text:
"Expect" Nature publication for PhD?
EDIT: Original title was "Guarantee" Nature
publication for PhD?

I am currently applying as a PhD student in a group at the intersection of experimental physics and engineering in a rather interdisciplinary research environment in Germany. The group only exists for about 2 years now. The group leader told me that he would expect every PhD student to be author of at least one Nature spin-off paper at the end of their PhD (Nature Physics, Nature Electronics, Nature Photonics, ...) and not "only" journals like Physics Review Letters (in my eyes publishing in the PRL family is already quite the accomplishment?). He said they would choose their research topics in such a way that these expectations would be realistic.
Are such expectations realistic? Can one "force" publications in such high-impact journals just by deliberately choosing the right topics? I have no experience with publishing my research in journals and thus do not really know what to think about this.

How long did it take for the PI to pass (not define) this threshold set? As in: after how many years into his/her PhD there were papers with his/her authorship in these journals, and how substantial was his contribution? And why these journals, what in their scope/audience is so much more attractive than other journals more specific to his/her direction(s) of research?

Probably worth noting that PRL is more highly-regarded in physics than Nature Physics, Photonics etc are (or at least that's the impression I have from experimental atomic physics).

There is a very large difference between a Nature publication and a publication in a journal with a name starting with Nature. Those are separate journals that of course profit from the Nature brand, but which you need to judge each on their own merit.

You should probably add whether the supervisor or leader (or/and his/her students) has a track record in such journals.  For example, in my disciplines, a supervisor who has a consistent publishing record at top journals will continue to do so.  On the other hand, a student who follows a supervisor who has no clue or does not work on interesting problems will find it very difficult to publish in these top journals.

By "expect" do they mean "come to our group, we are good and will help you to have a paper there" (→ an ad for aspiring PhD students) or "if you do not have a paper there, your life will be miserable and you will  get fired from the program" (→ they are, rightly or not, setting expectations)?

It’s not possible to strictly guarantee publications anywhere but in   some groups it is highly probable that you can get a publication in a prestigious journal.  If you work in a group that publishes quite a bit in journal A, the odds are you will get publication in this journal.
The Nature family of journals is notoriously clannish: the probability of publishing there is not necessarily related to the quality of the work but strongly correlates to provenance, and your history of publication in Nature journals.  Provenance also beyond the institution to personal or professional connections with the editors etc.  (Some would argue that publication history in Nature journals is a proxy for quality but in my experience this is far from uniformly true.) For the main journals, papers have a certain style because Nature is primarily interested in high drama work which sell copies, rather than high quality work that advances a specific field.
For secondary journals (and at least one in physics - can’t remember which one), you can actually publish results as long as they are correct (rather than novel) and as long as someone pays the publication charges, coat-tailing on the more prestigious journals.  These correct papers are still highly visible and do collect large number of citations, and but can be of quite modest quality.
For better or worse, publishing in Nature (or other very prestigious) journals has become something of a status symbol, kinda like being member of an exclusive club or having tier status on an airline.  However, not all elite fliers are equal (or access the same lounges), just like not all Nature journals are equal.
Thus, while you cannot get a true guarantee, you can expect to publish in a Nature journal with very high probability.  The question is: which one?

Comment: please note the original title of the question was:

"Guarantee" Nature publication for PhD?

Is the secondary journal you're referring to Scientific Reports? If so I don't think the visibility is that high just due to the high volume of papers, and the reputation of the journal has suffered in recent years.

@Anyon it could be: I’d have to check.  If you are right and the reputation has gone down, I would not be surprised.  While I recognize that publishing correct results with limited novelty is important (to confirm other experiments for instance), this journal has gone way too far IMO and has allowed stuff of very limited value.  Yet people are still willing to pay to get their stuff in there so the journal must have something going for it.

"as long as someone pays the publication charges" Many major journals in physics are still closed and free to publish.  ArXiv largely eliminates the advantages of open access.

@AnonymousPhysicist I’m not sure what you’re getting at: it is well known that Nature journals in particular frown upon authors posting preprints on arXiv so arXiv is of no help here.  Additionally, researchers still read journals simply because the volume of arXiv postings is impossible to keep up with everything.  The reality is that the number pay-to-publish open access journals is exploding: witness the new PhysRevs by APS, all open access with publication charges.  If arXiv was all that was needed and there was no value in such open-access format, it would be dead by now.

I am just pointing out that it's not necessary to pay.  The open access journals were created primarily to fulfill mandates and secondarily because people want to be editor-in-chief.  I think APS has at least three times as many journals as it needs.  One elitist journal, one journal branded for applications, one journal branded for education, and one less-selective journal for all the sensible physics research would be sufficient.

@ZeroTheHero Thanks for your answer! As the group and the researcher are both rather young, their publication record is not that strong yet. He does have 2x nature communication publications with both more than 50 citations though, if that means anything. No record in non-open-access nature journals though.

@CactusSouffle it’s a really good start.  If the PI has a history as a postdoc or student of publication with Nature, then the odds are good although I would never guarantee such an outcome.

@CactusSouffle Note that Nature Communications is in a tier below the journals you named in the question. A lot of papers are (desk) rejected from the journals you mentioned, and then end up being published in Nature Communications. Does the group leader include it in the category of Nature spin-off journals? I would say that significantly affects the likelihood of meeting their expectation.

''one less-selective journal for all the sensible physics research would be sufficient'' one journal to cover all remaining sensible physics research?  Are you sure about that?

@Anyon I am not completly sure anymore honestly, but I think he did include that in his list.

No, no one can guarantee that a particular research effort will result in publication in Nature or similar venues. However, someone with a lot of experience, working in an active area, can have a pretty good idea about publish-ability. Wide experience gives you a good idea about what a given journal is likely to publish.
However, when engaged in true research - a look into the unknown - there are no guarantees about what will be learned, or the time frame in which it will be learned. In some areas negative results are as valuable as positive ones, so there is less risk.
However, there is another tactic that might be at play. Some researchers are funded by outside agencies and they are very prolific.  One way that this sometimes happens is as follows:
Suppose you have already done a significant piece of work but haven't yet published it. Apply for a grant to do that work, promising good results. If the grant reviewers don't know about the work, but judge it important, then you get funded. You then use that funding to do the next piece of work while you publish the results you obtained previously. This makes you successful in the eyes of the grant agencies. When you complete that new work with the funding for the old work you repeat the process. Applying again for a grant to do the work you've just completed and use any such funding for the next bit, having already completed the work for the hoped-for grant.
I don't think the above is a ubiquitous practice, but historically it has gone on.
In the current situation, you can believe the claims if that group already has a very good publishing record for significant results. They seem to know what they are doing and manage resources to aid the success of members, including students. Not a terrible situation, but less than a guarantee.

"I don't think the above is a ubiquitous practice" Hmm, are you sure that this kind of optimism is justified...? (But +1 of course for a very good answer, as usual.)

@JochenGlueck, maybe I should have said "I hope that it isn't a ubiquitous practice." ;-) It is perfectly proper to work on several projects at once, of course, including when you are funded for only one of them.

"However, when engaged in true research - a look into the unknown - there are no guarantees about what will be learned" That is how it works in science, but engineering researchers often choose to improve a metric without consideration for what is learned.

@AnonymousPhysicist, hmmm, what they "learn" is how to improve the metric and I doubt there are guarantees of success in a given timeframe. Or if it is just scut-work then it is hard to call it research.

@Buffy Thanks for your answer! The researcher in question has less than 10 years experience in his field himself, which is why I am a bit doubtful about these expectations.

10 years seems like long enough to have a fairly good idea about what journal an article might be publishable in?

@JochenGlueck, I don't think it takes special knowledge to assert that the research-then-fund model is not ubiquitous.  If it were, then that could not help but be well known, including to funding agencies, because that's an aspect of ubiquity.  Where there is uncertainty is in the question of how much, short of ubiquitously, that approach is employed.  I like to think not much, but that is based mainly on my observations and knowledge of research efforts in departments in which I have worked.

@Tom I've been in this game 20 years, I have papers in journals of every level from Nature to journals that no one that hasn't published in them has heard of, and I still couldn't tell you with any level of confidence whether a given piece of work was going to get into a Nature family journal.

@Buffy while this is all very true (and sadly far more common than you might hope), it seems unlikely for a grip lgrouo that has only existed for 2 years.

Your statement in the body of the text is slightly different from the question in the title and this difference is crucial. Of course there are no guarantees but a successful research group can have a high probability of success.
I would separate the process into two parts. First the group leader needs to find suitable problems and questions that if the solved would get a publication in a Nature journal and that their group is qualified to solve with the lab equipment they have. If the group leader is good they will manage that part.
Second the PhD student needs to successfully do the research. And here is the difference between title and body of the question. The group leader expects their PhD students to manage that and provides a lab and guidance that make this possible. Whether you actually manage still mostly depends on your own work. No honest group leader can give you anything like a guarantee for this part.

