Five Things to Make Your Collaboration Go Smoothly

Communication matters. We all know it. Good communication is the number-one skill people will ask from you, but it is also a vague term. (I sometimes think a person who demands good communication skills from others is someone who needs to learn communication skills themselves.)

We are scientists, so we need definitions. Here, let’s define “communication skills” in scientific collaboration as the organizing skill to provide information that your collaborators need.

(If you are an experimentalist, you will most likely collaborate with researchers who do measurements or calculations for you.)

As with labeling your samples, you need to provide clear, easy-to-understand notes about your samples for your collaborators.

Sample notes should include

 

example of a note 

1. Your Name and Date

Your collaborator(s) might have a lot of samples from other collaborators. You must put your name and date in the note to avoid mix-ups. The golden rule is to not assume it’s obvious. If you label and take notes well, your collaborator(s) might have better recall of your sample, even after many years.

2. Sample Information and Photo

Thanks to modern technology, it is easy to take a photo of your samples. Including a photo will help your collaborator(s) know what is what. With the photo, include a detailed note of the sample to explain what the photo and sample entail.

Receipt of FedEx is also good to share
with the tracking number

3. Label Samples

Proper sample labels mean everything when you’re working with others. The label should contain your name and sample name.

4. Tasks You’re Asking Collaborator(s) To Help With

You need to specify any measurements or calculations you need from your collaborator(s). If you don’t know the standard measurements or calculations and what they’re referred to as, check with papers reporting similar measurements/calculations. Use them as an example.

5. Related Data

Include any related data that are necessary for the collaborator(s) to complete the request.

Including these data will help your collaborators keep track of your notes and samples and to perform the requested tasks. Proper communication matters, and that includes written communication with your samples.

Good luck researching with others!

Six Tasks to Get Good Information for Your Successful Research

Information is the key to your success!

It sounds like a quote by an entrepreneur or somebody in Wall Street, but I believe it is true to academia.  When it comes to academic research, “the less you know, the better” is not correct. (Somebody who said it "to pursue his/her own originality" most likely is just lazy.) The more you read, the better to improve your skill to see your research in the third-person perspective. And you can know what is new and what is known.  That is how you claim a novelty.  Over the past years, for my own research, I have read 1000 papers per year on average.

But you just started your research in the lab, so you may wonder, for example, what to read and how to organize them. Actually, it is important skills that you want to cultivate in your Ph.D. course.  The goal is to be comfortable enough with research that you can find research as easily as searching for your favorite video on YouTube. (I know it is sometimes difficult though!)

Tools to use

Search engine: Google Scholar (free), Web of Science (free on campus), SciFinder (free on campus)

Paper organizing: ReadCube (paid), Mendeley (free)

Exercise (for example, gold nanocrystals)

Task 1: Find top-five cited papers about gold nanocrystal papers

Task 2: Find top-five cited papers but not review paper about gold nanocrystal papers

Task 3: Find top-five cited papers published after 2013

Task 4: Find top-five cited papers published after 2005 about gold nanocrystal in oil (not in water) phase

Task 5: Find famous researchers in the gold nanocrystal synthesis field

Task 6: Save all papers and organize using Mendeley

Good luck orienting yourself with research!

7 Classic Papers on High-pressure Nanochemistry

People in academia are like my perovskite nanocrystals. You feel pressure from graduation, pressure from your boss, pressure from your families, or pressure from your peers. But believe me, you will shine brighter after the pressure cycle was over, just like my perovskite nanocrystals got brighter after the pressure process.  (This is my favorite joke before I present my research Nagaoka. Y. Chen, O et al Adv. Mater, 2017 29 1606666)

If you research high-pressure nanochemistry, there are a lot of jokes you are entitled to say. Of course, high-pressure nanochemistry is a pretty interesting research subject. "High-pressure nanochemistry" I mention here refers to a subject to deal with physical and chemical property changes under 1-15GPa typically using diamond anvil cells. 

The research community may not be as big as such as, for example, nanocrystal synthesis in general and perovskite materials, but there are some papers you should study before you conduct your experiments. More importantly, if you are familiar with high-pressure nanochemistry, you may relate your research with some research in physics or geology.

High-pressure nanochemistry classic papers to study as the start of your own studies

High-pressure chemistry in general: Grochala, W.; Hoffmann, R.; Ashcroft, N. Q. et al. Angewandte 2007, 46, 3620.

Atomic crystal phase transition: Tolbert S, Alivisatos A.P. Science 1994 265 373. Tolbert S, Alivisatos A.P. J. Chem. Phys. 1995, 102,4642. Chen, C. C., Alivisatos A.P. Science 1997, 276,398

Superlattices change under high pressure: Wu H., Fan H. et al. Angewandte 2010, 49, 8431. Wang. Z et al. J. Am. Chem. Soc., 2011, 133,14484. Podsiadlo P., Shevchenko E. et al. Nano Lett, 2011, 11, 579, 

Enjoy researching under high-pressure!