text:
Should I wait for the next Ph.D. openings?
I'm finishing my master's degree in theoretical physics (probably with distinction) and have published a paper.
I'm searching for a Ph.D. position in theoretical physic in Europe, but I can't find any position which I'm passionate about. I think, there will be more opening in 6 month. On the other hand, I will be then 30!
Would you suggest me to wait for a position which I really love? Or should I apply to for a position which is interesting but not that much? The problem is that I'm not sure about future!

First things first: Find out what is your own priority. Why do you want a PhD, what is important for you about this?

@skymningen I wish to be a researcher and maybe a professor.

Maybe if you wait, you'll find your dream position and everything'll be perfect.  Or maybe the offerings will get less-and-less appealing each year.  Seems like such trade-offs are a matter of personal opinion.

Sounds like you have an "optimal stopping problem" on your hands: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optimal_stopping

@Dawn Exactly! I wish this was a mathematical problem!

Are there typically better positions in spring? Perhaps look at a cache of last spring's openings. Your age is irrelevant. There is zero practical difference between 29 years 364 days and 30 years.

I'm not sure where in Europe you are looking, but in my experience not all positions are advertised. I would suggest to use your network (especially your MSc advisor) to contact the labs you are interested in and inquire about opportunities.
In both European countries I am familiar with (Germany and France) there are government PhD funds that are allocated on individual application from the student. So often, you can get professors who are willing to work with you if you apply for your own funding, even if they don't currently have funding for an open position and therefore aren't advertising anything. There are usually yearly or twice-yearly deadlines for this.
Whether openings are continuously advertised or clustered around certain dates will depend on your country's habits. What makes you think that better positions will open in 6 months? Are there some big grants being awarded at that point?

There is always a compromise, Immanuel. It all depends on your intentions, as dan1111 said.

From my experience, I wouldn't care that much about the topic. If I
  were you, I would make sure as good as I could, that you are in an
  environment that can support you.

That means, finding a supervisor, that works in a similar way as you; a facility that can provide you with good opportunities, like fast computers clusters, as an example. And so on..
In this way, you can leave out passion a bit aside and focus on the real world, on something more objective. Passion is anyway overrated in m opinion. Good luck!


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Cover Letter for PhD Application
I have to write a cover letter for a PhD application (in theoretical physics).
I didn't find any useful sample about this. Does anyone have any suggestion?
Moreover, I have to write a research statement. I don't know how I can write them in different ways.

Which country?..

Your cover letter should be about you, not some dork that you found his / her letter on the net...

@neuranna Europe, in particular Germany.

Several different templates are available on the net, it depends only on your taste!
I would like only one thing: write it in LaTeX. If you are not familiar with LaTeX or you don't feel comfortable with it, Theoretical Physics is not for you. Obviously I'm joking, but not completely...
Anyway, without too much efforts, on the net I found in particular this template that is really suitable for many purposes (actually, with some modifications, is the one I use for my letters):

As you can see this is very sober but direct and clear.
If otherwise you fell very comfortable with typing in TeX, I suggest you to try to emulate some template in LibreOffice downloadable on the net. In particular I recommend this one, in particular the one at page 23, but many others are really nice.
Therefore, I would like to quote also this answer from SE Academia that partially answer your question. In particular I stress the importance of these sentences:

What is unavoidable to write
Make your cover letter personal, remarkable (i.e., stands out from other cover letters), specific to you and specific to the position at hand. Be enthusiastic. Be specific. Show that you've put thought into the position and why you are applying.
Relate your specific skill sets and previous experience to the programme you are applying for. Relate the content of specific aspects of your CV to the programme:
"During my masters, I enjoyed working on the topic of A, which relates to your programme [in this way]"
"I worked three summers at company B, where I gained experience in topic C ..."
"I visited your university in March last year and was impressed by ..."
"I read paper entitled 'D' published by your group at 'E' and was interested in ..."
"I recently published a paper 'F', which I believe compliments work by 'G' in your department on 'H' ..."

Good luck for your application!

Then you will not have problems at all... Actually the answer had also an image about the template but since I don't have enough reputation that was hidden...

@ErikPillon You seem to have embedded the image incorrectly (you entered it as a link). I've edited your answer to display the image as I believe you desired.

@StellaBiderman absolutely! Thank you a lot! Actually was not my fault... I couldn't embed properly the image because I hadn't enough reputation points... enyway, thank you so much!

@ErikPillon Interesting. I didn’t realize that was a limitation of low-rep users. Anyways, it’s an excellent answers.

source: Stack Exchange

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About the job prospects and skills learned during physics/math PHD
I am nearing the end of my degree (which is equivalent to a double major B.Sc in mathematics and physics) and the time has come to specialize in a field. The chliche is almost obvious, I am having a hard time choosing between studying:

Fundamental physics; high-energy theory. Due to the lack of knowledge I cant be more specific.
Mathematics; Mostly of the analysis sort (in the intersection of geometry, functional analysis, probability). Perhaps with a more applicable touch.

I have not considered anything else. CS / engineering do sound nice and exciting, but I know too little about either to determine if I may enjoy them.
To make sure this isn't the standard "math vs physics" topic; I will attempt to detail as much as I can, and pose answerable questions.
After lengthy contemplation, I am still unable to realize towards where each academic degree would lead me. Academia is an option, but, adopting a more realistic point of view, the number of positions is small and I cannot foresee whether I will still like academia. This pushes me to explore other possibilities. Fortunately (or unfortunately) I have enjoyed both topics very much, and studied them with success.
To avoid unnecessary repetitions, in the rest of my post, physics would mean high-energy physics (phenomenology or theory). Math would mean geometry, functional analysis, probability.

What skills, applicable outside of physics/math, does one acquire in physics/math PhD?
What can a physics/math student do during their PhD to increase their job applicability? I refer to this What skills can I get during a PhD to be competitive on the job market against non-PhD holders? but would like to note that the former is broader, as the possible PhD there is not mentioned.
When physics/math PhDs leaves academia, they would rebrand  themselves, for example, as engineers or data scientists. How difficult such a transition is? Asking friends, professors and searching through the internet shows they get to high-tech, big data, financial trading. But more specifically, how could a theoretician/mathematician develop the skills to become, for instance, chief engineer (maybe simply engineer)?
Are these degrees appreciated outside of academia? For comparison, let's say CS and engineering are appreciated. How bad does math/physics compare to them? I apologise this question is not very subjective, but I get the feeling that although people who go through these programs are capable of dealing with such abstract concepts - they are disregarded outside of academia.
Studying any of these, can you get involved in developing algorithms fairly easily? What about AI? This sound like things I would like to do if academia doesn't work out for me.

I find this: MS degree after a PhD in physics demoralising, but would like to understand what I should expect. Expiriences like that probably answer some of my questions, and are very welcome.

Welcome to Academia SE. Unfortunately your question is not a good fit for this site for multiple reasons: 1) It asks many (separable) questions at once. 2) Some questions are about the content of an academic field (instead of academia itself). 3) Many questions are shopping questions.

Studying any of these, can you get involved in developing algorithms fairly easily? ... This sound like things I would like to do if academia doesn't work out for me. — Algorithm development is a serious academic research area, and most algorithms are developed within academia.  The likelihood of a mathematician or physicist just "picking up" algorithms are about the same as a computer scientist just "picking up" algebraic geometry or high-energy physics.

@Wrzlprmft Should I close this post?

@JeffE I did not mean to underestimate anyoe. It is not unreasonable to think that a skilled mathematicin can study CS, and it would probably take less time then it would take an undergrad (and vice-versa, for that matter...). Moreover, some research areas are so closely linked, or the mathematical structures they study or use are similar, which makes such a transition even easier (e.g., a geometer that works on strings). Perhaps ``picking up'' was not appropriate here.

@Ranc: You lack the reputation to close posts. The best thing would be if you [edit]ed it to address the problems while not invalidating the answer (which answers most parts of your question which are a good fit anyway).

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If you have two bachelor's degree in related fields, can you mention in your CV only the latest of the two?
I obtained my bachelor's degree from a third tier school before completing my second bachelor's degree and a master's degree at more reputable schools. I was wondering if it is acceptable to omit my first bachelor's degree from my CV.

Include all of your education.

CV for what? For graduate admissions, you will likely have to list (and supply transcripts from) all schools you've attended anyway.

Why would you want to leave it out?

I think it would make for an awkward line of questioning at an interview when they inevitably ask what you did during those years and you reply that you completed a Bachelors degree but didn't feel it was good enough to include it.
Worst case scenario: your interviewer went to that institution and you've just shot yourself in the foot.
Always include your full educational and work experience as it makes for easy nitpicking at an interview that is easily avoided.

Withholding the information would be acceptable to most people, but it may expose a large gap in your education/employment track record. You may be asked about what you did during these years.