That is true. I changed the title, I think it was misformulated when I tried to quickly come up with a suiting title for the question.

He said they would choose their research topics in such a way that these expectations would be realistic.

That will not work.  In physics/engineering, the only way to obtain high probability of publication in an elitist journal is to have a very large budget.  I would suggest $10 million per paper in Nature.  (If you spend that much, you would incidentally get a lot of other nice things.)
Lots of papers in journals like Nature cost much less, but for an individual author, those are unlikely events.

I would be extremely skeptical of these claims, in two separate but equally important ways:
First, I am skeptical that this can be arranged.  I would not even entertain this as a reasonable possibility unless and except the professor in question has a long history of Nature (and spinoff) publications under both their own name and their former students' names.  The former is easy to track down through Google Scholar; the second may take some digging to verify.
Second, I am skeptical of the true meaning of "expect".  Does the group leader "expect" that this will happen in the sense of selling you on the idea to join the group, i.e., the expectation is theirs to fulfill?  Or do they "expect" that this will happen as a soft requirement for you to achieve prior to the defense of your dissertation?  The difference between the two is critically important for you in making your decision.  As is making sure it does not change from the former to the latter during your candidacy.

I agree with this - It is incredibly important to figure out if the PI is saying "We're going to try as hard as possible to make sure your work is sufficiently interesting that you get a nature publication, and we'll make sure you have the resources to do it"
Or
"We expect you to get nature publications, and we'll do little to support you, but bully you until you get one or have a nervous breakdown"
One of those is a good environment to be a part of, one of those is unfortunately common in academia.

Personally, I am familiar with some European groups where PIs are alumni (PhD, postdoc programs) of Northern American groups working on hot topics that got a bunch of Nature-family papers when they finished their programs. So, if the topic is hot, and there is some innovative experiments going on, a hard-working PhD can indeed expect authoring a paper in a Nature-family journal. In other words, this is quite a realistic scenario if the PI and the group have the decent background, appropriate equipment, and budget (an ongoing project that financially supports they studies).
I would even consider this not as a requirement but as an advertising from the PI, so they present working with their group as an enticing opportunity that will also contribute to the future PhD's career. A Nature-family publication during a PhD can surely help securing a postdoc position.

Your descriptions raise a few red flags.
First, a newly established group with a 2 years history probably can't really even promise you, that you will get any publication, let alone one in a Nature journal. Is your group leader by any chance just starting? This sounds very naive to me. They haven't worked long enough as a group to have an established work flow yet. So how do they even know if you will end up observing something worth reporting?
Second, even if you end up observing something, how do they know it will be something interesting enough for that particular journal?! Again, are you one of the first phds your supervisor is working with?!
Please don't fall for such nonsense.


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Should I do more than one master/PhD if I want to do interdisciplinary research?
Some background info: CS and Philosophy major; Asian; intending to study in the US or Europe.
I am currently doing research related to CS (computer security in particular) and intend to pursue a PhD in CS and look for a tenure-track position in the future. It doesn't have to be in the West, in fact I want to go back to my home country, it's a wonderful place. I know it's ignorant and naive to say this as an undergraduate, but I like doing academic research more than industry jobs. I have some research experiences and publications, though none of them are considered exceptional.
But I have a dream that in the future I can do research related to (political) philosophy. I'm currently doing a double degree in philosophy, and then I'm super into that field, as much as I'm into CS. Sounds even more ignorant and naive, if I get a research position in academia someday, I can do interdisciplinary research in philosophy and CS.
As far as I can tell, doing research in philosophy is far from doing research in CS, and I do not think getting a PhD in CS make me a good philosophy researcher, let alone a "philosopher."
Here are some of my concerns.

It's probably not a good idea to do a interdisciplinary PhD. I have heard that doing a interdisciplinary PhD will make it harder for me to find an academic job and eventually get a tenure-track position. People in CS departments still prefer traditional CS PhDs. Is this true?
Doing two PhDs is probably too much. Life is too short for multiple PhDs.
Maybe I should get an MPhil in Philosophy before getting a PhD in CS. But will this hurt my application, since I will have done much less CS research in the last two years by the time I apply for CS PhD? And even if I get the degree super fast, I will be 35 by the time I get the PhD. I have heard that age affects the chances of getting a job in academia, though information are equivocal (ref1, ref2).
Or maybe doing an MPhil in Philosophy after a PhD in CS? It might affect the continuity of my research. Getting a job in academia is hard enough, and I would probably be less active in the CS research community for two years while others are doing postdocs. Also, I am concerned that doing a Master's degree when I have a PhD will sound strange to most people, including my potential employers. (ref3, ref4, although in both cases two disciplines are related, which is not true in my case) And the previous concern also applies, I will be 35 when I finish my MPhil.
Is it even a good idea to do multiple degrees in completely different fields in the first place? Maybe I should only consider doing interdisciplinary research after I get a tenure-track position? Some professors told me that cross-disciplinary research is for tenure-track professors because they have full freedom in their research, especially in my case, we all know that many people think Philosophy is useless.

In conclusion, the main questions are: whether I should get an additional degree in Philosophy, and in what order should I study one, before or after CS PhD?
I understand that there are many individual factors. I have tried to refine the question so that the answers would be applicable to other students who are also interested in doing super-far-away interdisciplinary research.
There is a related question, but the fields they are interested are not as far apart as in my case, and in that post the author was already doing a PhD so he/she did not have to worry about the order of getting degrees.

Hi Anonymous M, I know that the post is long. However, the problem is that most questions in themselves are trivial. Of course finishing PhD earlier is better; of course having a degree to prove my research ability is better. The problem is that I can’t get the CS PhD early while have an additional degree in philo. So the problem become whether the advantages of getting additional degree in certain order compensate the disadvantages. Or, if getting an additional degree worths it, in what order should I get one.I believe that this is a single question that cannot be further separated.

I slightly updated the post to clarify my question. Thanks for pointing out the problem of the post.

Have you investigated the background of the people who are doing the kind of interdisciplinary research you're interested in? I would suppose you have, as this seems to be something you'd be somewhat aware of even without extra investigation (e.g. being familiar with the work and background of some of the well-known researchers for things you're interested in), but regardless of what you know in this regard it would be helpful to indicate in your question what you know in this regard. (continued)

Incidentally, it occurs to me that relatively recent researchers would be more relevant for how helpful their background education would be for your concerns than those beginning several decades ago, since moving to or from CS was likely different in the 1970s and 1980s than the 2010s (due to the rapidly changing nature of CS as an academic discipline in the last few decades).

At one point in my career, an administrator in my university said (paraphrased) "Being able to promote yourself with qualifications in interdisciplinary areas is nice, but after all .... interdisciplinary is just a word." Which is to say, often the only ones who seem to appreciate the added talents required to be truly interdisciplinary are those who themselves also are.
With this example, recognize that interdisciplinary is not the norm, it is the exception. In this regard, when you are at a PhD level, have a keen interest in what is otherwise considered as interdisciplinary studies, and have an eye on going into academic fields later, focus on one discipline where you find your greatest passion. Allow that you also demonstrate how your focused studies can be used in the interdisciplinary field. Follow up with post-doctoral studies that broaden your experiences in the companion interdisciplinary field.

If you really want to do this, find the professors who are doing the kind of work you want to do. Then apply to the programs they teach in.  There is a lot of overlap between CS and Philosophy (although probably not political philosophy) and if you follow these things you even see that philosophers sometimes get NSF grants.
I think you should talk to your faculty in both fields and get their suggestions. You might want to look into summer programs or research opportunities in both. Being a graduate student or professor in either of these areas is really different from being an undergraduate.  I don't know about if any of these programs takes international students but this is a list of some for philosophy. summer programs

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If you know the original source for something you found in a more recent paper, should you cite both?
The situation I am asking about goes like this: I am writing a math paper that I hope to publish, and want to use a certain math technique that I found in a paper from 2021. In that paper, the author gives credit to two other papers, one from 2011, as well as the original 1887 paper by Ernesto Pascal creating this technique in the first place. The 2011 paper cites the 1887 paper as well.
I now have three possible sources to cite this concept, with all the references readily available to me. What would be the standard practice in this case? Is it bad form to cite all three?
On the one hand, it could be more convenient for the reader to have all three references, if they want to know more about where the concept came from, instead of having to trace it back through the one reference.
On the other hand, maybe this is redundant because I am essentially citing three sources for one idea.

My personal preference would be to go back to original source, so go for it!

Include all the references.  This is to help the reader.

