Career Development
Training and advising in the Fringe Lab includes building complementary skills needed to be a successful scientist and access to as many opportunities as possible to help you develop the skills necessary to meet your career goals. In the Fringe Lab, you will be provided opportunities to write grants and review articles, present and speak at conferences, participate in training courses and workshops, mentor students and other researchers, participate in (and develop) outreach activities, etc. Please take advantage of opportunities through the department, college, and Graduate School for professional development. Become a member of one or more professional societies (e.g. American Society for Microbiology, the Geobiology Society, the Ecological Society of America and consistently look for and apply to opportunities for outside funding, and personal and professional development. (See Funding page for some opportunities.)
Scientific Integrity
Never manipulate or selectively exclude/expand data to achieve an expected or desired result. This is falsification and ignorance is not an excuse. Never use text or content from elsewhere in your writing without citing it appropriately.
Lab Notebook and Data Backup
Every experiment must be documented in its entirety including date, time, detailed methods, and every result. If you also have additional notes or calculations, upload a picture to your online notebook. Your notes, records and all tangible research data are property of the university. Ensure your notebook is up to date by the end of every week if not sooner and backup your computer data to dedicated hard drives and MSI weekly. It is imperative for federally funded research that you record your data and findings. Be sure to follow the lab’s data management plan for your project (available in the Fringe Lab’s shared google drive).
Lab Meetings
Participation in group meetings include presenting your own work, leading or contributing to discussions, and providing support for others in the lab. Do your part to create a climate of constructive engagement and mutual respect. Our lab is a team of which you are a member, thus you are expected to attend lab meetings and lab events and to show up for individual meetings on time and prepared. In the event that these expectations cannot be met, it is your responsibility to alert myself and other members of the lab in a timely manner.
Departmental Seminars
Attend the weekly PMB seminar, Tuesdays at 3 pm.
Lab
The lab is a shared and open environment. The Fringe Lab is located in the Biological Sciences Center. We do not have dedicated laboratory technicians responsible for tidying space, stocking supplies or doing dishes. It is the responsibility of each lab member to ensure a safe and clean working environment including washing dishes and to communicate any safety issues. In addition, each lab member is responsible for replacing lab stocks and notifying others when materials or supplies need to be ordered BEFORE the materials are exhausted. Remember, discriminatory behavior or attitudes are not welcome in the lab.
Each and every lab member is responsible for safety in the lab. Use personal protective equipment and if you have questions about how to ensure safety—for instance, proper disposal of waste, what needs to be performed in the fume hood, what is secondary containment—always ask and get an answer before proceeding. There should never be food in the lab, and keep all work areas clean and organized to maintain your safety and the safety of others. Label all chemicals and solutions with their contents, and hazardous or toxic material, and your initials/name and date of preparation and be sure to store each in an appropriate location—ask if you are not sure!
Do You Need Help?
The Fringe Lab is an open environment for constructive feedback and collaboration. However, everyone is responsible for their own learning and development. This responsibility includes commitment to your coursework and research.
If you find yourself stuck, start with Google and primary literature. Adopt the policy of not asking someone else by default if you can figure it out yourself in a few minutes. We respect and value ours and others time while valuing the opportunity to learn something more deeply. Still stuck? Seek advice from your fellow lab-mates — use the lab Slack channel when possible so your peers can answer when their time permits. I am also available to help if needed.
Be knowledgeable of the policies, deadlines, and requirements of the graduate program, the graduate school, and the university. Comply with all institutional policies, including academic program milestones, laboratory practices, and rules related to chemical safety, biosafety, and fieldwork. Be familiar with and meet the deadlines and benchmarks laid out in the Program Handbook.
Feedback and Mentoring
I expect each member of the lab to participate in the mentoring process. We each have strengths and weaknesses, and differing expertise or experience. As a result, each lab member is expected to help out other members of the lab when help is requested, provide constructive feedback and suggestions, and ask for help when necessary.
The lab is collaborative with broad expertise — your peers and I are here to help and provide constructive feedback on writing and presentations. Also be respectful of others time — aim to finish all written projects several weeks in advance of the deadline to allow enough time for feedback and revision.