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How to define methodology for two different approaches?
I am working on my Master Thesis and I am exploring two different approaches to the same problem. I am having trouble deciding on how to structure the Methodology section to divide these two approaches, since they share some components.

The best way to go about this is to be very clear about what you're doing. Label one as Methodology A and the other as Methodology B. Write them up separately and if then if you feel it necessary, write how they are similar.
When moving forward in your thesis be sure then to refer to each methodology explicitly in the context of what results were achieved et cetera.
As long as the reader is fully aware of what you're doing throughout, it shouldn't be a problem.

I decided that I'll divide methodology in 2 sections. One that is further subdivided into the two different approaches (which form the first steps in my pipeline) and the second section is what they share (the last steps). It looks something like this:
Step 1
  Method A
  Method B
Step 2


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How to get nominated for awards?
I came to the US with my PhD classmate having similar backgrounds and took postdocs at two different universities. My research output is much better than him, but he has won three awards from reputable societies/organizations. Now he got a tenure-track position, but I was not even invited for an interview.
The point is that his PI nominates him for every possible award, but my PI never does. I specifically asked several times, but he doesn't care.
What should I do? Should I move to another group whose PI supports me in getting such credits?

It is very unlikely that he got a tenure-track position and you didn't, simply because of three awards. Hiring committees in my experience don't put much weight on awards.  Rather than blaming your PI, you might be better served to understand what you can actually do to improve your chances. Perhaps your research output isn't as strong as you think it is. Perhaps your cover letter is off-putting. Perhaps your letters of recommendation are not great. Any of these are far more likely to be problems than the lack of awards.

Could it be that his PI is much more connected than yours? Just based on the two facts that you have mentioned.

@iayork why aren't awards important? They represent the approval of the scientific significance of his works by reputable panels. At the senior level, don't search committees care if an applicant has a Nobel Prize or something at that level?

It is not always about a better application. Sometimes the reason is that his field and experiences better match with what the hiring department wants/needs.

@All Sure, if you have a Nobel Prize, you're probably OK for job searches. But it's not the Nobel Prize or other award itself that makes the person attractive, it's the work that led to the award, which -- key point -- a hiring committee can judge for themselves. If the work is good, then scientists will know. I suppose if the work is way outside the expertise of the committee, an award might help (but then they wouldn't know if the award is prestigious either); but why would a hiring committee be so out of their depth that they can't judge a candidate's work by themselves?

To be fair to OP's query -some advisors do a good job at promoting their postdocs/students and some do not. (Personality of advisor can affect this). Yes it can feel or be unfair and even the same advisor can be more excited about certain employees (with some unfair unconscious biases) and be lukewarm about others while still being a good advisor in other capacities (sharing expertise, good ideas,  good mentoring day to day). But the comments of @layork  are good - spend less time blaming the PI and being jealous of the other person. Observe the culture of your field. (grow up professionally)

@iayork There are many scientists at the level of Nobel Prize. There are many debates that Nobel laureates were not the best choice or other scientists deserve it more. But the credit goes to someone who holds it. Nobel Prize does not guarantee that an applicant fits the faculty job, but no university reject it because it gives credit to the university. At the junior level, having awards means that the applicant is more likely to receive more awards, fellowships, grants, etc, which are important for the university.

Hiring committees in my experience don't put much weight on awards. — Your experience is very different from mine.

"My research output is much better than him". "Better" is not well defined in academia. No one has grades: you can't compare an A to an A-. Instead, everything is "graded" more casually.
But this casual grade has nothing to do with how hard or difficult the work is. If you mean "better" as "I work harder, have more publications, and my publications use more difficult techniques etc." then I think you have the wrong definition of "better". In academia, "better" means your research is clear and interesting. Doing better in academia seems to usually be less about doing harder and more technical work, and more about picking the right problems to pursue and communicating the results well. This has nothing to do with how "good of a technical mathematician/scientist" you are, rather it has to do with how good you are at understanding what is interesting to a research community and clearly communicating results which reflects the interests of said community.
Your classmate is likely doing "better" because his PI is very interested in the results of his research. Others must be interested as well: that's why he got awards. You should look at his work and ask: who finds this interesting and why? See what you can learn about what his success says about the research community you are engaged in.
A good practice to do from time to time is to take a few papers from a high-impact journal and just try to understand why these are considered as highly impactful. What I have found is usually two things:
1) They have a really clear introduction which motivates this work as part of some larger research question which many people are interested in.
2) They are simple.
The first is pretty simple: writing clearly is important. "Selling your work" is important because if people don't know at a glance that your work is interesting, they will never dig into the paper to find out. The second point is kind of counter-intuitive. Academia tends to be very elitist about "being smart", but a lot of the most impactful work is actually relatively simple in its methods and arguments. One reason this occurs is because a simple result is easy to generalize to other fields: biologists can follow clear and simple mathematical results, but a more advanced mathematical treatment is a subject for mathematicians, meaning breakthrough mathematical models without all of the extra bells and whistles are the results which are most widely known and applied. But also, people more easily understand it and see all of the nuances they can add to it, generating a lot research interest surrounding the idea (i.e. you left something for someone else to look into!).
Of course, this depends on the audience. In mathematical journals sometimes very dirty mathematical derivations contain some of the most cherished results by other mathematicians. Knowing your target audience for each paper/presentation is the best way to make sure your research is read and appreciated.

Technically, better research output means that the OP has published more papers in better journals (probably judged by the impact factor or prestigious).

@All No, that's just more research output.

@JeffE It is meaningless to debate what's in someone else's mind, but the reasonable interpretation is that better is an adjective describing the quality.

This response aligns not only with my experience in academia (as a PhD student and a Postdoc), but also, to some extent, with promotion decisions in the industry. The prevailing academic culture seems to encourage PI's and researchers to take up popular projects and come up with 'positive' results. If your results are negative (e.g. 'xyz cannot be accomplished within the specified constraints'), then all you get is a 'meh'. This makes me wonder about the risks of younger researchers gravitating toward popular/easy problems.

Interestingly, your two things seems for high impact articles seem to apply also to highly upvoted StackExchange questions and answers.

@All I completely agree that "better" describes the quality.  But your proposed definition only describes the quantity.

Apart from your research and academic recognition, such things as personality, and social and communication skills can be crucial when you are being considered for a teaching job. Especially at a small department. Same goes for your relationship with your PI. Not only your research should be interesting and promising, but your personality should fit into the local culture. While occasionally a university might hire a world renowned genius who generates horrible student reviews,  when it comes to regular professors, they want somebody who won't complicate matters at the department.


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What fraction of theoretical computer science researchers work on quantum computation?
I know that the theoretical computer science aspect of quantum computation was a very niche subject until the 1994 discovery of Shor's algorithm, which lead to a huge increase of interest in the topic. Very roughly, what fraction of theoretical computer science researchers in a typical CS department have published any research on quantum computation or quantum complexity theory? Is it a big part of the field of TCS today, or is still considered a rather niche subject?

Define "a typical CS department".

@DanRomik Say, a department whose fraction of researchers studying quantum computation is close to the average fraction across all university CS departments with five or more researchers specializing in TCS.

The problem is that none of the terms "university", "CS department", "researchers specializing in TCS" (or individually "researcher", "specializing in" and "TCS" for that matter) are particularly well-defined. Well, I'll grant you that "five or more" does have a precise meaning... Regardless, I'm sorry to say it but your question is unanswerable in its present form.

Quantum computing research isn't limited to computer science. Researchers could also be in applied mathematics departments (U Waterloo for example) or physics (yale). So I'm not certain the statistical data lies where you think it does.

@DanRomik Agreed, but I'm not looking for three significant figures of precision. I bet the majority of TCS researchers (under any reasonable definition) would agree whether the answer is, say, below 1/3, between 1/3 and 2/3, or above 2/3 (although I'm not sure which one they'd pick).

I think it clearly is under 1/3 - its not like there aren't a million other topics in computer science going on still.

@JonCuster What about 1/10? 1/30? ;)

I would guess zero. A typical CS departent has few theoretical computer scientists.


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How should I acknowledge a reviewer who left a negative review?
I submitted a paper to a journal and received three peer reviews. Two reviews were very positive and recommended acceptance, and one was very negative and recommended rejection. This journal does non-anonymous review, so I know the reviewers' identities. The editor accepted my paper despite the one negative review and gave me the opportunity to revise the paper in response to the reviewers' feedback.
I usually thank all reviewers by name in the final version of my papers as a courtesy. In this case, how should I acknowledge the reviewer who recommended rejection (if at all)? On the one hand, she offered valid criticisms that improved the paper, so I think she deserves to be thanked. On the other hand, I wonder if thanking her risks implying that she endorses my paper (which she doesn't, as her review was quite harsh). She may not want her name associated with this paper.

If for whatever reason you feel it's appropriate to name names, how about 'I acknowledge the constructive comments of the reviewers X, Y, and Z and the improvements they brought to this work.'