"... the original 1887 paper by Pascal creating this technique in the first place". If that is the famous Pascal in mathematics, then the year 1887 for an article by him sounds way off since he has been dead for over 200 years by that point.  I guess it was some publication of his collected works or something, but still sounds strange to refer to "the original 1887 paper" by someone who died in the 1600s. I searched around and the book you're look at is probably https://www.amazon.com/Opuscules-Philosophiques-French-Blaise-Pascal/dp/1167796047

@KCd Sorry, this is actually a different Pascal. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernesto_Pascal

I currently cannot imagine a situation where it is a good way not to cite the original source. Give credit to the inventors of an idea, that is simply good practice.
Concerning the newer papers, it depends on what you want to express, or if there have been adjustments to the original method that make it more powerful, for example. You can make this clear by adding a little context, so that it becomes clear to the reader why you cite the different papers for the one method. For example:

The method applied here, originally discovered by Pascal in 1887 [reference 1], was more recently adapted by [another author] to solve problem X [reference 2].

If you simply want to give a source for the method you use, and you still are using the method as published originally, there is no strict necessity to cite the newer work.

I disagree with always going to the oldest. Sure, for a survey or if you study the history of mathematics, that makes sense. But for a regular paper, in my opinion you should cite whatever source would be most useful to your readers (you can still additionally credit the original author if you feel like it). A recent book is likely to be more useful to someone who wants to read the proof of that result than an old badly written paper in a language they do not speak.

I obtain, read, and cite the original sources whenever I can.
I first did it as a kind of mindless distraction while avoiding writing my PhD but then I discovered that it was also fun. Adding to my long-term enthusiasm for tracking original sources was the fact that the examiners of my PhD commented on how frequently they had been unaware of the original source of many of the ideas that were central to my research area, and how much they enjoyed learning of them.

It depends entirely on the purpose of the reference:

Do you want to cite the other paper as the original proof of a concept? Then cite the original.
Do you want to cite the other paper because it contains a good description of the concept? Then cite whichever paper fits that description, which may or may not be the original.
Do you want to cite the other paper to show that the concept is still of interest during recent years? Then cite the most recent paper.
etc.

Depends. I can cite this paper or this one, and within the right context, the same information is conveyed either way (e.g., general case for where researchers may use synthetic controls). I would only cite both if the case of the old paper was substantively different/interesting or there were other reasons to cite both at once. But there's no rule.

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Getting into new field after tech career / PhD in STEM, should i start a new degree as undergrad or at postgrad level
I have an undergrad and PhD in a STEM field (engineering), and a few publications in some decent journals. since passing my PhD, i've been working in a management position in a tech company for the last few years, but needing some mental stimulation / diversification, started doing some papers in economics and philosophy after hours. I've done pretty well and i'd like to continue diversifying. After many years of self guided research, being back in the teaching environment as a student has actually been very cathartic and enjoyable and it turns out social sciences / humanities seem to come more naturally to me than i had thought previously.
My question relates to whether it would be wiser to start in a new field 'from the bottom up' (ie undergrad) or try to get into things at a higher level. I dont want to be bored but i also enjoy the rigour of starting at undergrad level. I'd like to get some opinions on this since most of the academics i know  tend to stay in their research fields. I should note i never intended to do a PhD but was promoted from a masters after my field year. I also seem to believe that education is not only about specialisation as is more common in the modern era, but more in tune with academics who covered many fields during their careers for instance Liebniz (law, mathematics etc)
Are their any PhD's out there who have diversified effectively into a completely new field? What is your advice? Did you end up 'starting again' ?

I don't see any reason to formally do another undergraduate degree. And you may not even need a credential at a higher level if you already have a doctorate and some publications in your new field.
My perspective is the US, where an undergraduate degree has a lot of things not related to the "major" subject. That is different elsewhere, of course.
But there may be some gaps in your education. If you are at a university, there is little reason why you can't ask a professor in some other field if you can "sit in" on one of their courses. I've done this, actually. The professor even agreed to give me ordinary student feedback (but no posted grade) on the homework assignments and exams. It was all informal and just let me "scratch an itch" in his field.
Once you think you have the knowledge gaps plugged you can, if you need the credential, apply for some higher level degree. You probably need to ask for special treatment in the admissions process, I suppose, but can probably justify it.


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Switching from theoretical to experimental after masters in electronics
I am a final semester masters student in the US and the topic I am currently working on as a part of my masters thesis is purely computational. I will be applying for Fall 2021 PhD programs and I came to realize that there are only a few research groups working in computational electronics. Is it common to switch from theoretical to experimental after Masters?

https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/147930/switching-fields-after-ma

https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/changing-fields

It's not common but there is no reason why you could not do it.  It might not even be difficult.


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Impact of Masters thesis on PhD application
I am a final year masters student and I will be defending in Fall 2020. I will be applying for PhD in Fall 2021. At the start of my Masters thesis, me and my PI had a specific goal in mind (lets call it Goal A). But unfortunately, we got stuck at a particular problem along the way for nearly three months before we could figure it out. Consequently, we made the decision to cut short the thesis to a smaller chunk (lets call it Goal A'). Now here are the couple of questions I have.

The schools that I am targeting work in A, is it a bad thing to have not achieved A in my masters thesis?
Is cutting short the thesis a bad thing? Does it give the application committee a bad impression on the candidate?
I will be working on the original goal (the goal A) in the 7 month period after I graduate my masters. Should I mention this in my Statement of Purpose? Does it balance out the fact that I was not able to work on it in my masters?

Thank you for your time.

That's research! I think anywhere you apply will understand that.

What count and will be useful is what you have learned. Forget achievements or marks.


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How to enhance my use of Google Scholar?
I would like to enhance my use of Google Scholar. Specifically, I am looking for functionalities I do not know whether they exist.

Is it possible to "follow" a specific paper? I would like Google Scholar to notice every time some other works quote this paper, as I consider they relate strongly to my Ph.D. dissertation.
Is it possible to get noticed every time specific journals publish papers that include defined keywords in their title or abstract?

I am curious about all the enhanced uses you can have of Google Scholar. If they are extra options, which notably help watching new publication on specific topics, I would be pleased to know them.

You should check YouTube. There are many great videos on how one can better use Google Scholar.

No, you cannot follow specific papers or journal-level keywords on Google Scholar; you can only follow researcher profiles.
However, there are other databases that support such a functionality.
Alert for specific keyword-searches in journals
For instance, on Web of Science, you can set an e-mail alert for your search keywords. Using their Advanced Search Options, you can design your keywords such that you only search in specific journals and only in their Abstracts and Titles. After you have done your search, click on Create an alert in the left menu.

The same applies to Scopus where the option is named Set alert:

Alert for specific papers
On Web of Science, click on a search result or publication. On the right-hand side, under the heading 'Citation Network' you can click on Create Citation Alert:

In Scopus, the same function can be found as Set citation alert.

Or on ResearchGate, you can get alerts for citations to specific papers by clicking Follow:


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Asking for Co-First Authorship
So recently, my PI submitted a paper that I and another graduate student have worked on for the past year.  The graduate student and I contributed equally on this project, in creating figures, getting data, writing the manuscript, etc., and he agrees as well. However, the first authorship is going to my partner, but I think it would be more fair if we had co-first authorship.
I want to bring this up and ask my PI, but I'm not sure what she'll say. How should I explain my situation to her?

I am not aware of any journals In my field that allow co-first authorship. There are journals that ask for a description of author contributions, and you can say that all or some authors contributed equally. However, articles in all journals that I am aware of have a unique first author

What was said in the conversation that determined the other student would be first author? Are you in a field of research where first authorship is meaningful?

@Thomas Perhaps not in your field, but it is (relatively) common in others to have an asterisk/other marking by the first two authors and a note "These authors contributed equally to this work." This is considered "co-first authorship". Due to limitations of written language, of course one actually appears "first", but the other can also consider this as a "first-author paper" for certain purposes.

@BryanKrause interesting, do you have an example?

@Thomas Try https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&q=%22these+authors+contributed+equally%22 - this one is particularly biased towards a specific publisher because of the specific phrasing I searched for, of course.

@Thomas Also a lot of related questions here: https://academia.stackexchange.com/search?q=co-first+author

I want to bring this up and ask my PI, but I'm not sure what she'll say. How should I explain my situation to her?

You're thinking about this wrong. It's not the PI's decision. You don't have to convince her, as she has no greater role in establishing authorship than any other, except of course by being the mediator between her own students.
Everyone on the author list has to agree to the ordering (and co-first-authorship). If the present first author agrees you should share first authorship, that's the big hurdle. I would suggest having him email all authors saying something like:

Monolo and I have discussed their contributions, and we would like to submit this paper as co-first-authors.

No one is likely to object, unless you're trying to jump from seventh author to first.

