations and homework problems with lots of algebra).

There's also the matter of maybe not knowing the physics.  Physics students sort of follow a plan of learning the same topic with more intensity (usually with new mathematical structures added) over time.  Consider that mechanics is tought as in intro course (similar to all students), than as a junior level majors course, than in grad school.  Same for E&M.  Quantum mechanics and stat mech (in grad school) are taught at a level harder than that during junior year majors course.  I.e. it's helpful to have had it before if you don't want to get killed.

Again, if you're a genius, it really doesn't matter.  But if you're just above average, I would be concerned about the pre-reqs.  Not for any silly reasons of credentials but just for the grounding.  I mean Jackson E&M is not trivial and many physics grad students struggle with it.  If you're anything like the average CS student as opposed to the average physics student (in terms of math and problem solving ability), I would recommend going nowhere near a physics grad program.  Even if you got accepted, you'd struggle and the experience would not be good for you.

P.s.  Finally to address your question specifically, I recommend to reach out to the departments.  You will learn more than just coming to a Q&A site.  Talk to them and learn something.  I suspect, they will actually be more willing to consider out of track people than you think.  But they will expect you to be rather special.  And you may get a few grim old salts like me, who warn you.

P.s.s.  Also, consider that the market for physics Ph.D.s is pretty dismal and has been for about 30+ years.  Many of them eventually go into some sort of computer related work since there's just so many jobs for that sort of stuff and since they have the physics brain to rely on to just get up to speed on the computer stuff.


TA Funding Length in STEM Field in USA I understand that depending on the department and the school the duration of the TA funding for a Phd student can vary. However, I’m interested in learning whether it’s common for departments in STEM field to have less than two semesters of TA funding for the same student in US.

I doubt that you will find many restrictions. It is fairly typical in many fields for students to spend a few years studying and paying for it as a TA. It is, normally, a job-like position, not a grant.

There may be some places that put a limit on it, but I doubt you would find anywhere that it was as little as two semesters. As long as you do a good job, of course, and keep up with your studies.

On the other hand, admission to a doctoral program doesn't automatically imply that you have a TA position. I is a separate transaction. But once you have the position, and perform well, it can continue.


Should list my advisor as an author on a paper I wrote alone? As a part of my PhD project, I wrote a paper. When my supervisor read it, she said “it is perfect and complete, go ahead and publish it yourself because I cannot contribute more to it”. She really meant it and tried to do me a favor.

However, I still think it can be more beneficial for my future to have her name on my paper. Should I insist to have her as a coauthor or it might be useful in the future to have all the credits of a good paper?

You should be a sole author for two reasons. First, your supervisor did not contribute to the paper. Some journals actually make you write out what each author accomplished, so you would be at a loss there anyway. Second, a sole-authored publication will demonstrate that you can work independently, which looks great to faculty search committees! When you are on the market, they want to hire people who will become independent researchers. You are demonstrating that by sole-authorship! If you want to publish with your supervisor because she is well-known in the field, my suggestion is that you talk with her about an additional paper project that both of you can work on.

On a side note, your supervisor might have described your paper as "perfect and complete," though this is only one reviewer's opinion. Though the paper may be at a stage for journal submission, please be prepared that the 2-5 blind reviewers may have different opinions about what is "perfect and complete." You still may get A LOT of revision requests from them. I'm sure you did a great job, I just don't want you to get discouraged if the reviewers end up being more critical.

Best of luck!!!!

My advice is to ask your supervisor. If she really does not want to go on the paper, ask other colleagues who might have helped you. If she hints otherwise, include her. Being alone on that paper might raise your reputation in a way, but it might also give the impression that you are grandiose and ungrateful and not a teamplayer. And that you don't recognize a situation where you can indebt other people to you at no cost. If in your group, everybody writes their papers with ten co-authors, chances are that being a sole author on a well-published paper will invite bad feelings from your peers.


Where to publish research if I do not want a peer review process? I have a few papers, one of which is on a topic that, after thorough checking, has not been researched from this particular angle before.

My question is where can I publish this without going through peer reviewed academic journals? I only have my undergrad, and am looking to publish the work to make myself competitive for a PhD finance program. The paper is on real estate finance.

I just need a quick- one, two, you're published! Will finance programs look highly on this, or will they ignore it completely?

"…a quick- one, two, you're published!"

That's not how it works.

What works is:

Make it a publicly available preprint (online repositories like
arXiv, a preprint series of some institute, university, maybe via your personal website or blog…).
Submit to some peer reviewed journal that complies with papers that are available as preprints (and there are journals that do not cost you anything; you will not get "open access" for free, but in many cases the preprint can stay freely available).
Put the paper in your CV and add "submitted for publication".

Then the paper will be visible and checkable and it also shows that you know how scientific publishing works.

I recommend github or something similar.  It is a format that is more conducive to collaboration.

Graduate committees are not going to consider this to be research, but it does show research interest.  This should count for something (though probably not much).

Way more importantly, the sooner you get started collaboratively researching the better.


Is it OK to turn down a postdoc offer (contract not signed yet) after getting a better postdoc offer I have received a postdoc offer from a world famous university (ranking ~ 60 worldwide) early June and accepted the offer via email. The university helped me applied for the visa an I have obtained the visa. The hardcopy of the contract, however, has not been signed. in early Aug. I received another interview from a top university (top 3 by some ranking) and got another offer. I have emailed the supervisor in the latter university and explained my situation and his idea is that it is OK to change to his offer since the work has not started. Is it OK to tell the first supervisor about my condition and ask whether he could permit my turning down on his offer?

While it may be legally OK, if your field is a small one, there may be damage to reputation as word of you withdrawing from an informal acceptance propagates.

Life goes on. Think ahead 10 years and ask yourself who's going to care. If someone is going to hold a grudge that long then you wouldn't want to work for them anyway. Take the new job. Unless its in my old lab. Don't do that to yourself ;-)