This may depend on your field, but AFAIK in some fields it is customary to ask people before you acknowledge them in your paper. Do you usually do that before thanking your reviewers by name?

@StephanKolassa No, I’ve never heard of that custom.

Asking them does sound like the common sense approach.

@tparker I think it's field-dependent; see Is it necessary to ask permission before including someone in the acknowledgements of a research paper?

While I acknowledge it might be field-dependent, in my view it would be unethical not to acknowledge someone whose comments improved the paper.

Perhaps this is the time where you break your usual approach and just say "We thank the reviewers for their constructive feedback" or some such. If a situation calls for a different approach, choose a different approach. It doesn't always have to be the same way.

she offered valid criticisms that improved the paper, so I think she deserves to be thanked.

Good instinct. Also, good for you for seeing the value in their review.

I wonder if thanking her risks implying that she endorses my paper

Not in the slightest! Reviewers serve a number of purposes, and you are thanking them for some of them. (I think you probably already feel this way. My guess is that you've never written "we'd like to thank Reviewer 3 for agreeing with us" or "We gratefully acknowledge Reviewer 2's compliments.") To the extent that a reviewer has made the paper better, acknowledge that. If you're worried about implying an endorsement, be specific in your thanks. But beware of damning with faint praise, as in "We acknowledge Reviewer 1's heroic discovery of a missing comma."

I dunno, if I miss an Oxford comma, I'd consider alerting me of that before publication pretty heroic. I have a hill to die on.

"We would like to thank Reviewer 3 for pointing out some subtle errors/glaring errors/unclear bits/entire pages of Lorem Ipsum placeholders. (We also thank reviewers 1 and 2 for their entirely positive reviews, the spineless brown-nosers :-))" Seriously though, the positive reviews might help the editors make their decision, but the negative reviews are the ones that can actually help you improve the paper. If you're thanking anyone, it should be them.

@ScottishTapWater I've seen a missing semicolon disable 200k debit cards for 3 hours on a Friday evening. Pointing out missing punctuation can be quite heroic.

@DavidS - And this is why you use strongly typed, compiled languages :P

@ScottishTapWater ...all of which require the Oxford comma for their comma-delimited array literals.

@ScottishTapWater "I'd like to thank the hero, Reviewer 1, and Reviewer 2."

Since you know the identity, maybe you can reach out per email (or telephone :D) and ask them directly, if they want to be mentioned?

You could ask her if she prefers your usual approach or the suggestion from Wolfgang Bangerth.

Also note: A reviewer being of another opinion does not make your work "bad" or false. It just shows, that there are more takes to it, as you could (maybe) think of. Don't feel rejected. Just acknowledge, that there are others who are interested in the field and also do their way of science and reached out to you.
Someone with a different approach or idea could be a beneficial partner to come into discussion with. I do not know about your topic and the real nature of the review, though.
Is it negative in your opinion, or does it clearly state what points led to the "rejection", and is this argumentation easy to follow and seems reasonable to you?

If so, then that is a good review, ignore the "rejection" result for a moment. It is not ment to stop you from publishing!

If it is not reasonable to you or you have questions or see things differently, contact the reviewer - that is, given you are interested into digging deeper into the field. If not and you just want your paper being published, that is also fine. 2:1 for you is still a green light! (given more reviews it could end up as 43:3. The 2:1 is just an approximation. You have only a low number of reviews being performed in total because of time and costs, etc. It is not supposed to mean, that 50% of all reviews disagree with you! That is/would be a severe misconception!)

Is the review targeted at your work effort and not at the topic, insulting you, etc. then contact and ask for clarification and an apology. If they ignore you, file a complaint somewhere appropriate (idk, at the journal's office maybe?)

Distinguish the case at this point if the reviewer just tells you "he/she did it this way and that way is much better than your way and shows those results which contradict yours", etc. This is not a real rejection. It is a way of trying to communicate that there exists another approach and it is open to debate which one is more suitable. Maybe you can answer back in this case. (It is harder if the topic is like a philosophical one, then the tone might be subjectively more negative but it is still the "open to debate" kind of way). This should not stop you from publishing. It should encourage you to publish and bring everyone forward in this field. Even if it turns out the truth is something different in the end.

Are the points valid, but you think the tone in which they are written is in a manner that does induce negative feelings in you - note that this is subjective. Maybe the reviewer did not ment to hurt your feelings, but just were unable to write it in another way or revise their review because time did not permit. Maybe they are a bit jealous of your work?

Look "behind the facade of the words". Does the tone change? Maybe in the beginning it is harsh, but in the end more objectively okay? Then see it as an improving tendency towards your work and the attempt of helping (aka trying to (maybe overly) "protect" you from doing something wrong). You can still decide to accept the help or not. Both ways are fine - in the sense of: Yes is fine and No is fine. Ignoring it or trying to cover it to forge something, wouldn't be of course.
On a personal note: This is of course not the case here, obviously! You seem very concerned in not to ignore it and doing it right! But also allow you to question if the review is valid/invalid (or parts of it). Because you are allowed to (and even ment to) decide if it isn't - and maybe give feedback to your reasoning, because you are the expert/author of your paper, not the others!
That is what the "No" means. You are also not supposed to take each and every review into account just because it arrived at your inbox! The journal gave you the opportunity to revise, not the obligation.

On the bottom line:
Think of the old days, where scientists like Einstein, Bor etc. all talked to each other, via letters or face-to-face, and discussed their ideas till late into the night. Notably those two had different opinions on the structure of atoms. And even Einstein was not "right" in each and every conception/conviction. Today we follow Bor's approach more. Both are great scientists, though.

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text:
Publishing from PhD thesis to papers
I have a question on publishing papers from my PhD thesis. I found this topic in other answered questions, but never exactly the same (forgive me if I am wrong), and I need some more comments on this.
I wrote my thesis as a collection of few papers, following the model of my research school, but never went on submitting those, for several reasons and for several years. Now I think the right time came, but I am doubtful I can publish the papers in the thesis "as they are", since the thesis is publicly available. Well, to publish papers from thesis chapters is a common procedure in the research school I attended, but normally it is done in the same year, or few years later, while I graduated 6 years ago.
I contacted the editor of the journal I wish to submit one of the papers, asking if I can publish data already presented in my publicly-available-thesis. He replied that data can be reused, provided that it is clearly stated they are not original. Can the text be reused as well? I will make some changes, add comments and update literature reference, but a greta portion of the text will remain the same. Can this be a problem?
Thank you very much for your answers,
Clelia

"... the thesis is publicly available." This seems to be the crucial point, on which you might want to elaborate: How exactly is it public? Has your school published it? Do they hold rights? I would suggest to contact the PhD school about this, you are surely not the first who wants to publish a little later than common and they will know how to deal with it better than people here, who are not familiar with your regulations.

You probably can't submit as they are anyway, because in 6 years the field progressed. At least you would have to redo the bib. review. Why didn't you ask the editor this as well? S/He is the right person to answer this, pretty much the only one.

Thank you for the suggestions. The thesis is available from the website of the University library, in this sense it is "publicly available". Not much changed in the field in the past 6 years, which is also why I am encouraged to widespresd more my results. However what you say is true: both co-authors and editor might help me find a way.

You can think of your thesis as a preprint. Thus, you can extract manuscripts from it and publish them. This is essentially how arXiv works.


text:
Should papers peer reviews be done publicly?
Three reviewers assessed my paper and all of them rejected it (weak reject), and to be honest I am not so mad about the rejection. One of the reviewers gave really good feedback and his arguments about rejecting it were correct.
But: The other two reviewers gave comments that were really wrong.
For example one of them said that my paper was short, but my paper had exactly the maximum allowed number of pages. Also his English was terrible and he was saying that the paper was written in bad English. I am not a native English speaker but my supervisor is, and he corrected all of my mistakes before submitting the paper.
Also the third reviewer made some claims (referring to my citations) that were wrong (so he didn't even read the papers that "supported" his arguments). I took the time and reread all of the papers that he referred to and all of his claims are false.
Lastly all of the reviewers gave completely different reasons for rejecting the paper which also seemed really weird to me.
I was thinking to complain to the conference but my supervisor suggested we shouldn't because we would just waste our time.
So my question is shouldn't peer reviews were public and is there any good reason that they are not?

I wonder if we should have a "paper review stackexchange", with one thread for each paper on the Arxiv.

It seems your last sentence  is not related to the rest of the post.  You could (as the proposed duplicate does) ask whether reviews should be public.  But your tale of bad reviews neither supports nor refutes that proposal.

I think you are right guys. I just wanted to share my story.

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text:
Grammatical mistakes and minor typos made during grant application
I have recently applied for a grant. The specific application consisted of a 3 page-pdf document and an online application form. The 3 page pdf document is solid (at least from my point of view), and there are no grammatical mistakes or typos. Unfortunately, in the form, I made some minor grammatical mistakes/typos. These are, however, very few and far between. For example, mistakenly not adding a word in the sentence, forgetting to add/type a verb in the sentence etc.
Do you think that such errors/typos albeit very few, in general, can be detrimental towards the outcome of the application?