I suggest that you first talk to your partner. If they agree, then you can go jointly to the PI. If they disagree then you are inviting a fight. Make sure that it is a fight you really want. Bad things can come from such fights especially if your PI also disagrees.
Having any authorship is a good thing and in the long run co-first-authorship will mean little extra for first papers.

You could request a meeting with your PI, at which you can say you'd like to understand why your collaborator was named first author. She may have good reasons or she may have a mistaken understanding of your contributions, which you can correct.


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Someone asked me for advice on their paper a few months ago. I pointed out an error. I received no reply. What should I do?
A few months ago, a PhD student I had never met sent me an email asking me for advice about their paper. I have written papers on related topics and apparently I answered a question of theirs on the relevant SE site.
The paper was interesting and I was happy to give advice. However I found a mistake in a crucial lemma that puts several results in jeopardy. I wrote back with the advice and added an explanation about the error. I never received a response (not even thanks for the advice), and the preprint remains on the public preprint server untouched.
What should I do at this point? Do I write back asking for an update? Do I wait until the preprint is updated?
I guess what I am afraid of is that the paper contains results I am not unlikely to use in the future. But if the proof is wrong, that's a problem. I would like to avoid the public humiliation for the student to write in one of my papers that their proof is wrong and that I have a correct proof, or even worse for the paper in question to be published (because the student didn't care that I found an error) and then corrected/retracted once I inform the editor of the error. On the other hand I may be overthinking it as I am not responsible at all for these things: I don't know the student, they asked me for advice.

It's never bad to send a follow-up mail. It shows empathy and provides support, but it may also feel pushy. Definitely tell him you're interested in the results! Maybe he got stuck at the lemma you pointed out and cannot fix it without making massive changes. Maybe you have an idea to improve it, or can provide him of a direction?

It's tempting to become emotionally involved here, but you need to resist that temptation. If the student (or their advisor) wanted to involve you more, they would have done so already.  If would be courteous to write back, and if they remember to thank you in a final version, that would be nice, but discourtesy is not a big deal.
If you did, indeed, find a significant error in their work, it may have been an easy fix (and they are just not courteous) or it may have been a serious problem that could have undermined the entire result. They might be scrambling to fix it, might have even decided it is unfixable and moved on to something entirely different. Moreover, the situation you describe may have other non-scientific factors in play, as a student would typically not reach out unsolicited to an outside expert without in some way involving their advisor (even if just as a cc on the email). All of which is a long way of saying that you have no idea what might be going on with the student right now.
So, what about the other reasons you express for involving yourself?

Should you be concerned about a manuscript with an error being publicly available on a preprint server?  No, you should not. Preprint servers are filled with unreviewed work that is, indeed, likely to contain errors, and anybody accessing them should assume as much.
Should you worry about an incorrect proof getting through peer review? No, you should not. They have your information, and if they choose to publish anyway and if then reviewers don't notice the problem, then that is not your responsibility. A correction or retraction would indeed be warranted and an unfortunately appropriate embarrassment to all involved.

All that said, if you are genuinely interested in making use of their results in your own work at this time, then you have an actual appropriate professional reason to contact them on that basis --- along with their advisor, who should be better versed in typical scientific practices. Say exactly your interest, and that you would like to know their progress for that reason. At that point, either an updated preprint or an offer for you to become more involved should be forthcoming --- and if not, I think it would be appropriate to consider yourself released to work in the area without constraint.

Do nothing. You've fulfilled your duty. The author needs to act, not you.
The author should be considering your advice. They may find you're wrong, or they may change their paper in response to your advice. Either way, they should have thanked you.
You shouldn't expect any changes to be released immediately. The author may be making many changes and they may want to complete all changes before releasing an update. Equally, they may be waiting for their co-authors. Assuming your advice helped, you should receive an acknowledgement.
It's possible that the author is unable to correct the paper alone. You could reach out to them, explain that you have a corrected proof, and offer to co-author the paper.
Before using the results in the future, you could reach out to the student, explain that you intend to use the results, but can't in the current form. Ask if they can update the preprint to contain a correct proof, perhaps even offering to co-author.
You seem convinced that you're right and they're wrong. Maybe you have a basis for that. You should entertain the possibility that you've falsely claimed that their proof is wrong. Perhaps you've missed something. Perhaps not. But always consider that possibility.


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I want to be the sole student author on a poster, but my advisor wants to bring on other students
I am in my 2nd year of my Ph.D. program and I want to submit a poster to a conference that will be held this spring. I brought up this idea to my advisor; she agreed, however she wants me to ask a few members from the lab to join in and help me do the work. My advisor is very positive and nice, and believes in constant collaboration among all members of her lab.
The problem is that I came up with this idea myself (using my advisor's data that she shares with all lab students), and already wrote a full research paper on it for a class project when I was in my first year. I got significant results, and aced both the assignment and class. Everything is already done - the lit review, method, results, conclusion, discussion, abstract, references, tables, etc. Although I am the youngest (rank wise) student in her lab, I definitely have a lot of stats and research experience and feel that I am more than capable to do handle this on my own.
This will be my first poster, so since the work is done, I honestly just wanted my name and my advisor's name on it. She also knows that I did this for a class project. All the other students in the lab are older and have plenty of poster experience. Since I had a toxic Master's thesis advisor at my previous school, I'm always careful of giving my opinion. I don't see any benefit of adding authors to the poster, and I don't really believe in adding your name to something unless hard work was put into it. Even though my current advisor is not toxic, I'm not sure how to bring this up to her without her thinking that I don't care about others's success. Thanks for your help in advance.

Have you asked her what they would be helping you with?

Maybe the other students could genuinely help because the material is not as ready as you think it is (all those who are in PhD programs did great at school, but few produce publication-ready first drafts). Maybe she wants them to learn stuff (either about the paper topic or about paper-writing) per Buffy's answer. Maybe she wants their name on one more paper and is involving them for a token contribution. Who knows?

Depending on how your lab works and how collaborative the work is, you may be right or wrong in this.
However, I suggest you keep a few things in mind. Fighting with your PI is seldom a way to academic success and having the good will of your supervisor probably has more value at this moment than having a poster with a small number of authors.
Also, the supervisor may, actually, be trying to get some of the others an interesting project with which they can boost their learning. Is it possible that she has done this sort of thing for you in the past? For others?
I'd suggest that you might just ask her for her reasoning in this, without appearing to be argumentative.
But you are probably (not necessarily) better off in yielding on this for the sake of your long term goals. Don't let short term goals interfere with the bigger - longer term - picture.


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Publications and career trajectory in the 'About me' section of a job talk
I am preparing for an upcoming job talk for a tenure track assistant professor position. I am strongly encouraged by the hiring committee to have an 'About me' section mentioning my career trajectory (like here) and to show a glimpse of my publications.
I am wondering what is the best way to do this in a manner that won't come across as aggressive or showing-off or shamelessly being proud of myself. Showing a list of publications as a slide looks like an uncomfortable thing to do as the audience will just get an idea of the volume of work I have done, without being aware of the quality of the content in the papers. What can possibly be the best way to do this?
Also about the career trajectory, I am trying to see what can be the natural way to 'fit' this information in the talk so that it is not abrupt. Of course, there is a way to tell the audience which universities I have been a part of while I am talking about my work. However, this needs to be done separately in the 'About me' section.
Any thoughts or ideas on this will be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

What can possibly be the best way to do this? You could highlight publication venues/numbers, e.g., 1 RespectedJournalA article, 1 RespectedJournalB article, 2 RespectedConferenceA papers, ..., rather than listed citations more verbosely

I am trying to see what can be the natural way to 'fit' this information in the talk so that it is not abrupt You'll presumably be talking about a strand (or two) of your research. You could just mention the venues where particular aspects of the strand(s) appeared.

Since they have asked for it specifically, it won't come across badly unless you make it "over the top".
But talk about how your publications set a base for future studies and, and maybe how you see your work benefiting future students in their own studies. If it is "in person" then a slide listing your publications could save you some time and words. Maybe in an online talk you could do likewise. Let the publications speak for themselves, but say some things about what they imply for the future "trajectory".
OTOH, sometimes "over the top" is a good ice breaker. "Greatest mathematician since Poincaré" would do it.

Thanks! It's an online talk given these strange times. The ice-breaker idea is a good one! ;)


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Sending a second follow-up email for a potential PhD position
Four weeks ago I contacted the department of the University to ask whether there are PhD positions open. They emailed me some questions I needed to fill in and said that they will review my application and let me know if they have something available for me as soon as possible. After two weeks, I sent a follow-up email asking if there was already some news about my application, but they didn't respond.
Now, two weeks after that follow-up email, I still haven't heard anything. Is it okay to send a second follow-up email? How should I formulate it? I don't want to seem annoying and intrusive. On the one hand, I'm willing to be patient as I really want to pursue a PhD at that faculty, but on the other hand, if they don't offer me a position, I need to start looking for other positions as soon as possible.

