Hi again notme24 –
Alright … this should give you good insight into how research
scientists spend their days. I’ve chosen a variety of types of
scientists so that you could see the similarities and differences
depending on what they actually do. I’ve included a few that are not
exactly what you are looking for but may give you added insight. I’ve
put those last and marked them with asterisks.
Some of these sites break down the days into hour-by-hour increments.
Others are more overviews but should give you a sense of what the
scientists spend their time on.
As I’m sure you understand there will be big differences between how
academic researcher/professors and industrial researchers, spend their
days. Naturally, the professor is going to be spending a great deal of
time in the lecture hall and grading papers and this wouldn’t apply to
an industrial research scientists.
This interview contains one fairly good description of the difference
between how and industrial scientist’s day differs from an academic
scientist’s day:
Interview with Drs. Xiaowei Jin & Zhenzhou Guo, a.k.a. Mr. And Mrs.
Zhenzhou Guo
http://af.ustc.edu/Interviews/jin_guo.html
Here are the rest in no particular order.
A day in the life of a scientist
http://www.malaghan.org.nz/news/scope/sc20b.htm
A day in the laboratory of Professor Basler at the Institute for
Molecular Biology:
http://www.lifescience-zurich.ch/focus/aday-en.asp
A day in the life of Douglas Kerr MD/PhD Attending Neurologist' and
neuroscientist at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in
Baltimore, USA.
http://www.gktscientific.com/2002/feb/pdf/v1i2p2-4.pdf
http://www.gktscientific.com/2002/feb/editorial.asp
A Day in the Life of a Medical Researcher
http://www.hmr.net.au/mr000608.htm
A Day in the Life of an Industrial Researcher
http://recruit.sciencemag.org/feature/cperspec/9906.shl
Re: Could you tell me about working as a research scientist?
Posted By: Michael Benedik, Faculty Biology and Biochemistry,
University of Houston
1. Could you describe "a day in the life of a biochemist?"
http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/mar97/854347113.Bc.r.html
A Day in the Life of a Food Biochemist
http://www.biochemistry.org/education/pdfs/1200.pdf
Day in the life - Principal Scientist for Programme Management
and Information (Biochemistry)
http://www.biochemistry.org/education/pdfs/0899.pdf
A Day in the Life of Kevin O’Driscoll *
Assistant Professor of Molecular Neuro-Oncology and Neurogenetics in
the Department of Neurology and the Division of Pediatric Neurology at
Columbia University and the Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in
the City of New York.
http://users.rcn.com/cac3/dayinkevin.html
*very detailed ..right down to the tooth brushing! :-)
A day in the life of a biomedical scientist
http://www.ibmsscience.org/portrait.htm
A Day In Devi Rathod's Life – Johns Hopkins
“I work in an academic research environment doing medical research in
one lab, and working on both research and laser microscopy development
the other lab…”
http://www.bergen.org/Engineering/Biomedical_Engineering/day_life.html
A Day in the Life of a Clinical Research Associate*
http://www.pharmaceuticaljobs.com/cra_day_in_the_life.html
* this is more related to Clinical Trials
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A YOUNG RESEARCHER*
4 minute online video or transcript
http://www.bbsrc.ac.uk/life/buzz/Welcome.html
* this is a field biologist – little lab work
The website below offers an entire list of “Day in the Life of”
interviews. The information is really brief, but I checked a couple of
their academic ones and found a few useful tidbits. Maybe you want to
take a few minutes and check more of them.
Samples:
TRACY CAMP: “Some days are dedicated to a large task (e.g., writing a
grant proposal); other days are dedicated to a bunch of small tasks
(e.g., create HW assignment, teach, etc.)”
LORRIE FAITH CRANOR: “Working at a research lab, I have a lot of
flexibility about how I organize my day. I usually have a conference
call or a meeting or seminar that I have to plan my day around. Other
than that, I usually spend some time answering email and phone calls.
I try to reserve some time for doing all the many "little things" that
seem to end up on my to-do list, as well as some time for
uninterrupted intensive work on one particular project. But often the
little things end up taking up my entire day.”
ACMC – CROSSROADS – Day in the Life sorted by Jobs
http://www.acm.org/crossroads/dayinlife/job.html
After I researched your question using the “day in the life of”
scenario, I also decided it might be helpful to you if I took a step
back and did some research in the direction of Project Management –
as in work breakdown structures and how much time to researchers allot
for managing different aspects of their projects.
I found very few websites which proved useful in this regard. This
PowerPoint presentation is very high-level, and only applies to Post
Graduate Research Projects, but it does include a chart with the
following:
Typical percent time spent ---
Topic Selection and Proposal 10-15%
Search of Prior research 5-10%
Research and Analysis 50%
Writing, editing, proofing 30%
Research Project Management
http://www.ucalgary.ca/evds/courses/Evds683-13/2002/10
I think the daily logs above should give you a good sense of how these
laboratory scientists spend their days, and also what priorities they
have. I would say, just based on my own quick overview of the
“typical” days that I’ve included here, that a great deal of their
time is spent reading, reviewing, and writing scientific reports. It
is key that researchers keep up with their field and keep others
(inside or outside of their own organization) abreast of what they are
doing. The dissemination of knowledge is vital.
As for an IT approach, obviously data collection, warehousing, and
mining is a huge issue, both for general knowledge and for specific
research data. Scientists must have the latest data at their
fingertips, and of course the means to manipulate it.
Also, project tracking would be an important aspect, especially for
those scientists overseeing multiple projects and large staffs. Many
of these scientists seem to get bogged down in the day-to-day issues
that come up and perhaps would benefit by having better technology to
manage workflow.
Please let me know if anything I’ve said isn’t clear or if any of the
links don’t work, and I’ll be happy to follow up for you.
Thanks for your question!
-K~
search terms
“A day in the life of” –
“Typical day”
combined with:
“bench scientist”
“cell biologist”
scientist
researcher
laboratory
lab
research
biomedical
medical researcher |