In general, more senior personnel are expected to take on more responsibility for mentoring but the overall goal is for each of us to know our own strengths and weaknesses and assist others when necessary / beneficial. At the same time, you are responsible for your research goals and are expected to use our time wisely to reach those goals and to respectful others time.
Work Schedules
Our schedules fluctuate between deadlines, coursework, fieldwork, and lab experiments. We each set our own schedules based on what works best for each individual and need not worry about the schedules of other lab members. Some overlap during “regular” work hours (~9 am - 5 pm) may facilitate joint discussions and trouble shooting but is not required. We will work together to establish mutually agreed upon deadlines for each phase of your work during one-on-one meetings. We will set short-term (weekly) goals and longer-term goals (semester / yearly) and adjust as necessary. Regardless of the schedule that works best for you, hard work is required. Balance between work and life is also necessary.
Authorship and Preprints
Barring unusual circumstances, it is my policy that advisees are first-author on all work for which they took the lead on data collection, analyses, and preparation of the initial draft of the manuscript. Authorship arrangements should be discussed at the onset of a project and be re-visited as soon as its apparent that data will result in a publication. In general, authorship arrangements will be discussed primarily between the first author and myself. I expect all students to prepare figures and write the results and interpretation of their data.
BioRxiv, EcoEvoRxiv, EarthaRxiv are free for everyone and posting manuscripts to these servers facilitates feedback from a much wider audience than the typical 2-3 reviewers assigned by a journal. Thus, we will work toward a policy of posting preprints for feedback from the broader community and then submit to a journal for review.
Collaborations
The Fringe Lab members have a range of experiences and expertise and the lab has multiple ongoing projects which include a range of collaborators. While we expect to exchange ideas and provide constructive feedback, each lab member has an individual project and are expected to report the tasks, experiments and analyses for their projects unless we have explicitly discussed otherwise. We are respectful of each lab members time and value their contributions.
If you have identified or would like to identify a potential external collaboration, discuss this with me first. Include me on communications (emails, etc) regarding any lab research (yours or others’).
Training and advising in the Fringe Lab includes building complementary skills needed to be a successful scientist and access to as many opportunities as possible to help you develop the skills necessary to meet your career goals. In the Fringe Lab, you will be provided opportunities to write grants and review articles, present and speak at conferences, participate in training courses and workshops, mentor students and other researchers, participate in (and develop) outreach activities, etc. Please take advantage of opportunities through the department, college, and Graduate School for professional development. Become a member of one or more professional societies (e.g. American Society for Microbiology, the Geobiology Society, the Ecological Society of America and consistently look for and apply to opportunities for outside funding, and personal and professional development. (See Funding page for some opportunities.)
Scientific Integrity
Never manipulate or selectively exclude/expand data to achieve an expected or desired result. This is falsification and ignorance is not an excuse. Never use text or content from elsewhere in your writing without citing it appropriately.
Lab Notebook and Data Backup
Every experiment must be documented in its entirety including date, time, detailed methods, and every result. If you also have additional notes or calculations, upload a picture to your online notebook. Your notes, records and all tangible research data are property of the university. Ensure your notebook is up to date by the end of every week if not sooner and backup your computer data to dedicated hard drives and MSI weekly. It is imperative for federally funded research that you record your data and findings. Be sure to follow the lab’s data management plan for your project (available in the Fringe Lab’s shared google drive).
Lab Meetings
Participation in group meetings include presenting your own work, leading or contributing to discussions, and providing support for others in the lab. Do your part to create a climate of constructive engagement and mutual respect. Our lab is a team of which you are a member, thus you are expected to attend lab meetings and lab events and to show up for individual meetings on time and prepared. In the event that these expectations cannot be met, it is your responsibility to alert myself and other members of the lab in a timely manner.
Departmental Seminars
Attend the weekly PMB seminar, Tuesdays at 3 pm.