Trust them to "let you know". And follow astronat's advice to send out a bunch of applications now.

What country? .

It's typical to apply for multiple (10+) PhD positions simultaneously, rather than sequentially. Don't wait to hear back from this place, just send your other applications now. It's fine to ask again about your application, but this time ask for the date by which you can expect to have a decision.
Here's a suggestion for how to formulate the email (you can modify it according to the specific details of your situation):

Dear Prof. X,
Last month I applied for a PhD position in your department. Do you
have any further news about my application, or an idea of when you
might make a decision? I am really excited about this opportunity and
look forward to hearing from you soon.
Best wishes,
MDG1999

The first part of this answer is most important, I think. Would you still recommend the bottom part knowing they inquired 2 weeks ago? Maybe something more like... Could you clarify what the typical timeline for this type of decision is at your lab/department/university?”

Another factor may be if the department hires a pool of students that are afterwards matched with supervisors after a year or so of courses, or if new students enter a research group directly.  In the latter case, you could reach out to your potential supervisor. In certain cases it is in fact beneficial to reach out to possible supervisors ahead of time.


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Is it normal to apply for a PhD when you have not done your master's thesis in that subject?
I have recently finished my master's thesis and I want to start applying for PhDs soon. Considering that I did my PhD in subject A would it be considered 'normal' to apply for PhDs in subject B? I feel that not doing your master's thesis in subject B would set you back in the sense that you would miss out on quite a bit of hands on experience in that subject. How much are you expected to learn while doing the PhD and how much is expected as prerequisite knowledge?
I did my master's in Theoretical Physics if that's relevant and subject A = simulations in soft condensed matter and subject B = quantum computing (but maybe other subjects still)

Both of those are physics, and really not that unrelated. Now if you now wanted to do a PhD in Roman History, that might (but only might) make some difference.

That's what i did and I got admitted to a Ph.D. program in the US, but it was 15 yrs ago.


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What is your correct title while working on a PhD?
After finishing a PhD, your title is either Dr or PhD. What is the correct title while still working on it? Is it MSc?
This question asks almost the same question, but doesn't specifically ask for titles.

"What's my professional title while working full time on my PhD?" doesn't specifically ask for titles ?

If you got an MSc, then your highest earned degree is MSc. If you didn't, then it isn't.

You don't really have a title, per se, other than whatever other social titles already apply to you: Mr., Ms. ...
You can add MSc following your name if you have earned that, but it isn't really a title.
But you are a student.
Once you pass certain milestones, you might be called something like a degree candidate but that isn't a title. Titles (other than hereditary titles) require earning some achievement that you haven't yet earned.
Some people might want to use "Master" after earning a MSc, but that is also often used for, say, five year old boys. Probably not what you are after.

It's pretty clear that the OP is using the word "title" to mean Bc., MSc., Ph.D. and similar abbreviations attached to one's name. Your answer explains to the OP that the word "title" doesn't mean what they think it means, but it doesn't tell them what they actually want to know.

OP's profile indicates they are in Netherlands, where they would typically be considered an employee, not a student.

And then there is of course also the issue that "Master" has some definite racial and historical connotations.

To add to the (very good) previous answers, I think it is also important to mention that the way PhD students are considered is also country dependent.
In the US, people working towards a PhD degree are mostly considered as students. They are often referred to as "PhD candidates" or "grad students" (depending on their level of advancement). The curriculum is longer (and can be started without a prior Master degree, which is usually not the case in European countries), and requires to take several classes and exams. The stipend is usually not fantastic, while the graduation ceremony is quite a big deal. Briefly, working towards a PhD in the US can be compared to getting any other academic diploma.
In Europe, people working towards a PhD degree are mostly considered as professional researchers. For instance, in France, it is common to refer to a PhD student as "scientist" or "researcher" (even though they are students registered at a higher education institution). It is not always required to take classes - and if it is, the requirement is often to simply validate a few credits once for all. The graduation process is pretty casual, if existent at all. If I were to summarize my PhD in Switzerland: I have been working in a lab doing science for some time, and at the end they gave me a piece of paper saying that I was now legally allowed to add the letters "PhD" in front of my name on my mailbox and my driving license.
I am less knowledgeable about this process in other continents. And these are only general trends, as sharp country-specific differences may exist.

The UK seems closer to the US than to "Europe" in these matters.
Here your title normally goes in front of your name, and does not change based on receipt of a masters degree, whether or not you subsequently start a PhD. You can start using the title Dr after completing a PhD, but many people don't use it, or only use it in a relevant professional context. You technically can put letters after your name following the award of any degree (including bachelors) and various other degree-like achievements, but this is never actually done in everyday life. A case where it would be done is if someone in medical, legal or related professions had a name-plate outside their place of work of the form "Jane Smith BVSc MRCVS" to demonstrate their qualifications.
Historically, however, there was a potential change in title. If Mr Paul Jones was awarded a masters degree, he could then be styled "Paul Jones, Esq.". Note that by "historically" I mean over 100 years ago, so at the time only men were allowed to get degrees. The title Esq. (for Esquire) is not really used any more and most people aren't aware that it signifies anything in particular, except that the user is somewhat pretentious. Maybe the best known recent usage is Bill S. Preston, Esq., who does not have a masters degree.

Within the Humanities in the United States, it's common to say "doctoral student" when enrolled in a PhD program, but if one has not yet advanced to candidacy. After passing qualifying exams, submitting an approved dissertation proposal, and/or whatever paperwork is required by one's university to be ABD ("All But Degree"), then one can say that they are a "doctoral candidate."

In Poland, they use X, Ph.D. or MSc X while being a student, and Dr. X when they obtain their degree.
However, this is not consistent throughout all universities in Poland.
I write X, Ph.D. Candidate and I think this is the proper way to describe my situation.


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How likely are you to be stressed in academia?
So a little context. I'm a second year masters student in theoretical physics and last year I almost had a burnout. I mean that I had symptoms of burnout but it was not severe enough to be an actual burnout (luckily). What stressed me out most was the frequent deadlines. The material also got harder compared to my bachelor which contributed as well. After taking it easy for a while now and talking to a psychologist to help cope with stress I'm feeling much better. I would rather not have this experience another time or even worse. So, since a lot of theoretical physicists go into academia my question is how likely are you to be stressed in academia? Or more specifically

How likely are you to be stressed in academia? Do you know examples of people who are very stressed/not stressed at all?
If it is stressful, is it possible to reduce your workload? Or is it possible to manage this stress?

+1 I'm sure the stress level of any person in Academia depends on individual factors, but they are unlikely to be completely idiosyncratic. So it would be interesting to know what these factors are. I'm sure research has been done on stress-levels and coping mechanisms across professions, perhaps even specifically among academics. This would be interesting as well.

The health implications of stress significantly depend on your mental attitude to stress. See this very insightful TED talk.

A majority of the expectations tend to be self-imposed.

While there are some things you're made to do by others, most deadlines etc come from your own choices. Do you agree to referee that paper? Do you want to submit to that conference? Do you agree to give that talk?

There is no "having done enough".

There is always something more that you could do. There will be almost certainly peers who get much, much more done than you (or at least appear to do). Research is never finished. The academic job market is very tight, so until you have tenure, there is always this question of "could doing this extra thing be the decisive factor in whether or not I get a job"?

Deadlines tend to be on a medium time scale.

Unless you are eg a postdoc with a micromanaging team lead, you will be rather flexible in the short term. Teaching aside, things are of the "do this this week/month", nor "this day".

There does seem to be a widespread culture of celebrating stress.

While relaxed academics exist, in my experience most academics tend to convey an aura of constant low-level stress. Of those, many seem to enjoy this. Admitting to be overwhelmed is very much acceptable, but I suspect that the stress can be infectious for some people.

This was actually really helpful! Point 1 seems to imply that you have at least some control over it. Point 3&4 give a nice quantification. I will wait a bit for other responses but I think I'll accept your answer

One particular feature of academe (I'm in math in the U.S.) that seems very unfortunate to me is that there is not a tradition of giving positive feedback to other people. And, in all the university administrations I've observed, there is more consistent effort exerted in "explaining" why there's just no money for raises... Never cost-of-living, and "merit" is 2%?!? When there are economic problems, salaries can get cut, but in economic good times, they'll not get comparable boosts.
We are in a situation where "everyone is above average", but somehow we're all still led to feel that we are on the edge of failure, especially with the trend in recent decades of appraisal of much shorter-term pictures of one's work, as opposed to "lifetime achievement", and as opposed to long-term projects.
The popularity of "performance appraisal software" in administrations is yet another mechanism that manifestly over-simplifies "good behavior" on the part of faculty.
Unless one is able to somehow ignore such stuff, it is at least annoying... and chronic annoyance is stress, and has a cognitive load.

