Yee-haw! Sorta science related.

[TomJoe]

My first, first author manuscript was accepted into the Journal of Bacteriology (http://jb.asm.org/) today!

[Sauron]

My first, first author manuscript was accepted into the Journal of Bacteriology (http://jb.asm.org/) today!


Congratulations!
:balloons:

You've now joined the hallowed ranks of the few, the proud, the peer-reviewed.

And you've got a damn sight more energy that I do - I doubt I could finish writing a get-well card, much less a professional manuscript. :giggle:

[Dragoon]

Well, a lot of you went into that damned ring. If you can get it back, you'll be your old self again. Keep looking.

[livius drusus]

Yay! :victory: Congratulations, TomJoe. I'd read it, but I'd just end up asking you and Roland to explain it to me as to a child.

[Crumb]

Great TomJoe! :thumbsup:

[TomJoe]

Thanks everyone!

Pssst: I even used the word "evolved" in the manuscript three times. :giggle:


And you've got a damn sight more energy that I do - I doubt I could finish writing a get-well card, much less a professional manuscript. :giggle:

Well, I'm not sure how much was energy and how much was fear. Fear of wasting all this time in graduate school only to come up short at the end and not get my degree, and fear of my major advisor who, by his estimates (and what we call "PI math" has spent "a quarter of a million dollars" on my education (most of which has been directed towards tuition wavers, and reagents ... by my last count, and my empty stomach, not much has gone towards my salary). At least we're seeing the payoff now, and while I'm excited about this manuscript, the data we derived from this one, and the hypotheses we've devised and tested that have come from it, are even more exciting.

[viscousmemories]

I can't believe you STOLE MY TITLE! Bastard.

Oh well, congratulations anyway. :appl:

[TomJoe]

I can't believe you STOLE MY TITLE! Bastard.


In the science world, we call this "being scooped". I had an article describing this "hell on earth" but it's 51.8kb and I cannot attach it.

[Roland98]

Congrats! I'll have to keep an eye out for that in my eTOCs. You're not heading to ASM in Atlanta, are ya?

[Dingfod]

That's cool, TomJoe. The closest I've come to being published in a peer reviewed medium is in a message board. You can see what kind of reviews I get here.

[TomJoe]

Congrats! I'll have to keep an eye out for that in my eTOCs. You're not heading to ASM in Atlanta, are ya?

Nope, no meetings for me this year ... unless I go to one after I get a postdoc ... which is my latest reason for being up all night with stress induced worrying. Either I'm being way too selective, or I'm not looking in the right places, or there really isn't anything out there that catches my eye. :sadcheer:

And my boss isn't being very helpful ... other than telling me what places he would prefer I not go work at.

[Roland98]

Ah, understood. When do you defend, and are you trying to stay in that area, or is anywhere game? I was lucky in that I'd originally applied to U of Mich to do an MPH degree so I'd be better qualified for a professorship in epidemiology, but the director of admissions informed me about a post-doc that might fit me, where they'd pay for some coursework in the process.

[Brimshack]

...between the sheets.

[livius drusus]

It's an author manuscript, not a fortune cookie.

[TomJoe]

When do you defend, and are you trying to stay in that area, or is anywhere game?

I defend in June/July. Not sure yet. My committee will hopefully decide that issue for me at the end of april (which is when I have my next committee meeting).

I had hoped to get out of the medical microbiology realm, as well as academia, and work my way into the government setting. I'm mostly interested in regulatory systems, most intimately familiar with bacterial ones but it can be applied to eukaryotic systems as well (fungal or even human/plant/mammalian), which with the advent of microarray technology are becoming much more easily studied. However, this job search is turning out to be a bit tougher than I realized. Everytime I apply for a job, they seemingly have it filled before the first day of posting the job has gone by. And those that remain ... well, I either don't find them interesting, or I find them interesting but it's out of my realm of expertise (I've been trained as a medical microbiologist, not a plant pathologist). Ideally, I want to learn another system, new approaches and basically broaden my horizons ... I just need to find a lab willing to give me that opportunity.

[Roland98]

I defend in June/July. Not sure yet. My committee will hopefully decide that issue for me at the end of april (which is when I have my next committee meeting).