Lab
The lab is a shared and open environment. The Fringe Lab is located in the Biological Sciences Center. We do not have dedicated laboratory technicians responsible for tidying space, stocking supplies or doing dishes. It is the responsibility of each lab member to ensure a safe and clean working environment including washing dishes and to communicate any safety issues. In addition, each lab member is responsible for replacing lab stocks and notifying others when materials or supplies need to be ordered BEFORE the materials are exhausted. Remember, discriminatory behavior or attitudes are not welcome in the lab.
Each and every lab member is responsible for safety in the lab. Use personal protective equipment and if you have questions about how to ensure safety—for instance, proper disposal of waste, what needs to be performed in the fume hood, what is secondary containment—always ask and get an answer before proceeding. There should never be food in the lab, and keep all work areas clean and organized to maintain your safety and the safety of others. Label all chemicals and solutions with their contents, and hazardous or toxic material, and your initials/name and date of preparation and be sure to store each in an appropriate location—ask if you are not sure!
Do You Need Help?
The Fringe Lab is an open environment for constructive feedback and collaboration. However, everyone is responsible for their own learning and development. This responsibility includes commitment to your coursework and research.
If you find yourself stuck, start with Google and primary literature. Adopt the policy of not asking someone else by default if you can figure it out yourself in a few minutes. We respect and value ours and others time while valuing the opportunity to learn something more deeply. Still stuck? Seek advice from your fellow lab-mates — use the lab Slack channel when possible so your peers can answer when their time permits. I am also available to help if needed.
Be knowledgeable of the policies, deadlines, and requirements of the graduate program, the graduate school, and the university. Comply with all institutional policies, including academic program milestones, laboratory practices, and rules related to chemical safety, biosafety, and fieldwork. Be familiar with and meet the deadlines and benchmarks laid out in the Program Handbook.
Feedback and Mentoring
I expect each member of the lab to participate in the mentoring process. We each have strengths and weaknesses, and differing expertise or experience. As a result, each lab member is expected to help out other members of the lab when help is requested, provide constructive feedback and suggestions, and ask for help when necessary.
The lab is collaborative with broad expertise — your peers and I are here to help and provide constructive feedback on writing and presentations. Also be respectful of others time — aim to finish all written projects several weeks in advance of the deadline to allow enough time for feedback and revision.
In general, more senior personnel are expected to take on more responsibility for mentoring but the overall goal is for each of us to know our own strengths and weaknesses and assist others when necessary / beneficial. At the same time, you are responsible for your research goals and are expected to use our time wisely to reach those goals and to respectful others time.
Work Schedules
Our schedules fluctuate between deadlines, coursework, fieldwork, and lab experiments. We each set our own schedules based on what works best for each individual and need not worry about the schedules of other lab members. Some overlap during “regular” work hours (~9 am - 5 pm) may facilitate joint discussions and trouble shooting but is not required. We will work together to establish mutually agreed upon deadlines for each phase of your work during one-on-one meetings. We will set short-term (weekly) goals and longer-term goals (semester / yearly) and adjust as necessary. Regardless of the schedule that works best for you, hard work is required. Balance between work and life is also necessary.
Authorship and Preprints
Barring unusual circumstances, it is my policy that advisees are first-author on all work for which they took the lead on data collection, analyses, and preparation of the initial draft of the manuscript. Authorship arrangements should be discussed at the onset of a project and be re-visited as soon as its apparent that data will result in a publication. In general, authorship arrangements will be discussed primarily between the first author and myself. I expect all students to prepare figures and write the results and interpretation of their data.
BioRxiv, EcoEvoRxiv, EarthaRxiv are free for everyone and posting manuscripts to these servers facilitates feedback from a much wider audience than the typical 2-3 reviewers assigned by a journal. Thus, we will work toward a policy of posting preprints for feedback from the broader community and then submit to a journal for review.
Collaborations
The Fringe Lab members have a range of experiences and expertise and the lab has multiple ongoing projects which include a range of collaborators. While we expect to exchange ideas and provide constructive feedback, each lab member has an individual project and are expected to report the tasks, experiments and analyses for their projects unless we have explicitly discussed otherwise. We are respectful of each lab members time and value their contributions.
If you have identified or would like to identify a potential external collaboration, discuss this with me first. Include me on communications (emails, etc) regarding any lab research (yours or others’).