"especially with the trend in recent decades of appraisal of much shorter-term pictures of one's work, as opposed to "lifetime achievement", and as opposed to long-term projects." I've heard this expressed too by older mathematicians. Everyone acknowledges that "academia has changed." It is not uncommon nowadays to have several papers straight out of grad school. I once lamented to a mathematician that you must have at least 2 published papers out of grad school to get a postdoc. He responded, "Look at this Fields medalist. How many papers did he/she have out of grad school?"

It is stressful but it comes with rewards.  The key thing is to assess if these rewards - they are not necessarily monetary but rather as Feynman stated just “the pleasure of finding things out” - are enough for you to compensate for the long hours and the actual stresses.
Personally I find I was well prepared for the challenges of research but not so well prepared to confront the naked stupidity and populism of some people I work with.
I deal with this by increasing my workload, giving me an out to avoid interactions with the people I like least.  This ability to basically isolate oneself from the local sh!tstorms and work pretty much always with people I like is probably the most important way I manage my stressors (not so easy for students or junior faculty though).


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Working as a Lecturer / Assistant Professor in UK vs Canada
I'm a research fellow based in the UK. All my academic experience (bachelors, masters, PhD, postdocs) have been in UK (English) universities. For the next stage, I'm considering the benefits of continuing in the UK compared with getting a position overseas. My field is biomedicine / epidemiology / public health.
Specifically I would like to consider the pros and cons of working as a lecturer in a British university compared with working as an assistant professor in a Canadian university.
Does anyone have experience of both systems and is able to make comparisons? It would be informative to have insights on:

Salary and benefits (e.g. days of holiday)
Pensions (boring but important!)
Working styles
Teaching responsibilities
Funding provided by universities or research councils
Work life balance

As Canada has a federal system, I'm aware there can be differences between states. Any answers with knowledge of universities in Quebec would be particularly helpful.
As a benchmark, I would characterise the UK system as follows:

Salary for a lecturer in the region of £40,000 per year, which is low relative to the cost of living in London and the South East, but high in North East or North West England. Holidays are fairly generous (30 days per year)
USS pension is generous as it is a final salary scheme, but takes 10% of gross salary (and may be unsustainable in the future)
High administrative burden. Often competitive working environments.
High teaching load for early stage lecturers
Not much support for funding from universities, but (in my field) several external funders (Medical Research Council, Wellcome Trust, Gates Foundation).
Hard to generalise, but work life balance often compromised by long commutes and high cost of living (more so in London/ Southern England)

The future of USS may be uncertain, but any benefits you've already accrued are protected by law.

USS is not a final salary scheme anymore.

What I meant by "final salary" is that USS has a "defined benefit" component, which (as I understand) is calculated based on salary and years of contributions. As compared to private pensions schemes, which pay the interest from an accumulated capital sum.

Pension planning is a serious matter. Please take time to carefully read the rules of different providers, and consider taking a professional advice. Do not simply rely on a few opinions sourced online.

Salary, benefits, pension, and teaching responsibilities: Take a look at comparable institutes and see what they're offering

USS is an average salary scheme, rather than a final salary scheme, but that still makes it better than almost any private sector pension and definitely better than 401k-like schemes in the US (I don't know what the system is in Canada).

@DanielHatton Not quite true. I joined a post-92 Uni and was allowed to maintain my USS membership from my previous employment. If I were completely new to academia, they would've put me on TPS, true.

This does not answer your question but you should definitely apply / consider Canadian job opportunities. In general, Canadian academic jobs are not obviously worse than UK ones, and the particulars you will find out when you apply. You might find that a specific Canadian position turns out to compare very favourably to a UK one. Go for it!

I do not know exact details of the UK system but I have colleagues there so at least I have some general idea of the UK system.  My impressions of Quebec come from doing grant committee work for the provincial government.
In Quebec the dominant language is French: it may or may not be a requirement to learn it but if you don’t you’d miss out on much the vibrant cultural scene.  Quebec also runs a French-inspired system of education (unlike English Canada, which is much closer to a US-based system): I don’t understand the UK system well enough to compare, but salaries are lower than the rest of Canada (although the prestige is greater).  The provincial tax burden is not light (although it’s not the horror stories you read compared with other provinces, except Alberta), but the quality of live is quite high: you can expect to have the means of buying a house within 5 years of your appointment (something not so clear if you are appointed in Toronto or Vancouver).
Quebec is culturally more creative than the rest of Canada: the joke is that the graduating theatre class in Quebec always puts on a new play at graduation, whereas the graduating class in Ontario always puts on a Shakespeare play.   This creative drive trickles to the research level: there are more funding opportunities in Quebec (the provincial government runs its own funding scheme, on top of all federal scheme).  Tuition is low compared with other provinces: it is a very attractive research environment, and many in other provinces are quite jealous of the additional government funding opportunities.
Of course there is “true” tenure.
My sense is that the UK is much much more complicated.  Quebec universities do not run on full-cost accounting (I know some UK universities do) so the paperwork required in applying for and managing grants is an order of magnitude lower than what I’ve seen in the UK.  Many federal grants are individual grants (there are also some team grants and some industry grants) and these individual grants are very flexible, with minimal oversight and simple rules (v.g. no business class flights).  If you use this $$ poorly (nothing to show for it at the end of the grant period) nobody will care but you’re unlikely to have a strong enough file to get your grant renewed: by and large the system works reasonably well.  Overall, my sense is that the Canadian and Quebec systems are much less business-like and penny-pinching than the UK system.  “Big grants” aren’t so frequent: the Canadian system tends to distribute its resources over individual researchers rather than concentrate resources in a few big centers.
I do not know what you have in mind, but - say - McGill is not called the Harvard of the North for nothing.  It has a history of excellent research: I don’t know about biomedicine but I know that there’s a lot of hospital-based research there (same as UK as far as I know).
Side note: I have a colleague who took a job in the UK and came back to Canada simply because the funding environment in the UK was so much more restrictive compared to the Canadian system.  I suppose this is anecdotal but it does align with my own experience with the UK system (through international team grants).
Nota: you can check funding levels for federal (NSERC) grants here: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/index_eng.asp
Public employees salaries in Quebec are not public but they are in Ontario (if you make over $100k).  Faculty salaries in Quebec are lower than Ontario and I do not know the x factor between the two, although I would guess ~0.8. You can get some of the public sector salaries in Ontario from this link.
You might have to download some stuff to search by university or sector.
Montreal has an excellent public transport system (including subway, with subway stops at all major universities).
My impression is that teaching loads are quite acceptable.

One big difference I see between Canada and the UK is that Tenure (in the US sense) doesn't exist in the UK, where as I believe it does at some places in Canada.

Probably it's more accurate to say that Tenure Track employment does not exist in the UK. A Lecturer post becomes "permanent" (open-ended) after a probationary period, which is non-competitive and much easier compared to US tenure.

Its a myth that probation is easy, or at least it is in my field. In my dept, 25% if people coming up for probation review in the last 5 years have failed. I don't think this is so different from tenure rates outside the famous universities in the US. The requirements are similar (a major grant, at least one 4* paper, plus teaching reqs). Open-ended is not the same as "permanent" in the tenure sense. Its very hard to get rid of someone with tenure in the US. In the UK it's no different from getting rid of any other employee. We lost someone last year for not having a good enough REF return

Things surely differ between your Russel group university and the place I am at. In my Faculty, 96% of new staff pass their probation successfully. I agree that "open-ended" is not quite "permanent", but from what I hear, tenured academics are sometimes pushed out from U.S. Universities too. Academic life is tough and full of terrors.

In general, it is much harder to get rid of an employee in the UK than in the US.  From the US perspective, it's more accurate to say that every employee in the UK has tenure than to say academics in the UK don't have tenure.

@AlexanderWoo I have not worked in the US but I have worked in Canada and in the UK (only as a mathematician) and my impression is that Ian's assessment may be more accurate, from the POV of a lab science discipline. "We lost someone last year for not having a good enough REF return" is simply something that doesn't happen in systems with tenure provided one gets tenure

@DmitrySavostyanov I think this is a maths-or-CS vs bio/chem/phys issue rather than a RG/non-RG issue, but I admit that is largely guesswork

+1 as someone who was on tenure-track in Canada and has passed probation in both Canada and then in the UK. However, I think the answer could be improved by adding some particular practical details to illustrate the consequences of tenure or its absence

It’s not really either/or, yes all jobs in the UK are more like having tenure than like having a normal US job, but it’s also true that there’s a substantial gap between having a UK job and having tenure in the US.