Very much depends on the reviewer.  If he/she is pedantic, then he/she may use that as an excuse to sink your grant application, especially if the reviewer is competing for the same grant.

@Prof. Santa Claus: At least in the US, and any country with a halfway decent funding system, no one "competing for the same grant" would ever be a reviewer of applications for that grant.

“Unfortunately in the later “ what? Later version? Letter? Even this post does not give a good impression...

@RaghuParthasarathy in Australia, unfortunately, that's not true. The Australian Research Council (ARC) will often invite reviewers who are also applying for the same funding program; so you can imagine the review process, everyone shows up with big axes.

@Prof. Santa Claus -- Wow! Thanks for the information. What a bizarre policy -- a guaranteed conflict of interest!

If the errors are of a type easily caught by a spellchecker, it will look like you were careless.  Everyone develops reading fatigue so repetitions of small words and/or forgetting some small words are usually not lethal.  Making incomplete sentences is more worrisome.
It is doubtful your application will be rejected because of small typos.  If your project is strong and error-free, it will be given greater weight than an ancillary form.  On the other hand, if you are ranked near the threshold line, it could be that the negative impression left by this type of oversight is enough to move you down one rank and sink your application.

Typos are always detrimental. Especially in a short submission they will stand out and broadcast to the reviewer that you are not careful or did not take the submission seriously enough. This is true in other areas as well. I vividly remember as a kid watching a friend's dad flip through resumes of job applicants for his company. He would immediately throw away any that had typos, complaining "how hard is it to make sure a 2-page resume is perfect?"
Whether they are detrimental enough to fully sink your application depends on the reviewer and your application's strength otherwise.


text:
Is it ok to ask ex-dissertation supervisor for any future funded phds
Following a computer science degree I would love to follow a phd research.
The problem is that all funded phds that are advertised from the specific university do not meet my desired criteria, i.e. research projects that target the  improvement of the quality of life of vulnerable groups of people.
I know that my ex bachelor dissertation supervisor used do research and observe researches of my desired criteria.
Would it be ok asking him through email whether such oportunities exist? Or would that be just a waste of his time?

The only thing it could be is a waste of your time. You are writing the email. If they are not interested at all they can ignore it, even writing a short negative answer should not cost them too much time. It would definitely be a waste of your opportunity not to try. Go ahead! Especially if you have a more specific interest you can tie in with their research.

The short answer is Yes. Rather, the supervisor might be happy to take you in if she had such a project.
Since you have already worked under the supervisor during your earlier degree and showed some excellent outcomes with research maturity, the supervisor would be really happy to take you in as a research lab member.
If you had not shown any good outcomes during your dissertation, then she might not consider the request.
However, it is not a waste of time to write and ask. Since she knows you she may read your email. Many a time, professors do not read emails even, and that is frustrating.


text:
Doing Ph.D in another country and Master in Italy at the same time, is it possible?
Doing Ph.D in another country and Master in Italy at the same time, is it possible? I am already Ph.D student in Armenia and I want to apply for one of Erasmus Mundus Master programs in University of Bologna. Is that possible?

I would say it is doubtful whether you have the time to do both - though I guess there is nothing stopping you from being enrolled in two courses provided you fulfill the entry requirements for both - and are actually able to give both your attention. This would not really possible if both are full time - if the contents overlap sufficiently for it to be possible, there may be future conflicts as to who contributed what in which work... - You might also want to clarify how you envisage this to work? Are you given leave from the PhD for obtaining a Masters?

Depends on the rules of your university and the University of Bologna. Ask your advisor and, if they say it's OK by your university's rules, ask the programme director in Bologna.

I'm not sure of the rules in those specific locations but it was my understanding that you can only be registered on a full time course at one university at a time. This is something you should check with both institutions.
Further to this, do you really think you would have the time to study for a Masters and a PhD at the same time and if you did do both then could you honestly say you were dedicating yourself 100% to one or the other? A PhD is not something to be done on a whim and requires a huge effort on the part of the student to complete.


text:
As a referee, is it appropiate to ask for further details on a model extracted from another work?
I'm reviewing a work in applied mathematics, and on it, the authors work on an equation that is derived from a previous work.
There is a parameter that has been chosen in a way I would like to be justified. Looking into the reference where they extracted the equation, the original authors also don't give any explanation for it.
Therefore, should I ask for further details on this parameter? or is it enough for them to point out the seminal work?

@corey979 You could post that as an answer. OP, I think a lot of papers would be improved by (better) justifying why specific parameters/models/methods were chosen. Suggesting such improvements to the manuscript is absolutely a part of refereeing. Asking to have such questions clarified to the reviewer(s)? Even more so.

The two answers beg the question about the quality of the review for the original paper...

The onus is on the authors to appropriately justify all of their choices and conclusions, either directly or by referring to previous work which in turn contains an appropriate justification.
In this case they have referred to previous work which (in your view) does not contain an appropriate justification, so their job is not done.  It is completely reasonable for you as referee to object.
(Even if the previous work did contain appropriate justification, you might still feel, as in Buffy's answer, that the justification should be written in the present paper, to make it more self-contained.  That's also appropriate to mention as a reviewer, but it's more a matter of style than correctness.)

My response would likely be in the report that the authors haven't sufficiently justified their choice of parameter. If you have the question and it isn't resolved in the paper itself, future readers will still have the same question. This is for the authors to fix.
A work should be complete enough that most people don't need to chase back through all references. Your job is to help the readers in the future as well as the authors.


text:
Is there a way to report to google scholar some systematic mistakes?
I've noticed, for citations, that some BibTeX files provided by google scholar are having regular errors (I believe these are errors).
For bib items, there is the "pages" field, in which we could input a range or a number of pages an article has. I've found at least two journals (in a short time span) whose articles have a wrong "pages" field. For instance
@article{baffou2009heat,
title={Heat generation in plasmonic nanostructures: Influence of                  morphology},
  author={Baffou, G and Quidant, R and Girard, C},
  journal={Applied Physics Letters},
  volume={94},
  number={15},
  pages={153109},
  year={2009},
  publisher={AIP}
}

or
@inproceedings{ammari2015super,
  title={Super-resolution in high-contrast media},
  author={Ammari, Habib and Zhang, Hai},
  booktitle={Proc. R. Soc. A},
  volume={471},
  number={2178},
  pages={20140946},
  year={2015},
  organization={The Royal Society}
}

Similarly, this last paper is not a proceeding, but an article from the journal "Proceedings of the Royal Society".
Probably there are some other mistakes around.
I know that these data are collected automatically, but, is there any way to report the errors to help google scholar to perfect their algorithms?

Look it is done by a program. There can be bugs. Simple, correct and use it as per your requirement. Change inproceedings to article.

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because this is not particularly about academia. It is about a bug in some third party website.

Yes, but it is a useful tool in academia, as we all should be citing properly. And yes, you could just cross your arms and do nothing about a systematic mistake or seek a way to make our life's easier; there is even a google scholar tag for the questions.
In case it is off topic, it begs the question, where could I ask something like this?

@Coder Sure, there can be bugs, but bugs can be corrected, and I think complaints from users are one of the main factors in decisions about which bugs are worth correcting.

@FranciscoJoseRomeroHinrichs There can be error in publisher's metadata. For example, one of my paper show the year 1926, another shows 1845. This is strange. Google scholar once replied asking me to contact publisher. Publisher said everything is okay. I gave up.

What differs proceedings from a journal that calls itself proceedings?

Edit: the contact us form is no longer available. There is an inclusion request form that can be used to request that a specific website / article be indexed with a correct version of the article.

Original answer:
The obvious place to report it would be the Google Scholar "contact us" form (dead link). I suspect there is little chance of the problems being fixed (since scholar has been around for over a decade, and I'm sure others must have reported these problems over the years) but you have little to lose by trying.

Thank you, I couldn't find this. You could be right tho, but I think it is worthy a try.

Anyone else getting 403 error on this page?

That link is dead

(Edit: I am no longer at Google Scholar, so I cannot fix issues for anyone anymore.)
I am an engineer on the Google Scholar team.
Errors in citation data provided by Google Scholar can occur either because of an error at the source or a case that is not handled correctly by our algorithms. We have automated monitoring systems in place to detect errors that occur widely and bring them to the attention of humans, but it is not possible to catch and fix every possible case at the scale at which we operate.
You can use our contact form to contact us but we do not provide any guarantees of responding or fixing the problem within X business days.
Regarding the paper "Heat generation in plasmonic nanostructures: Influence of                  morphology", we have provided the citation data as it appears at the source.
<meta name="citation_firstpage" content="153109" />

I believe for some physics journals it is standard to cite the first page only instead of a page range.
Regarding the paper "Super-resolution in high-contrast media", it is our mistake that we have classified the venue as a conference instead of a journal. Thank you for bringing this issue to our attention.

