Starting New Research Programs and Building Collaborations Prof. Michael Wysession Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences Washington University in St. Louis St. Louis, Missouri 63130 USA Cutting Edge Early Career Workshop Washington, DC July-Aug, 2013
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Starting New Research
Programs and Building
Collaborations
Prof. Michael WysessionDepartment of Earth and Planetary SciencesWashington University in St. LouisSt. Louis, Missouri 63130USA
Cutting Edge Early Career Workshop
Washington, DC
July-Aug, 2013
Relevant Professional Service:
• Editor of Geophysical
Journals
• NSF Panel Reviewer
Research theme:______________________
Topic A:
New or Continuing
Available Resources: Needed Resources:
Plans for obtaining facilities or instruments
Stage 1: Development
Stage 2: Implementation
Stage 3: Dissemination
Plans for recruiting students and
collaborators
Writing ProposalsBeginning Field Work or
Setting Up LaboratoryConducting Research
Initial Presentations
Student Projects
Formal PublicationsWeb Sites
Independent Studies
Honors & M.S. Theses
Ph.D. Dissertations
New
Research
Ideas?
Creating a Strategic Plan
for Research
What to do if not funded?
Build a Portfolio of Grants
1. Mixture of types
• Federal vs. private foundations vs. industry
• Instrumentation (do as a research “group”?)
• Student support
• Collaborations (etc.)2. Use smaller grants to
• Build your experience & capabilities
• Collect preliminary data
• Build confidence/credibility in your capabilities
• (Typical award size of a „new investigator‟ project is not as large as that of veterans, but may have higher success rate)
3. Set realistic goals for # & type of proposal submission. Think about what you NEED to run your lab/research
Choose a Project Carefully
1. Make sure that your topic is of broad importance Don‟t choose a topic that is so narrowly defined that
it is only of interest to you2. “More of the same” doesn‟t sound very fund-worthy3. It takes as much time to do research on a problem of
low importance/interest as one that is of high interest/importance (your time is limited!!)
4. However, don‟t aim too big; don‟t claim to answer questions that your experiments/models could never actually resolve. The topic needs to be solvable given your
experience/capabilities/expertise
Choose a Project Carefully
5. Do your research to find out what is being done in this field (it is embarrassing to write a proposal for something that someone else is already doing or has done!)
6. Go to meetings to see the latest work and who the major players in the field are (This also helps to inform your Bibliography!)
7. Cultivate interesting and important ideas • Collect ideas (keep a Notes page open)• Allow TIME for choosing research topics, winnowing
and sorting, revision and improvement (START EARLY!)