@DmitrySavostyanov there is always the possibility in the UK of just shutting down programs, something that is inconceivable in Canada.   In general once you get tenure in the Canadian system, you are very secure.  Moreover, because of the differences in funding system, tenure is typically yours to loose in Canada, and much less dependent on research-generated overhead as in the US.  And of course your summer stipend is not grant-dependent either.


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Is it better to have a strong letter of recommendation from a professor in a different area of study or a weaker letter from the same area of study?
I want to apply for a graduate electrical engineering program next fall. I have one engineering professor who has written letters of recommendation for me in the past, however I only know her from more generic courses which I didn't always do well in (hence why I know her from office hours).
The other letter I could get would be from a business professor. I took two courses with him which I got A's in, spoke to him about a startup I cofounded, and was in a student community he chaperoned. He could likely give me a stronger letter of recommendation, however he was a professor for business management (specifically entrepreneurship), and knows little about engineering.
Although I do have one letter from another engineering professor I'll submit regardless (and one from another cofounder of the startup), is it better to have a stronger letter of recommendation from a professor in a different department, or is it better to have a weaker letter from a professor within my area of study?

@Buffy Converted comment into answer, as per your suggestion.

If you have your engineering side covered already with strong letters, you can get a strong letter from outside of the field.
However, you are applying to an engineering program, so first and foremost, you must make sure that the program managers understand that you are strong in engineering, not business. It is no harm, of course, to demonstrate that you also can do business.
I cannot tell you whether just one support letter from your core field is sufficient, probably you need at least two.


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ambiguity about informal postdoc offer
I am concerned that an email I sent can be interpreted as an (informal) acceptance of a postdoc offer.
The email was in response to a PI who emailed saying that he hoped to have an official offer out soon, and then asked about an ideal starting date.
I replied,"Thanks for the update! I could start at the beginning of xxx."
My intention with my wording was to give the information requested without accepting the offer, but also without explicitly stating that I was looking into other options. After sending this email I applied to other laboratories, and received a couple offers. All the offers, including the one referenced in the email, are almost equally attractive and I would like to select the option that works best for me. However, I do not want to be guilty of any dishonesty with regards to the original offer. Does my email pass as a firm commitment? I have since clarified to the PI during a call that I was considering other options and he did not seem too bothered, but I do want to make sure I am acting ethically.
I can provide more details but I have tried to include the most relevant.
Thanks!

I replied,"Thanks for the update! I could start at the beginning of xxx."

You're almost certainly okay. You haven't gotten the actual official offer, and though you've shown clear interest you haven't accepted anything. Of course, the PI involved could be disappointed, and if they're a jerk they could even retaliate by speaking badly about you. Unfortunately, though, just about anyone can choose to be a jerk whenever they want and it doesn't necessarily have to be a consequence of something you've actually done wrong.

I have since clarified to the PI during a call that I was considering other options and he did not seem too bothered

Now you are definitely okay. Some people would suggest this level of honesty is somehow not strategic; personally I think in most cases it's better to be clear. People who are hiring for a position should always assume the people they recruit are pursuing other offers, just as people applying for one should always assume there are other candidates.


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Journal article suggestion website or application
I'm finishing up my PhD in mathematics at the moment. I like to read journal articles from a wide range of different disciplines, and I wonder if there's some kind of service that might suggest articles that I like based on ones that I've already been reading.
For example, Google Chrome has a feature called 'Discover' built into it, where it suggests different articles that I might like to read.  This is mostly news articles, which I do read and find interesting. Sometimes it picks up on some journal articles, or for example some science journalism articles which link to papers.
Is there a website or app which works similarly to this, but suggests only journal articles or web pages which are discussing journal articles, covering a wide range of disciplines?

Google Scholar has a "Recommended articles" feature, but I don't know how useful it is.

Maybe you could pick a handful of papers you are interested in (say 10-50) and use a service that sends you email notifications whenever those papers are cited? Alternatively, you could set up RSS feeds that pick out papers by keywords of your choosing (for example, arXiv has this feature)

There are quite a few paper recommender systems (a highly active area of research, by the way; see this Google Scholar search on "paper recommender systems"). They first draw from a corpus of research publications you 'follow', have read or stored; second, they use algorithms to find related papers; and third, they recommend these related papers to you.
To name a few platforms:

Google Scholar: You can 'follow' Google Scholar profiles with the option to get e-mail alerts with publications related to the followed
profiles' research. This is possibly the widely used approach.
ResearchGate: You can 'follow' ResearchGate profiles, and the RG main site will show you papers related to their publications.
Academia.edu: Same like ResearchGate, but including with the option to get e-mail alerts.
Mendeley: If you use Mendeley, its feature "Mendeley Suggest" sends you (I think weekly?) e-mails to recommend similar papers to
you as the ones you have stored.
Twitter: Follow journals and 'journal lists' (an aggregation of Twitter profiles of journals, such as this one on Political
Science) on Twitter, and you will see them announcing their newest publications in your Twitter feed.

In addition, there are some platforms that require you to type in a DOI of a paper and that then search for papers that are in a co-citational relationship with the DOIs. Just some examples:

CitationGecko: https://citationgecko.azurewebsites.net/
ConnectedPapers: https://www.connectedpapers.com/
CoCites: https://www.cocites.com/

This is great thanks for your help


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Where do all the research paper annotations go?
Today, an increasing number of research papers are publicly available. At the same time, a community of researchers and students are reading those materials. We are highlighting, commenting, finding connections between topics, contradicting... in general digesting that knowledge.
Where does all that information go? Is there a project/app/platform that allows me to access the comments and annotations of those who read the papers before me? Something like a line comment on github.
Being science a collective endeavour, why is something like that not the standard way of doing research?
Am I missing something?

Quick remark: The annotations of one researcher are often not useful for other researchers. Papers are frequently read with a particular question in mind, and the annotations will reflect how this question is answered in the paper (or is not answered). The next researcher may have a different question in mind, and hence may not find the first annotations useful.

I feel like how to order/use the annotation data is a "next question". The current is more like, are we throwing away all that information?

Yes, it's thrown away, and no, that's not a problem.

I don't see what use anyone else could have for my frequent "???" and "google this" comments in the margins of papers...

Well, I think data is always valuable. Even when you add "???" or just highlight a sentence you do it for a reason, e.g. you are pointing a focus of attention. It could be use to improve findability, or link related topics. I don't believe that all the work people do while read and analyse a paper is rubbish.

Does this answer your question? Why there isn't provision for writing comment on published articles like social media?

Mostly duplicate of https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/89693/why-do-sites-that-host-papers-not-have-a-comments-section-for-each-paper . The idea is a good one, but no one has gotten much mileage out of it in practice -- most sites for discussion and commenting of papers have folded, for technical or social reasons. The internet doesn't seem to be ready for non-self-contained writing.

I was recently introduced to this site: hypothes.is (I have no affiliation). In essence, any PDF with a URL when opened with their layer allows you to see comments and highlights from anyone else who has chosen to use it, or sub-groups you can join or arrange.
I have not seen anyone in academia use it, but perhaps you could start. It does seem like it could be useful for a small group of people who want to understand a paper.

My impression from reading the comments section of papers that do allow comments, especially those on any topic of broader interest, is that, like most content on the internet, it's mostly junk. I'd expect the same of other types of annotation.
Therefore, you would need to design a whole platform around people not only providing their annotations, but also rating the annotations of everyone else. There has to be enough good content there to motivate people to keep the quality level high. There need to be enough people interested in curating any specific paper or the junk level goes up and the usefulness goes down.
Using StackExchange as a model, in particular my experience on the scientific stacks here, there are not enough people interested in a specific academic topic to curate properly. The curators are a tiny minority, so this would only even have a chance of working for papers that are very popular, and those tend to be least in need of annotation because they produce other types of content: editorials/comments posted in journal, posts on Twitter, etc.

Also, guaranteed that, where applicable, half of the comments are going to be something like "Is the n big enough?" without any sort of mathematical consideration.


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Who to ask for letters of recommendations?
I am an undergrad from a pretty unknown Asian university and I would be applying to PhD programs (mostly US) in pure mathematics this application cycle. However, my major is physics and my intention to switch fields came relatively late, and therefore very few math professors know me very well. I have taken as much upper division pure math courses as my schedule allowed, with courses in analysis, algebra and geometry/topology. I will hopefully have taken 11 one-semester upper division and graduate courses by graduation, but 6 of them will be taken this year.
I am now trying to gather the three recommenders needed for application. My thesis advisor is a math professor and I have been doing some independent study under him for quite some time, but I was struggling in choosing the remaining recommenders. I have a few candidates:

A physics professor from an Ivy League university supervising a summer research project on supersymmetry, though this particular project is not very mathematically intensive,
A math professor from my home uni teaching me a graduate topology course this semester (this is the first graduate course that I have formally taken due to curriculum constraints); I don't have much interactions with him though,
A math professor from my home university who taught me an undergrad algebra course on representation theory last semester: we had a bit more interactions but I haven't worked closely with him,
A math professor from my home university that I have been doing some small group study under, but he is not very closely involved (our small group does meet weekly but he only occasionally comes in and discusses) and we started fairly recently; since I also hope to do an MPhil under him if I don't get an offer, I'm a bit worried whether asking him for a letter at this stage will make him feel negatively about taking me in as a master student.

