Sticky Wicket
497
Journal of Cell Science
An occasional column, in which
Mole and other characters share
their views on various aspects of
life-science research. Messages
for Mole can be sent to
[email protected].
Any correspondence may be
published in forthcoming issues.
Elephants II – taming the
big guys
It was so cool. We were at a meeting in South
Africa, and some of us took a trip in the rain to an
elephant rescue reserve. Elephants live a long
time, and once raised in captivity have to remain
in captivity. These beautiful beasts were gentle
as we interacted with them. They were huge,
very muddy, and, well, strange, and I loved
them in part because they were not the least
interested in eating me. Professor Possum (or
Opossum?) was positively dancing as she led
four of them in a magnificent line. We all were.
Dancing, that is. Rapture.
For those of you who are just joining us, we
were talking about one of the most exciting,
terrifying, and difficult events we face in our
careers in biomedical research – the move to an
independent position: the building of our first
laboratory and our first research program. I
suggested that success at this all-important
junction requires something arcane and
seemingly impossible – to produce research that
will attract the attention of the scientific
community. In short, the terribly important and
utterly unfair need to be astonishing. We never
talked about elephants. We will, but not yet.
I need to clarify what I mean by this. Of
course, we all know that the first goal of a new
investigator is to get something to work, and by
far the most expedient way to accomplish this is
to continue doing what you know best – the
research you had been doing in your previous
incarnations as a Mole-let. Presumably, this is
why you were hired into your shiny new
position. So, by all means, start on those things
you know, and publish whatever you can.
Getting some papers out is a first priority, and if
you can develop some nice collaborations with
your new colleagues, this is not only a bonus but
an excellent way to forge ahead. It will help you
build your lab, troubleshoot your systems, and
show your independent research skills. And you
will publish, which is essential.
But if you stay on this path, you will probably
disappear. Unless your work has opened up
fundamentally new areas of research that are
already drawing attention (and excitement) to
your program, carrying on in this vein is a recipe
for slow death by neglect. Think about it – you
got into this work because other folks were
already doing it and you thought it was cool. But
other folks are doing it. So you tucked in and
eked out a little corner of the field for yourself,
and managed to publish some nice work. But
Journal of Cell Science
498
Journal of Cell Science 123 (4)
unless you can open up that corner into much
more, you will be trapped in it, and each new
little thing you find will probably garner less and
less attention.
So what can you do? Here’s the thing. While
you are dealing with designing experiments and
fixing problems, advising students and directing
your technician, juggling budgets, teaching
classes, sitting on committees and trying to find
time to write some papers, you have to do
something else (in all your free time – what, you
wanted to sleep?). You have to think. You have
to come up with something different and cool.
And then you have to sneak in experiments here
and there (or only experimental groups) into
your research plans.
Different and cool? Oh come on, Mole, what
in the world is that supposed to mean? But if you
step back, you already know. Every time you
look at the Table of Contents of a journal,
especially the ones with soft pages or really
shiny ones, you see things that are cool. These
are the ones you read, especially if they are a
bit outside your field. Now we just have to
figure out how to get you on track so that
you get research going that will produce cool
things.
This, finally, is where the elephants come in.
Great hulking, gentle beasts that are just waiting
for your touch. And they are all around us, if we
can just see them. Most of us don’t, though. We
are just too busy with everything else we have to
do, and it is so much easier to keep our heads
down.
The elephants are the big questions, those
things that we all know are important. And many
of the elephants are already surrounded by the
blind, wise scholars who are feeling the trunk
and legs and ears and sides of each one, hoping
that they are all touching the same elephant. But
you don’t want to squeeze into this throng of
groping intellectuals. What you want is an
elephant who, while not standing alone, has only
a few folks touching the tail.
Yes, you have to spend some time thinking
about the elephants, the big questions, but how
will you find the one that is right for you? Here
are some of the features of your own personal
elephant, the one that can take you well into your
successful independent career.
First, it has to really be an elephant. Try this.
Find someone who is not a biomedical scientist,
and ask them. Really (or you can just imagine
asking such a person if you don’t know any). If
you can’t explain to them why the question isn’t
important, then it isn’t an elephant. Hint: ‘Does
protein X participate in microtubule assembly?’
is not an elephant. ‘How do cells control their
shape?’ might just be.
Next, you have to check out who is groping
the elephant, and how. Many elephants are
already very tame (these probably include those
you have worked on all this time) – easy to put
your hand on, but very difficult to lead because
so many folks are pulling on it in different
directions. But others are only being tapped,
using outdated techniques and hand-waving
conceptions. These are often the ones that your
senior colleagues will warn you off – important
fields that are so poorly researched that we see
them as dangerous, wild beasts that are best
avoided. But maybe you have a new approach,
and with a steady hand you can tame it. That
might be an elephant worth getting to know.
Then there are the elephant graveyards, where
the elephants that have been around forever and
are so well studied that we suspect they are
dying. But there are surprises here. If the
elephant has not been looked at for years, maybe
the application of some new approaches can
revive it, and brilliantly. Elephants live a long
time, and have very long memories.
You have a special way that you look at
biology. You have a deep interest in not only
your own area, but in all things scientific-y, or
you wouldn’t be doing this (right?). You know
what the elephants are, but maybe you’ve been
looking down so long (or at only one) that it has
been a while since you thought about them. Do
you need some examples? How nutrients turn
into energy and living matter. Why we sleep.
How different living things compete and survive
and change in the process. How information
flows from the environment and through an
organism. How molecules, cells, tissues and
organs assemble to make new organisms that
usually work, and why they sometimes don’t.
Now think of more.
You are, or will be, an independent scientist.
Go find an elephant, tame it, and show it to the
rest of us. We’ll notice. It isn’t easy, and you will
probably go through a lot of elephants before
you find one that you can make friends with.
And then we’ll want to be your friend.
Peanut, anyone?
Mole
Journal of Cell Science 123, 497-498
© 2010. Published by The Company of Biologists Ltd
doi:10.1242/jcs067058