I did stumble upon something that looks like an indexing problem, but I can not access the contact form. "The account xxx doesn't have permission to see this page." Is there any other way?

The form is not available now. Do we have other ways to send feedbacks?

@wpzdm I don't think so.

FYI https://support.google.com/scholar/contact/general is now broken. It gives a 403 "The account xxxxxxxx@gmail.com doesn't have permission to see this page.". Is there an alternative form?

Pont is right that Google Scholar has a contact form, which is mainly useful if bugs in their own system causes mistakes. I'd hesitate to call this a mistake, however. At least not on their part, as they presumably source their data from e.g. publishers and journals. Contacting the publisher directly may be more productive.
The reason for the pages error you mention is simply that, at least in physics, you usually only include the starting page in a citation. In a list of references, I'd expect those two papers to be listed like this (or similar):

Appl. Phys. Lett. 94, 153109 (2009)
Proc. R. Soc. A 471, 20140946 (2015)

By oversight the end page then sometimes gets left out from e.g. BibTeX files. If you download the BibTeX file from the first paper  from the publisher's website or from ADS it again works this way:

pages = {153109},

which, of course, is enough information to produce the above citation. As for the second paper from Royal Society, the BibTex file doesn't even contain a page reference! Still, in the PDF version and their table of contents, they give the citation with just the one number. The ADS version actually gives a range, but it's just

pages = {20140946-20140946},

(Google Scholar classifying it as a proceeding might be on them though, as the two other sources correctly identify it as an article.)
If you're using a reference style that requires including the end page you have my condolences. Otherwise, for your own sanity, I recommend accepting that "pages" sometimes just means "page information needed to produce the citation". Different databases, different publishers, different journals just aren't fully consistent with each other - especially when it comes to citation data that isn't necessarily required.

You make a good point about the data being sourced from publishers / journals; presumably, at least some systematic errors of this kind arise from how the publisher is presenting the data (e.g. they may find that presenting it a different way helps Google pick it up better). It may be worth contacting the publisher themselves, as they may be able to deal with the error or pass it to whomever handles their data for them.

Yes, I think you're right about contacting the publisher - it certainly is easier to correct data at the source than later down the chain.

Thank you for your output. I thought so at the beginning, but diving inside the papers themselves,that incredibly high number sometimes was constant along the paper, so it didn't gave me an impression of being a page number; Furthermore, I was suspicious of a 20 million page issue.
Anyways, google scholar replied with a generic "deal with the Journals", so at least I tried.

Can't do more than try. Anyway, sometimes you get what seems like artificially high numbers, but it's still the number you're supposed to cite. For example, some journals use running page numbers that don't reset between issues. In the case of that 20 million number, I suspect the 2014 part is the year when they first received the manuscript. It would be more of an article identifier than a page number in that case, but it's still the way to find the article.


text:
Authorship of code published in Zenodo for non-contributing authors of main paper
We are working on a paper that is heavy in both theory and numeric. The numerical code was exclusively developed by a subset of the authors (i.e. some of the authors have no made a single contribution to the implementation of such code).
The code will be published in Github and in Zenodo to get an associated DOI of it for citation. When doing so, one has to declare the authors of said code. Should all authors of the paper be included or just those that exclusively contributed to the code?

Arguments I see in favor: The code came from the developed theory and would have never been written without extensive discussions among the authors of the paper.

Arguments I see against: These authors do not even have a Github username and are not listed as contributors in the repository. Even if they join Github, the repository history explicitly shows who contributed to it.

What is the reasoning behind obtaining separate DOIs for the code and the paper? It is quite normal in many fields to simply publish a paper, and ask people to cite that if they use the code.

The DOI is to reference  to the repository that contains the paper. It is useful when one wants to actually find the code (say, if write down an url address in the paper, this address might dissapear at some point). In this regard, authorship of the published code is irrelevant, but I am not sure.

It is an interesting situation. Clearly the 'authors of the code' have the copyright (and the repository shows who actually contributed). But the purpose of the code was to address a question broadly, as demonstrated by the broader group on the paper. For the purposes of a DOI (which does not indicate IP ownership on the code) I think having the same author list as the paper is acceptable, but not necessary.
As something else to think about, would the code have been developed outside the context of the project leading to the paper? Did the non-code-writing collaborators have no intellectual input to the code?
As an aside, if the repository URL disappears, then  the DOI link will die as well.

Thank you for your answer. The code is a direct conclusion of the paper and there are no other works remotely close to it, therefore, the code wouldn't have developed outside that context. The non-code-writing collaborators had input in the sense that the main paper discusses technical aspects as convergence and stopping criteria, which are employed by the algorithm.
Regarding URL, Zenodo is supposed to host forever the repository with its url/DOI. I am not aware of a any safer option.

@pancho - as far as I can tell, having been on networks from the early 1980's, the only things that are 'forever' are the very things you wish would disappear before your children find them...


text:
Is obtaining a professorship contingent upon the ability to secure federal grants?
I am a DACA student in the US in my last year of my PhD program, and that means that I will be applying for postdoc and professor positions. However, DACA status means that I am ineligible to apply for federal research grants and I am limited to only applying for private grants that have no restrictions on legal status.
There's also a lot of uncertainty surrounding the fate of DACA as the Trump administration has previously stressed that they would work to rescind the program (which may result in deportation of people like me).
My advisers said that applying for lecturer positions should not pose a problem, but I'm concerned about my chances to apply for professor positions when I am not able to secure any federal grants issued by the government, in addition to the fact that my stay in the US is not 100% guaranteed in the long run. I love teaching but would also like to continue doing research as well, in a university setting...
Any insights on the matter, especially by those that have worked in hiring committees, would be much appreciated!

There are many legal aspects to this question that this list is not the right place to answer. But, that being said, do remember that there are universities in other parts of the world...

@JonCuster - I've flagged your comment.  I wouldn't think that you meant it to come across badly, but to my ear, it did.  As the child of a WWII immigrant (who almost didn't get naturalized due to the McCarthy era witchhunting), to me, "do remember that there are universities in other parts of the world" sounds uncomfortably like "You are welcome to leave the country," which is not nice, and not necessary.

@aparente001 I took it as more of a "you can have a great academic career outside of the US, so you don't have to pin all of your hopes on the one country. Which the subtext makes it seem like you're doing."

@zibadawatimmy - I would not flag what you wrote.  Nicely put.

Are DACA faculty really ineligible to be PIs on (say) NSF proposals?  Formally, to first approximation, American faculty do not apply for or receive federal research grants. Faculty write the proposals, but universities formally submit them. Faculty are responsible for managing the money, but the money formally belongs to the university. So it’s not at all clear whether being the PI of an NSF grant counts as “receiving federal funding”.

Setting aside all of the questions around DACA, let's focus on the question of how necessary federal grants are to obtaining (and keeping) a position as a professor.
Professorships at research-intensive universities are indeed generally strongly dependent on the perceived ability to bring in funding.  Among other things, without funding it is difficult to support graduate students. Without graduate students, one's research typically progresses much more slowly (excepting perhaps in certain theoretical areas).  Moreover, at some universities successful graduation of Ph.D. students is part of making tenure.  You may be able to do this with private, state, or international funds, of course, in which case you would want to try to demonstrate why this plan is feasible to a hiring committee.
Professorships at teaching-focused universities, on the other hand, are typically much less tightly linked to the ability to get federal funding. While you may face other obstacles there, your primary job would in any case be teaching rather than research, and small amounts of funding from non-federal sources may be much more plausible as an approach.

Actually, there are many tenure track positions, depending on field, in which there is no expectation whatever of external funding. True, these are teaching colleges and universities where some research is required, but much of that doesn't require funding. Such schools don't tend to have doctoral programs and so the need to fund students isn't essential as it is some other places. Also in some fields, research requires a library and the internet, but not a laboratory.

@Buffy I believe that's entirely consistent with my statement about teaching-focused institutions.

As the OP is interested in applying for professorship, I would assume (s)he has many papers with many citations.
If so, perhaps it is better to get rid of this DACA status first. As I understand, all one needs to do is to leave the US, then re-enter legally with a different status.
This sounds crazy for normal people, but it is not difficult for postdoc positions (which of course, much less competitive than professorship). So, instead of apply professorship directly, how about doing a postdoc 3 - 6 month in EU first?
You can also self-petition your green card while on J-1 visa, either EB1 or EB2-NIW. According to this data, 60 citations is the median to obtain EB2-NIW.
I had my green card after 2 years living in the US. I applied for EB1, my citations were around 150 at that time.
Note that, since J-1 is not dual intention, it is better to change to O-1 before applying for green card to avoid the risk if the application fails.

