How to Be a Scientist

Gina Kolata

Ask most people—even students majoring in science—to describe the typical life of a successful scientist, and chances are they will describe a dedicated existence: long hours in the laboratory, toiling alone among racks of test tubes and beakers.

But researchers say that nothing could be further from the truth. Indeed, they say, the irony is that to succeed in science, most people have to leave the lab completely. Leading biologists and chemists say they spend no time in the laboratory. Instead they write grant proposals, travel and give talks on their group's research; they think up ideas for their staff of graduate students and postdoctoral fellows to work on, and try their best to motivate and encourage staff members to be creative and productive.

Dr. Shirley, Tilghman, a molecular biologist at Princeton University, says that most people have no idea of the skills needed to succeed in science. "I get these undergraduates in my office saying they are trying to decide between medicine and science," Dr. Tilghman said. "They say, 'I really want to go into medicine because I want to be involved with people.' I just say, 'My God.' The extraordinary thing about being a principal scientific investigator is that I should have been a psychology major. I do nothing but try to motivate people, try to figure out why they're not working hard. Most of biology is a profession where success depends to a large extent on how you work with people."

Some researchers say that the most valuable course work for scientists may not even be science.

Dr. Ponzy Lu, a chemist at the University of Pennsylvania, says his worst memories of his days as an undergraduate at the California Institute of Technology were the humanities courses he and every other science major were forced to take. "We had to write 500 to 1,000 words a week in essays," Dr. Lu said. "I wasn't good at that kind of stuff."

But as soon as he became a successful scientist, Dr. Lu said he found that rather than puttering around the laboratory conducting experiments, he had to spend his time writing grant proposals, meeting deadlines. Dr. Lu said, writing "is about all I do." And the dreaded essay writing at Cal Tech was "the most useful thing I learned."

Some scientists are delighted to leave the laboratory and find that they can finally shine when they are judged by their ideas and their administrative skills. Yet even people who feel this way are often loath to admit it, Dr. Lu said, because it is part of the mystique of science to say you love the lab. "It's like Jimmy Carter saying he lusted after women," Dr. Lu said. "You can get in a lot of trouble saying things like that."

But no matter what they think of laboratory work, most researchers say that it was not until they were in graduate school, well on their way to becoming scientists, that they realized what the career path actually is.

Dr. Kenneth Gross, a molecular geneticist at Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, N.Y., remembers well his epiphany. It happened when he was a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. One day, Dr. Gross was working happily in the lab next to a postdoctoral fellow, Dr. Arthur Skoultchi, who is now at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Full of enthusiasm, Dr. Gross said, he remarked that "the most incredible thing is that they paid you to work in a lab." Dr. Skoultchi, he said, replied, "Enjoy it while you can," and explained to Dr. Gross what lay ahead.

Young scientists move up the ladder from graduate student to postdoctoral fellow to assistant professor to, they hope, recipient; of a federal grant. From then on, their time in the lab rapidly dwindles to nothing.

Dr. Lu explained that it was not so surprising that most successful scientists ended up as thinkers rather than doers. "That's the whole problem with big science," he said. "You have to have an army of people to do the work." But, he added, "Part of what makes a person become a scientist is the desire for influence and power. And the only way you can have that is to have a group of people working on your ideas."

A typical research group at a leading university has about a dozen people, paid for mainly by grant money either from the federal government, private groups like the American Cancer Society or companies, that the principal investigator raises. Dr. Lu said that although his salary is paid by the university, he must bring in $300,000 a year to run his lab. This includes paying for equipment and paying the budding scientists who perform the experiments. Graduate students earn about $12,000 a year, some of which, is paid by fellowships; the rest comes from grant money. Postdoctoral fellows receive about $20,000 a year.

Some scientists run huge groups that have budgets equal to those of small corporations. Dr. Jerome Groopman, an AIDS researcher at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, said his group of about 50 people had an operating budget of $2 million a year.

"It's clearly a major problem for a lot of people," said Dr. Tom Maniatis, a molecular biologist at Harvard. "Nowhere in your education are you trained to be a manager or administrator. Suddenly you are faced with writing grants and keeping track of spending. But the most difficult challenge is managing people. I don't think scientists are prepared to do that at all."

From The New York Times, April 4, 1993.