From Facebook to disease control, starting in New York via the UK to the Volcani centre in Israel and back again, my interview with Benjy Firester, winner of the Regeneron Science Talent Search 2018, felt like a whistlestop global tour. This bright senior student at Hunter College High School in New York began his research […]
Part 7: Don’t forget – IT IS EXCITING! by Amanda Rasmussen This has turned into quite a long article based on the advice and insecurities of 8 PIs of varying experience (see details at the end). Our intention is not to scare anyone off making the jump from post-doc to PI…but rather to let you know that […]
Part 6: Academic Imposter Syndrome (AIS- pronounced Ace) by Amanda Rasmussen Academic Imposter Syndrome (AIS): (I’ve decided to call it AIS (pronounced ace) because that sounds more positive) I’m not going to lie, this is something I struggle with on an almost daily basis. There are so many challenges in academia – this first list of […]
Part 5: The Importance of Mentoring by Amanda Rasmussen Finding and making the most of good mentors is incredibly important (dare I say in particular for the transition from post-doc to PI?). There are blogs elsewhere about this (here) including my comments and experience so I won’t restate the same thing. Instead I’ll just point out […]
Part 4: Building a team by Amanda Rasmussen As reflected by the length of this section, building a team is perhaps one of the biggest challenges to new academics. My team started as me, myself and I. And we don’t always agree! Aside from diluting the Gollum-style conversation, building a team is crucial to get […]
Part 3: Hitting the ground running – but not too fast! by Amanda Rasmussen Momentum/Time management: “I was told that starting your PI position will be slow, but I didn’t realize quite how slow it would be. After six months, I’m delighted that I’ve cleared all the paperwork and other hurdles to obtain my seeds, […]
Part 2: Isolation Busting by Amanda Rasmussen “I was told to expect the isolation, but it’s still difficult to move from a big, functioning lab with lots of people to being on your own.” –Erin Personally I was used to working independently having come through two fellowships but for me the isolation came from being […]
Part 1: Introduction by Amanda Rasmussen A cloudy day in June. I wait patiently outside an office for a meeting for which I’m 10 minutes early. The meeting is with a professor (Prof K) who has recently begun at Nottingham and whose research is of interest as a potential collaboration. As a newly appointed group leader […]