I think that advising a person to leave and re-enter is a rather risky gamble in the current US political environment, and would not advise it unless the person would be comfortable staying in the other country in case something goes wrong with their attempt to re-enter.

@jakebeal: Suppose there are two person A and B, who are offered postdoc with J-1 visas: A had been in the US under DACA, and B has never been to the US. Is it more difficult for A to get the Visa than B? If it is not, it is better to get rid of DACA status, and have a chance to become permanent resident and citizen. As DACA is a curse that will haunt someone for the rest of his/her life, not only funding.

The choice is not "Get rid of DACA status" vs "Do not get rid of DACA status" the choice is "Attempt to pursue career with DACA status" vs. "Attempt to remove DACA status, with the possibility of being barred from the country long-term."  There are, unfortunately, no good choices for people in this position at present.


text:
I drop out from a PhD and the professor is unhappy with it
I started a PhD in US wanted to study machine learning. Instead of that I cleaned experimental data (coming from human-related experiments), without any algorithmic endeavur or learning anything new. The choice of lab was pure, since they are supposed to use machine learning but not explicitly study it, but I chose it because of personal reasons (they would allow me to visit my family in my country more often). I regret it, since I see now that they do not use machine learning at all. I told my professor, after a year, that I want to stop at masters and he got angry. He agreed but I get the feeling he will not allow me to do any kind of research on the masters, and he'll probably make my life hell. I want to apply for a new PhD but since I have not done substantial research for the past year, I don't think I have good chances of getting accepted in a better PhD program. How should I handle this case with my professor? Can he not allow me to even take a masters? of course asking for a recommendation letter is out of question..

You are entitled to leave the course, he does't need to approve that decision. I think the most important thing is that you do what is right for you in your life. His anger is to do with his own personal issues, it's not actually about you, although it may feel this way. You are leaving the course anyway, why not start a fresh at a masters or PhD in another university, one that better suits your needs, with a supervisor that is more understanding? It is much better to make a switch early on, rather than continue unhappily down a road you do not want to be on.


text:
How do I reference a publication in my CV where I am alphabetically listed as an author but the citation lists the organization?
I recently was part of a large writing group that produced a publication. Authorship, including myself, is listed alphabetically in the acknowledgements however the group leadership chose to list the organization as the author in the citation/reference rather than acknowledge contribution for authors. I previously brought this up as a problem when there was a proposed order of authors and sent the group leadership standard criteria for authorship listing.
How can I list the publication in my CV?

Is the authorship listed in the paper, just not in the author field?

Possible duplicate: https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/61648/19607 or https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/1246/19607

You should definitely keep the original reference format but could easily add a simple footnote/inline note to elaborate your involvement. I would do something along the lines of:

[P7] Organisation name**. Awesome paper written in large writing group. Published in the Journal of Awesome Research [3.14], pp.200-222. 2017
** Note: Published under organisation name, I am listed as nth author and contributed x.

I thought about it, too. But, it has been found out that in certain fields, footnotes are read first. So, better avoid them.

@LeonMeier Only if you are in those fields.


text:
Meaning of "Honours" in the Leverhulme Trust fund application
I am applying for Leverhulme Trust Research Project Grant. In one of the sections, the application system has this field called "Honours" that we need to fill in. I am not sure what it is? Does it mean highest education qualification obtained?
Any ideas?

It probably refers to awards or prizes you may have been given over the course of your career, but if you're still uncertain it would be best to get in touch with Leverhulme and ask.

I think I will do that. I need to ask them a few queries anyways.

Posting my comment as an answer. It probably refers to awards or prizes you may have been given over the course of your career, but if you're still uncertain it would be best to get in touch with Leverhulme and ask.


text:
Approach math prof with proof
I received a master's in math a long time ago and now I am thinking I would like to get a Ph.D. Since I have not been in school, would it be ok to approach a professor I would like to work with by proving a small thing from one of his papers he says is "work to be done" and emailing to him? I already have a proof. Would this add value for him or would he be annoyed? Many people here say you need letters from professors but I have no way for that. This is in America.

How small is this proof? 3 lines? Half a page? If you proved something really nontrivial and substantial that took some clever ideas and several pages of calculations, I think this could be a good start for a conversation and may be appreciated, but for something really small I don't think it would get you very far.

Why do you want a PhD? You seem to phrase it quite casually, while getting a PhD needs quite some dedication for quite some time.

In most math PhD programs in the US [I believe most turns to "all" as you approach the pure side of the mathematical spectrum] students are admitted and funded by an admissions committee representing the department as a whole, not primarily by the recommendations (or funding) of individual faculty members.
So if you are contemplating showing this work to a professor in the hope of getting admitted to that department's PhD program: that is not a very direct route.  If you are applying to that department anyway, then by all means contact all faculty members with whom you feel a connection and especially in the situation you described.  You should also mention this work in your application, e.g. in your statement of purpose.  That way it is likely that the admissions committee will contact the faculty member and ask about your case.  If you have correctly answered a question from one of their papers [and especially if this answer has not already appeared elsewhere in the literature; it would be a good idea to try to find that out], then they are certainly likely to put in a good word for your application.  However, you should understand that students are being judged mostly on the quality of their coursework, the present state of their mathematical knowledge and their potential for future achievements, and not very much on their own research achievements [e.g. because it is common for top candidates to have no research achievements].  So you should not expect this to offset any major weaknesses in your application.
By the way, having no letters of recommendation is a major weakness: in fact, it will cause your application not to be considered at most programs I know.  Maybe your idea is rather to get into a correspondence with this professor that will allow them (in time) to write a letter for you?  If so: yes, that could work.
By the way, I am currently the Graduate Coordinator [and ex officio chair of the graduate admissions committee] of the mathematics department at the University of Georgia.

I got into a CS PhD program using reference letters from industry people, because it was 25+ years after my master's degree. Might that work for Mathematics?

I'm a little surprised by this. Wouldn't answering a research question be the best possible evidence of potential for future achievements, regardless of whether it was common for top candidates?

@Patricia: It would work better than no letters at all, but at least in pure mathematics, it would probably not work very well.  One point that may not be the same as in CS: virtually all students in US math PhD departments are admitted with full funding.  A student with no letters would probably do better to enroll in a non-degree program for a few semesters, thereby to generate the requisite letters.

@Elizabeth: If the research question is a significant one, the work is correct, novel and done independently by the student: yes, that sounds very good.  (The OP said this was a "small thing" described as "work to be done," so it may not be novel to the professor in question.)  If the OP has done all this then he should get a letter from the professor in his file.  If the professor thinks the achievement is significant, then such a letter will carry a lot of weight.  But IME students who have done such things are very likely to have otherwise strong applications.

If he actually says that it is "work to be done", and you really have answered the question he intended to pose, he would probably be interested to hear from you.
And even if he thinks it's too small a contribution, or if you've answered a question that is different from the one he asked, you have nothing to lose by writing to him.

If the proof is correct, non-trivial, and it was not kind of handwaving "oh, you could do this too", but rather "it would be curious to do, but we have not yet" -- yes! Even if you do not have a second thought of getting a position.
It is always fulfilling to hear about someone picking up your old work. It might even give you a paper together with the Prof. But! Getting a PhD position is a bit uncoupled from fruitful cooperation, as already detailed above.
Is something like an "external" PhD position viable in your country? Basically work elsewhere (possibly part-time) and get the PhD (e.g. from that Prof.) in your free time. I don't know your circumstances, but if you already have a steady job, leaving if for a (typically underpaid) PhD position might be unfulfilling. "External" PhD is about getting the title without working at the university.


text:
Why and how to reference chemical vendors in paper
In my paper I used a chemical bought from Sigma-Aldrich.
I've seen some papers refer to the chemical vendor, so my questions are:

Why should I include the chemical vendor in my paper?
How should I cite/format the reference to the vendor?

Just do it in the experimental section, in text, without an endnote.
"The starting materials were X% stuff and Y% other stuff (cation  basis,  Aldrich  Chemical  Company, USA).  Vendor  supplied  ICP showed the following major impurities: Z ppm blalba, W ppm blablabla."  (I have seen master batch numbers listed as well.)
The main thing is to share enough info so that someone can repeat the work or can find a flaw if there was one.  For example if 5 9s purity is important, at least list that (probably make a comment to that effect as well).  If you had relatively low purity or possible impurities that may affect your results, just be honest and disclose it. (Feynman, Katzoff advice on sharing possible limitations of the research.)
However, I think for routine synthetic chemistry, probably well into the high 90s% of experiments are not really dependent on the starting materials.  That is, it is possible to get sufficient purity relatively cheaply and the experiment is more about what you decided to do and the methodology.  But there may be cases where this is not true or where your results are particularly noteworthy.  All that said, synthetic chemistry, in my experience has very low replication problems.  It's just not like priming research.
EDIT:  Just noticed you had a 1, 2 format.  I believe I address both questions.


text:
Can I only submit my graduate transcript for a second-master/PhD application?
I am applying for some (second) master programs and a few Ph.D. programs. I earned my undergraduate degree outside the US but got my master degree in an American university (I am an international student). I wonder if I can only submit the transcript of my first master degree for my application?