I had hoped to get out of the medical microbiology realm, as well as academia, and work my way into the government setting. I'm mostly interested in regulatory systems, most intimately familiar with bacterial ones but it can be applied to eukaryotic systems as well (fungal or even human/plant/mammalian), which with the advent of microarray technology are becoming much more easily studied. However, this job search is turning out to be a bit tougher than I realized. Everytime I apply for a job, they seemingly have it filled before the first day of posting the job has gone by. And those that remain ... well, I either don't find them interesting, or I find them interesting but it's out of my realm of expertise (I've been trained as a medical microbiologist, not a plant pathologist). Ideally, I want to learn another system, new approaches and basically broaden my horizons ... I just need to find a lab willing to give me that opportunity.

Gotcha. Gene regulation was actually the field where I did my PhD work as well (specifically looking at the Mga regulon in Streptococcus pyogenes) but I ran screaming away from that. Why government instead of private industry, if you don't mind me being nosy?

[TomJoe]

Gotcha. Gene regulation was actually the field where I did my PhD work as well (specifically looking at the Mga regulon in Streptococcus pyogenes) but I ran screaming away from that. Why government instead of private industry, if you don't mind me being nosy?

From what I have seen in collaborations my boss has set up, government has a greater degree of autonomy than industry, and has less of the bureaucratic bullshit that academia does. I know if you work in government you have less access to grant monies (no ROI grants for government labs afaik), but the funding allotments are decent, and the output expected/year is fair. I don't want to teach a bunch of spoiled medical students, I don't want the project I've spent the past 3 years busting ass on yanked out from underneath me because some science-ignorant investor is not pleased with the bottom line and I'd like to have some semblance of a life outside of the lab. Don't get me wrong, I like working at the bench, I like analyzing my data, I get geeked about my hypotheses ... but damn, I'm tired of working these 7 day weeks, 12-14 hour/day. I know that up in Ames, at the USDA for instance, weekends off are mandatory, unless you make special arrangements to gain access to the buildings on Sat/Sun. Or at least, thats how they were a few years back. I wouldn't mind working in that sort of environment.

I see my boss and his work schedule (he's in the lab as often as I am) and I just can't spend my life doing that. I've worked hard to get my PhD, and I'll work hard to get my job and make my next employer happy and famous, but somewhere along the line ... I need to enjoy my life, start a family and enjoy the fruits of my labor. From what I've been exposed to, I think my best shot at achieving that goal would be by working for the government.

[Brimshack]

It's an author manuscript, not a fortune cookie.

You say that with fortune cookies? I always did it with book titles.

Anyway, Congrats Tom. Taste in pets aside, you're okay by me.

[Roland98]

From what I have seen in collaborations my boss has set up, government has a greater degree of autonomy than industry, and has less of the bureaucratic bullshit that academia does. I know if you work in government you have less access to grant monies (no ROI grants for government labs afaik), but the funding allotments are decent, and the output expected/year is fair. I don't want to teach a bunch of spoiled medical students, I don't want the project I've spent the past 3 years busting ass on yanked out from underneath me because some science-ignorant investor is not pleased with the bottom line and I'd like to have some semblance of a life outside of the lab. Don't get me wrong, I like working at the bench, I like analyzing my data, I get geeked about my hypotheses ... but damn, I'm tired of working these 7 day weeks, 12-14 hour/day. I know that up in Ames, at the USDA for instance, weekends off are mandatory, unless you make special arrangements to gain access to the buildings on Sat/Sun. Or at least, thats how they were a few years back. I wouldn't mind working in that sort of environment.

Huh. I don't know about USDA; most of the people I know who are employed by the government in science are either at NIH or CDC. NIH sounds like it's more insane than general academia, and CDC sounds more laid-back. And I don't know about less of the bullshit, but again, that's just based on friends in those 2 places.

I see my boss and his work schedule (he's in the lab as often as I am) and I just can't spend my life doing that. I've worked hard to get my PhD, and I'll work hard to get my job and make my next employer happy and famous, but somewhere along the line ... I need to enjoy my life, start a family and enjoy the fruits of my labor. From what I've been exposed to, I think my best shot at achieving that goal would be by working for the government.

Just personal antecdotes of course, but I've already got a family and some semblance of a life even after a fairly grueling postdoc, trying to set up a lab, get grants, etc. The difference though between mine and some other science jobs is that it's pretty equally bench work and analysis, so I can split my time between the lab during the day and computer analysis at home after the kids are in bed.