Any advice would be helpful. Thank you!

Broadly speaking selection for PhD's these days is fundamentally premised on completion risk: a good risk is someone who looks like they are:

Eligible to apply;
Adequately prepared* for the demands of the program;
In the case of research degrees - able to complete the research proposed given the time and resources available;
Likely to produce quality* work (to a standard at least sufficient to pass, but at best to make them look good);
Likely to complete on time.

*Noting what 'quality' and 'preparation' can mean something quite specific depending on the discipline area.
They are likely to use all of the evidence they gather from you during the application process to inform their decisions against criteria that will - either explicitly or implicitly - look something like the list outlined above.
Most application processes require several referees or letters of recommendation.
With the above in mind, one strategy would be to consider different aspects of the proposed research and what makes you a good choice. For example, you may have a great referee on content knowledge but another one on method or skill or innovation or the like and another that may be more about working style or approach to problem solving.
Having said all that, the closer the referee is to their own department the more sway it is likely to have, and everybody likes an Ivy League branded referee - especially if you have worked directly with them and they can speak to the prospect that you would be a safe bet.

You want the letters that can say the most about you beyond how you did in a class (that's in your record) even if their expertise is not the closest to the mathematics you want to do in grad school.
That suggests your thesis advisor, and #1.
I would hope that your ambition to go for the math PhD would appeal to #4 even though acceptance would mean they wouldn't have you for a master's student.
Related: Postdoc Letter of recommendation same school or different school


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What mechanism prevents government organizations from handing out too much money for research during a year with exceptionally good proposals?
What mechanism prevents government organizations from handing out too much money for research during a year with exceptionally good proposals? I'm imagining that people in charge of approving funding go about their business and realize that there's been too many good ideas and they're gonna run out of money before the end of the business cycle if they continue going at this rate, so they dial back and raise standards. However, there should be some ways to quantify this.
Furthermore, they might have to raise standards in an artificial way, creating rejections where the reason is not that there's anything wrong with the proposal, but rather that there's not enough money to go around. In this case, do they write something along the lines of "we couldn't find anything wrong, but money is tight and we received a lot of submissions blah blah blah..." on the rejection letter?

Are you asking about organizations that don't have specific calls and deadlines, but just continuously accept (and possibly fund) applications?

About "there's been too many good ideas and they're gonna run out of money": In most cases they know from the start that there's not enough money to fund all the good projects.  (I said "most cases", but it might actually be all cases; I've never known of an exception.)

@Mark Either is fine. I know the NSF has deadlines and cycles, but not every organization is awarding things in one big batch every quarter, year, or season.

Since spending more money than Congress has budgeted for you is not possible, they literally can't hand out more money then they have...

creating rejections where the reason is not that there's anything wrong with the proposal, but rather that there's not enough money to go around — doesn't that apply to the majority of rejections?

If a funding body doesn't get significantly more good applications than they have money for, something has gone really wrong beforehand.

Not every funding agency does it the same, of course, but the system I am most familiar with is:

Rank proposals in order of "best" to "worst".

Fund the proposal at the top of the list.

Continue until you run out of money.

There are some caveats about determining exactly how much funding to provide a project relative to the amount asked, as there is a trade off between fully funding the best proposals and funding more proposals at a reduced level. In periods of reduced funding, there may be percentage drops applied to all current projects to avoid reducing the number funded (and risking causing some labs to fold permanently).
For NIH, for example, they will tell you what percentile your project is at, and later, whether that will be funded or not. Things remain consistent enough that for all but the borderline cases, you know based on percentile whether or not your grant is likely to be funded. No comparisons are made to past submission cycles.
For what it's worth, the same is done in other areas: graduate student admissions, hires for open jobs, etc. The bound for success is not "meets requirements", the bound for success is "best option above the cut-off". Many qualified applicants are rejected whenever there is high demand for money, jobs, etc.

Yup. And sometimes if more money becomes available after the first batch of funding is allocated they do another round.

This is it: It's not that there are fixed criteria a proposal has to satisfy to be funded. It's whether it's among the N top proposals during this round.

And where there is more than one round per year, each round is allocated a portion of the annual budget. So if you have 3 rounds, and  $3 billion, each round will get $1 billion.

Would you be able to elaborate a bit on how agencies [r]ank proposals in order of "best" to "worst"? Since you mentioned familiarity with the system, I'm curious how agencies do this (do they consider "trending" fields/topics, "big-names" on the proposals, potential for money-making/reputation/whatever, etc).

@Daevin They give them to a committee of academics in the field and say "please rank these" (or at least, "give each of these grant applications a score"), along with some criteria. Addressing "trending topics" is more about allocating funds for different available funding announcements, categories that people submit to. See for example https://www.ninds.nih.gov/funding/find-funding-opportunities

@Daevin If you like youtube videos, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EeFj0LxSW1I&list=PLOEUwSnjvqBIgzR9UIQiWveYW1Rx44A9k particularly https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEQh49zyv4E

Good to know, @BryanKrause, cheers! I'll check out those videos for sure.

There's often a "0" step which is "Reject any proposal not meeting a 'fundable' quality threshold" and step 3 becomes "Continue until you run out of money or proposals".

realize that there's been too many good ideas and they're gonna run out of money before the end of the business cycle

Most grant programs only fund grants once per budget cycle.  They run out of money exactly when they intend to.
There are some exceptions.  Funding agencies that have switched to a deadline-free system award grants continuously.  They do this because it greatly reduces the number of applications (academics often do not know how to work without deadlines) so it's quite a bit harder to run out of money.  There's only a risk of running out of money if all the programs are funded continuously.  In my experience, it's only a few, with most being on the annual schedule.

That's a very interesting point, that there are less proposals to deadline-free systems.  Do you have a source to support this?

Even some of the deadline-free funding agencies (UK) actually have set dates for internal panel meetings so for the budgeting purposes, they behave exactly the same as the agencies with hard deadlines for "general" proposals. (These panel dates are published but are slightly different to deadlines, as there is no guarantee that your proposal will be evaluated at the first upcoming meeting from the date of your submission).


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Copyright Complications - Cumulative Dissertation & Elsevier
I am bit puzzled over the copyright issued involved in the publication of a cumulative dissertation.
Lets imagine you publish a paper in an Elsevier journal. The process of publication usually requires you to transfer the exclusive copyright to Elsevier. This would basically mean, you are not allowed to publish the paper as part of your cumulative dissertation (e.g. in the repository of your institution).
However I found a multitude of exceptions that allow specifically the publication within the context of a dissertation. Examples:
Source

Theses and dissertations which contain embedded PJAs as part of the
formal submission can be posted publicly by the awarding institution
with DOI links back to the formal publications on ScienceDirect

Source 2 - FAQ

Can I include/use my article in my thesis/dissertation?
Yes. Authors can include their articles in full or in part in a thesis
or dissertation for non-commercial purposes.
Can I use material from my Elsevier journal article within my
thesis/dissertation?
As an Elsevier journal author, you have the right to Include the
article in a thesis or dissertation (provided that this is not to be
published commercially) whether in full or in part, subject to proper
acknowledgment; see the Copyright page for more information.  No
written permission from Elsevier is necessary.
This right extends to the posting of your thesis to your university’s
repository provided that if you include the published journal article,
it is embedded in your thesis and not separately downloadable.

Also this .PDF by elsevier explicitly allows the use of the published journal article in a dissertation.
So now, this looks to me like it would be okay. However, I also read about that this is usually only allowed after an embargo period of for example 12 month. This would be highly problematic to my time schedule. Also in this document by Elsevier on Hosting Policies there is also an embargo period mentioned.
Does anyone of my fellow PhD students has experience with this issue?
Am I supposed to wait now for the 1 year embargo, or would it be permitted to publish an Elsevier article as part of a cumulative dissertation on our institutional repository.

In essence, you give them the copyright and they give you back a license as detailed in your Source 2.

Thank you. Do you know if this requires to wait out an embargo period? This is the part which is most confusing to me

I think the embargo was intended to apply to a different set of cases (not dissertations), but I haven't read all the pdfs. But if Source 2 nowhere mentions an embargo then I doubt it could apply. You could ask one of the editors, of course.

There are many questions about copyright on this site, but not a hint of anyone running into any sort of trouble for copyright infringement. People generally underestimate their rights, and spend too much time worrying about what is permitted.