Do the applications ask for transcripts from all universities you have attended? If yes, then you have to submit all.

The general answer to this question is no, your undergraduate transcript is required as well.
The reason is that for master's degree programs where coursework dominates, undergraduate success is usually a good predictor of graduate success. While for PhD admissions, they don't have as much predictive value (since PhDs are about research, not classwork), it is still important to have a baseline for judgment.
In addition, the schools will want to check if you have the necessary prerequisites to undertake PhD studies. This usually requires your undergraduate transcript.

Submit exactly what the application ask for, and if it's not clear, ask for clarification. When in doubt, submit them all.
Different schools will have different requirements, but if they ask for your undergrad grades, or all grades, you need to submit them.


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Does applying for a PhD program directly make more sense in my case than for a second master program first?
I recently decided to apply for either a Ph.D. or a second-master program in computer science in the US.
Educational Background: I earned my undergraduate degrees in economics and mathematics (average GPA 3.2) from a university outside the US and got my master degree this past summer in quantitative finance (GPA is slightly higher than 3.5) in a US university ranked around 60 nationally.
That said, I had a few project and invited-talk experiences during my master program that are related to CS, also, I had a working experience in a fin-tech startup as a software engineer since April (I am using my OPT now to work after graduation). My only undergraduate experience relating to CS is a short summer internship as a quant in a non-US investment bank.
I also consider the possibility of applying for a second master in CS first and then preparing for a Ph.D. while reading my second master. Honestly, I know this may sound over-educated because this can take even longer time (say, 1.5-year second master plus 5-year Ph.D.) before I can come out of campus and look for a job. But there is an advantage: I suspect my current background makes it hard to enroll in a decent Ph.D. program now (I am not even talking about top universities/programs, the list below may give you a sense of the levels of schools in my mind), but by first reading a master in CS, maybe it will be easier for me to apply for a better Ph.D. program in the future?

FYI

None of my referees are working in the university I am applying for (two are from my graduate program and one is my current employer)
I don't have the working opportunity after the second master so that I have to read a Ph.D. later to find a job afterward. The only reason for applying a second master is it makes a Ph.D. application easier;
The invited talks mentioned above are like some developer community seminar/meetup, and I don't have published papers

Should I just go for a Ph.D. now or consider a second master in CS first?

I realize that application fees (and hassle) are not trivial, but can you just apply for both? Identify the places you want to go for PhD, and then also identify some places you would want to do a pre-PhD masters (sometimes this can be some of the same Universities,  but each institution has it's own rules). If you don't get in to places you really want to go for a PhD, but do get a good option for a masters, then there you go - no need to wait until the following year for the next admission cycle. There is so many variables in play that we can't say you will or won't get a good PhD offer.

In the US most PhD programs do not expect you to have a masters already. In your case, since you lack CS fundamentals you would likely take a few extra classes in your first year or so. Then you might need to write a masters thesis before proceeding on after passing the qualifiers. But that is all highly program specific and is best addressed with each department.

@BrianHall Thanks, Brian! Just wondering if a student applies for a Ph.D. instead of a master and he is not qualified for the Ph.D. but is qualified enough for the same university's master program. In this case, will the university still offer him the master opportunity rather than rejecting him completely simply because he doesn't apply for the master? Also as for the pre-PhD masters, what is this exactly? Is it just the Ph.D. program (why I only saw master and Ph.D. possibilities on most school websites?) and is it still tougher to enter than the comparable master just like a normal Ph.D.?

@JonCuster Really appreciated. When you mentioned "extra classes in the first year", "master thesis" and "qualifiers", I guess you are assuming one is already enrolled in the school's Ph.D. Program? Is this the pre-PhD programs mentioned by BrianHall above? How tough is it to enter compared to a regular master program and a regular Ph.D. prgram?


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LOR from Digital Circuits Course Professor (No projects or work done with the prof)
I had achieved the highest possible grade in this course (Digital Circuits) and most likely in the top 5/180 of this specific course, although I was very active in class I didn't really have any communication with the professor outside class hours. We didn't have any projects/assignments during the semester and haven't worked with him. He is happy to write me an LOR and asked me to draft one, however now I am worried that it would not be really strong as the prof wouldn't be able to cite enough evidence to show that I am a good student and fit for the summer research program.
I have two questions:

Would it be fine if the prof cited a course project I completed from another course (minor in data science and artificial intelligence) as well as another project related to Digital Circuits course taught by him but being pursued separately by a group of students?
Note: My research proposal of choice is a junction of computer architecture, VLSI, FPGA prototyping and artificial intelligence.

Would citing ability to solve difficult/creative problems posed in the exams/quizzes be relevant? This definitely seems to be weaker than being a testament to working on projects.

I am open to any suggestions to strengthen my LOR, the professor probably would guide me once I provide him with a draft but I want to make sure I take time to think about this so that he can work from something that is decent so that it is neither a burden and I benefit from a strong LOR.

Sorry, but I need to suggest that this is probably not the best option for a letter writer. The only evidence they have is how you did in one course and it wasn't a research oriented course, not did you have extensive communication with them along the way. If you asked a lot of questions in class, then you might stand out in their mind (in a good way), but that isn't really enough without other supporting elements.
However, if the letter is for masters study, rather than doctoral applications, it might not be so bad as the standards are lower, unless the masters is research focused rather than course based.
For a good LoR for a research program, the writer has to be able to honestly and confidently predict your success in that program and thereafter. Anything short of that is wasted for a high quality program.
I don't know how you could write a draft that would express that requirement. I'd think that the best you could do is give them a checklist of your accomplishments in that and similar courses, including pointing them to other professors who would have a high opinion of you. Include something in your checklist about the relationship, if any, between that course and your overall goals.

Sorry, I forgot to mention that this is for an REU. Does that help? The program doesn't mandate prior research experience however it could be a criterion for selection. I also did what you suggested by handing the professor my CV and transcript in the mail requesting them for an LOR, I mentioned my research proposal of choice and how this specific course could be relevant academic experience.
Is there anything else I could do?


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Before submitting a paper, should I remove acknowledgement for the sake of anonymity?
I have this paper to submit. A professor has given great comments on a previous version of my paper. To submit I need to make it anonymous. Should I also remove my acknowledgement. I think that to mention a name in my paper might be regarded as producing a bias in my favor.

I don't really know these things well, but does the editor have any responsibility for anonymizing papers?

If you do redact the acknowledgement from the version you submit, I would strongly suggest making this clear in the text (write something like "Acknowledgements: [redacted for anonymity during review process]").  Maybe someone you acknowledge will be a reviewer/referee, and you don't want them to mistakenly think you haven't acknowledged them.

I would remove the acknowledgement. It's better to be on the safe side when you are submitting and do not disclose the data that could be used for author identification. You could always add that part back after review process is over.
If I recall correctly, I have once used a publisher-supplied Latex template that automatically generated pdf file with authors' names and acknowledgement section removed for the sake of anonymity, so the practice of not giving out that kind of information in review copies seems to exist. (EDIT: I remembered well. ACM's sigconf template can be configured for anonymity - in that case acknowledgement section is removed from output pdf file, while in non-anonymous mode this information is retained in the output).


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Writing to prospective advisors who co-authored a paper
I wrote an enquiry mail about graduate positions to a Professor who is working in the field I am interested in. I cited a paper authored by the professor in my e-mail. The paper is co-authored by another professor in the same department, whom I wish to write to as well. They share research interests, have co-authored many papers and often co-supervise students. Would it be wrong to cite the same paper again in my e-mail to the second professor? I am worried that the two e-mails may end up looking identical.

Structure it differently then...

@SolarMike so it's ok if the content seems identical?

If you are equally happy to work with either of them you could structure a letter that focuses more on the topic than the professor and send it to both of them "I'd like to work with one or both of you" phrasing, perhaps.

Depending on the field you are in, the order of authorship might give you more information. It's possible the work you are referring to is mostly done in one lab or the other, with the second person mostly providing support, or it may be a true close collaboration. It might be hard to figure out which is the case, but you should probably investigate as well as you are able to. Is one of these professors a more senior person? Another situation that comes up in my field is that a senior person is very busy and they have actual tenure track faculty that basically work under them.


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Postdoc vs. academic position
I'm a citizen of a third world country, currently living in Canada. I've completed a 2-year postdoc position here and recently got an offer for an academic position at one of the reputable universities in my home country. They want me to initially obtain a research funding, though, which will take at least a year to get.
On the other hand, I was offered a second postdoc fellowship at one of the top universities in Canada.
I'd like to follow a career pathway where I can be an academic member eventually. However, if I accept the faculty position, I know that I'll never be able to have much funding throughout my career. On the other hand, if I accept the postdoc position and work hard, I might be able to apply to few Canadian universities for a faculty position, tough I don't know what my chances are, as it will be more competitive.
I just wanted to hear your opinion on which path to take.

Always and always faculty possitions

The title of the question looks strange to me; a postdoc is an academic position.


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Letter of nomination versus letter of recommendation for Sloan Fellowship
Background: I'm a math department administrator in the U.S. preparing to nominate one of our faculty for a Sloan Fellowship. As described here, fellowship candidates need to have:

A letter from a department head or other senior researcher officially nominating the candidate and describing his or her qualifications, initiative, and research;

[...]

Three letters from other researchers (preferably not all from the same institution) written in support of the candidate’s nomination.

My question: how is a letter of nomination different in its requirements from the "three letters from other researchers"?
In particular, the three letters would be coming from researchers in the area of the candidate who can speak with authority about his research achievements, but I (and I expect the same is true for other department heads writing similar letters) am not an expert in the candidate's area so can only survey his achievements in a relatively superficial way. What is expected, and what is the best way to add value in such a letter of nomination on top of the three "standard" letters of recommendation?
Scope: please answer only if you have direct experience with the Sloan Fellowships or other similar type of fellowships, preferably in math or at least in STEM. I am not interested in "common sense" speculation based on parsing the required materials text I quoted above, which is something I can do well enough on my own.

Asking only people with experience with those fellowships to respond makes the question program-specific and thus off-topic.

@aeismail I don't think this question should be closed. Sloan is an important part of early-career funding in mathematics, and perhaps in other fields too. It's quite likely that a significant number of ASE posters have this experience.

@ElizabethHenning IMHO, the answer is "contact the organization behind the fellowship and ask". Way too specific to be posted here, regardless of how useful the information would be.

@FábioDias I understand your concern. It's true I am interested specifically in the Sloan, but between my specific situation and the most general question of "what to write in a letter of nomination for a fellowship/award when you are not an expert in the field of the person you are nominating?" I think there is a continuous spectrum of levels of generality (where one specializes to STEM, fellowships in the US etc), many parts of which are clearly on-topic. Note that I did say "Sloan ... or other similar types of fellowship", so I'm not limiting the scope to only this specific program.

If your university is large enough, talk to the...research office (not sure of the name). They're likely to have knowledge or experience in this area.


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How to handle research advisor meeting stress
I'm starting my master's thesis work with a new professor and had a really bad meeting with them recently. They asked me questions I am supposed to be able to answer, but I was so stressed I couldn't think. I couldn't write stuff on the board. It was just a mess.
He said some things that made me feel pretty bad about myself and I really don't want that to happen again in the next meeting. Could someone please share their ways on how they prepare for research meetings they are nervous for?

What did he say? Were his questions related to your research topic or you personally? Did he offend you or say anything that is questionable?

@Michael His questions were all research related and he did not say anything that attacked my character personally. The comments were all about "you should know this AlgebraWoes", "we are so far from being able to do xyz if you cant do zyx" etc. It made me feel bad because I let him and myself down by not being able to perform well. The comments were well deserved. I just need to find a way to...better prepare myself

It sounds like you're a new graduate student, and that you clearly care about performing well in your program. You stumbled, and you've accepted responsibility and looking for ways to correct the problem. That's great, and suggests that you will end up doing very well in your program. As a master's student, you're not expected to be able to work completely independently, and your professors will likely be happy to help you navigate your program (they certainly should). The key is to ask for help early and often.
I would consider scheduling an appointment with my adviser, telling them exactly what you've said here, and asking them for advice on how to prepare for meetings, and perhaps even advice on how to structure your independent learning so that you're learning the specific techniques/concepts that want you to know at each stage. Every adviser is different, so the best advice you can get will come directly from them. It may be intimidating to ask for help, but it is completely appropriate at this stage in your graduate education.

Personally, the best way to handle a situation like that is to sit and listen. Then afterwards reflect upon what your adviser has said so that you can better prepare for your next meeting. I have had plenty of meetings where I went in feeling confident and then left feeling like crap.
If you are able to, I would send an email with a list of topics you would like to cover in your meeting. If he doesn't respond, then focus on that list. If he respond, then adjust accordingly. Like-wise, if he doesn't respond, but then goes into the meeting like he hasn't read the email, I would bring up how there's a lack of communication and that you can't do your research if communication is going to be limited to just these meetings.
Perhaps it's just his attitude and demeanor that makes you feel uncomfortable and unable to complete your work - in which case, you might want to consider finding another professor to finish your thesis under.

Michael, thank you for your Answer. It was very informative and I will be taking your advice to heart in the coming week as I prepare for my next meeting.


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How to Deal with Boisterous Officemates?
I'm currently a grad student in a moderately large department. I share an office with a few other grad students, and I get along with all of them fairly well. However, one of my officemates is rather loud and unfiltered with what he says in and around the department. The office walls are very thin, they are movable partitions, and the professor next to us clearly dislikes the noise and behavior. I'm very concerned with how this may be affecting my reputation around the department. I like my officemate, but the immature behavior is very noticeable.
How should I deal with this situation? I can't really ask for a new office, but I don't want to be associated with the poor behavior. I've talked to him about it, but I don't want to constantly remind him to be quiet or conscientious of other people. I am at a loss with this situation. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

"I can't really ask for a new office" - are you sure? I've done this - asked to move from a loud shared office. I was offered a desk in a much quieter shared office. It worked out great.

The available offices are full as far as I can tell. I currently have one of the better shared offices, but I still have the issue described above.

I would suggest asking. Then at the very least, if a space becomes available, they may offer it to you. Otherwise, they'd just give it to the next new student.

If your only concern is for your reputation, I think any such concern is entirely unwarranted, and your best course of action is to do nothing and simply not worry about it. You are in no way becoming "associated" with the other student's poor behavior by occupying the same office as him, which you have been assigned by the department. The student's behavior will not reflect well on him, but unless you and him are identical twins or just happen to have extremely similar voices, which I find difficult to believe, as long as you do not emulate his behavior or egg him on in some conspicuous way, I don't see any chance that anyone will think you have a role in the way he behaves.
If the student's behavior bothers you for reasons unrelated to protecting your reputation, or if you are unwilling to accept the advice in my first paragraph, some options you may want to consider are:

Remind him again that his behavior bothers you, perhaps pointing out that you noticed that the professor in the office next door is unhappy with the noise and are concerned that his loudness may hurt his reputation.
Send an email to the department chair pointing out the student's loudness, and ask to be assigned to a different office and/or for the chair to do something to make the student improve his behavior.
Send an anonymous email if you prefer that it not become known that it was you who made the complaint.
Talk to your other officemates to try to get their assistance in getting the loud student to change his behavior. (Peer pressure can be a powerful inducement agent.)
This is a defeatist option that I would not recommend, but if all else fails you can stop coming to the office (or at least minimize your presence there as much as possible) and find some other place to do your work.

Going direct to the department chair feels a bit extreme to me.

I don't see why you should feel associated with this person's actions, just because you share an office. If they are speaking loudly, those who can hear will recognise their voice.
While it may be that your office mate is simply immature, among grad students it may well be that something else is going on. It is possible that repeated reminders to be quieter would be the right thing.
Alternatively, if they start talking to you, you could say 'Let's go find somewhere we can talk without disturbing other people,' or you could try having an office agreement of fixed 'silent times' when everyone gets on with their own work without any discussion.


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Peer-reviewer asks the author for the manuscript to be reviewed by two other experts
I have received a peer-reviewer's comment that states that my manuscript needs to be reviewed by experts on two different fields. Is it possible that I am being asked to find those two experts myself and ask them to review my manuscript, or is this probably a mistake/missunderstanding (that is, maybe that comment was not meant to be sent to the manuscript's author)?

What does the editor say? Have you ask the editor?

I have sent an ad hoc email asking about that.last Monday. No answer yet.. The decision is "minor revison" but then the reviewer's comment is "need to be reviewed by two other experts". And I also would not know of any of those two experts to whom I could ask to review my manuscript. I hope the manuscript is not reject because of this!

Without seeing the actual text, I would guess you are mistaken or the review has a confusing grammatical mistake.  The peer reviewer normally addresses the review to the editor, not the author.  The reviewer is telling the editor that they should select other reviewers.  It is possible that the editor has already done this.  (Did you receive more than one review?)  Probably there is no need for you to do anything.

The reviewer's comment that was sent to me (the author,) was: This manuscript needs to be reviewed by an expert in X and by an expert in Y.. To me, this comment looks like a comment which was intended to be sent to the editor. It is impossible that they are asking me to find such two experts and ask them to review or support by manuscript, right?...There was only one reviewer.

Thank you very much for your responses. Now I feel more confortable with writing to the editor about this.