This page compiles helpful links on a variety of topics related to being a scientist in my field or related fields. It is designed to be a go-to reference for myself and students for resources.
General
- Things a Scientist is Supposed to Know by Philipp Bayer
- Readings on Diversity in Science
- Chaos in the Brickyard by Bernard Forscher (Science), a classic essay on the process of science
- Free and low cost resources for graduate students, postdocs, and early career researchers (or really anyone else) by Jaclyn Siegel
- Building a Better Fieldwork Future - Workshops and resources on preventing sexual harassment and assault in field settings
- A Dialectical Future for Behavioral (and Evolutionary) Ecology by Amika Kamath - Presentation on bringing new ideas into science (also, see other posts on the blog!)
Being a Student
- How to Grad School While Poor by Karra Shimabukuro
- First Gen Grads blog by John Kincaid
- Ten Simple Rules for Graduate Students by Jenny Gu & Philip Bourne
- Ten Simple Rules for Finishing Your PhD by Jacopo Marino et al.
- Twenty things I wish I’d known when I started my PhD by Lucy Taylor
- Links and tips for Graduate Student Success by Danielle D. Crain
- 2 page PhD proposal template by Richard McElreath
Undergraduate Research
- Some modest and practical advice for undergraduate researchers by Vikram Chhatre
- Ten simple rules to make the most out of your undergraduate research career by Megan Yu & Yu-Min Kuo
Finding and Applying for Graduate School
- Demystifying the Graduate School Application Process by Estien et al.
- Graduate School Application Cheat Sheet (Hints and tips for the PhD application process) by Field Guides program at University of Minnesota
- Evolution & Ecology Graduate School Preview (Guide to Applying to Graduate EEB Programs) by UC Davis Population Biology graduate Group
- How to Select a PhD Lab by Sophien Kamoun
- Bio/Biomedical Graduate Programs Dropping GRE Requirement compiled by Joshua Hall
- Funded Organismal Biology MS Programs compiled by Stacy Farina
- Applying to a PhD program in the US as an international student by Rafael Marcondes (written for students interested in evolutionary biology)
- A guide for applying to graduate school in Biology by German Lab
- How to Apply for Grad School (and questions to ask before graduate school) by Danielle D Crain
How to read a scientific paper
- Infographic: How to read a scientific paper by Natalia Rodriguez
- How to read a scientific paper by the American Society of Plant Biologists
- How to read and understand a scientific paper: a guide for non-scientists by Jennifer Raff
- Ten simple rules for reading a scientific paper by Maureen A. Carey, Kevin L. Steiner, William A. Petri Jr
- PRINT YOUR OWN: Journal article notebook by Christine Liu (a printable notebook template for taking notes on papers)
Impostor Syndrome
- The importance of stupidity in scientific research by Martin Schwartz (Journal of Cell Science)
- "Unmasking the Impostor" by Karen Kaplan (Nature)
Conferences
Writing and Presenting
Scientific Writing
- Research to Publication (Reading Materials) by Julie Libarkin, covers writing, ethics, authorship, journal selection, and more
- Five common writing mistakes new scientists make by Jacquelyn Gill
- How to construct a Nature summary paragraph (or any abstract)
- Ten Simple Rules for Getting Published by Philip Bourne
- Ten Simple Rules for Writing Research Papers by Weixiong Zhang
- Ten Simple (Empirical) Rules for Writing Science by Cody Weinberger et al.
- Ten simple rules for structuring papers by Brett Mensh and Konrad Kording
- Journal/Author Name Estimator (a tool that helps find a journal that fits your abstract)
Telling the Story
- "How to write/present science: BABY-WEREWOLF-SILVER BULLET" by Andrew Hendry (Eco-Evo Evo-Eco)
- "The And, But, Therefore of Storytelling" by Randy Olson, TEDMED 2013 (YouTube)
Grant-writing
- Open Grants
- Jabberwocky – A list of publicly available grants
- What to Include in a Program Officer E-mail
- Suggested information to include in an initial email to a Program Officer
- What to Say—and Not Say—to Program Officers by Michael J. Spires
Presentations
- Ten Simple Rules for Making Good Oral Presentations by Philip Bourne
- Ten simple rules for short and swift presentations by Christopher Lortie
- Ten Simple Rules for a Good Poster Presentation by Thomas Erren & Philip Bourne
Data Visualization
- Fundamentals of Data Visualization by Claus Wilke (online book)
- Ten Simple Rules for Better Figures by Nicolas Rougier et al.
Peer Review
Being a Peer Reviewer
- Ten Simple Rules for Reviewers by Philip Bourne & Alon Korngreen
- How to be a reviewer/editor by Andrew Hendry (Eco-Evo Evo-Eco)
- A Guide to Peer Review in Ecology and Evolution by the British Ecological Society
Responding to Peer Review
- Ten simple rules for writing a response to reviewers by William Noble
- How not to respond to reviewers – even if it is Reviewer #3 by Simon Leather
Curating an online presence
- ORCID
- The Ins and Outs of a Professional Academic Website (Guest Post) by Roger Whitson
- The Benefits of Twitter for Scientists by David Shiffman
Genetics, Bioinformatics, and Analysis
Statistics
- Handbook of Biological Statistics by John McDonald
- Pathway Guide to Statistics for Gene Set Enrichment Analysis
Introduction to Bioinformatics
- Ten simple rules for biologists learning to program by Maureen Carey and Jason Papin
- So you want to be a computational biologist? by Nick Loman & Mick Watson
- My opinionated selection of books/urls for bioinformatics/data science curriculum by Ming Tang
- Harvard Informatics: Learning Bioinformatics at Home
- Aggie Tutorial farm
- Bioinformatics Workbook: A tutorial to help scientists design their projects and analyze their data
Setting up a new machine and useful software
- Macbook Pro Installation by Andrew Severin (Installing GNU version tools and R is useful!)
- Setting up WSL Bash on Windows 10 by Anil Chalisey
- Setting up your computer for bioinformatics/biostatistics and a compedium of resources by Leonardo Collado-Torres
- UCSC Genome Browser and Blat application binaries
Basics of Bioinformatics
- Happy Belly Bioinformatics by Mike Lee (has Unix and R tutorials)
- UNIX/LINUX Tutorial for Beginners
- sandbox.bio (learn Unix and bioinformatics in an interactive Unix emulator)
- Introduction to text manipulation on UNIX-based systems by Brad Yoes
- Unix, R and python tools for genomics and data science by Ming Tang
Genetics and Phylogenetics
- Evolutionary Genetics: Concepts, Analysis & Practice (Online Textbook) by Mark Ravinet & Glenn-Peter Sætre Oslo
- Specifying substitution models in mrbayes by Brant Faircloth
R
- RStudio cheat sheets (Check out the base R one!)
- Learn R with Swirl (Interactive R lessons within R): Install the R Programming course for good first basic lessons!
- Awesome R Learning Resources (a link list with books for R)
- Learning R Resources by Josclein Rocha (links marked by Beginner, Intermediate, or Advanced)
- R for Cats (An intro to R for new programmers) by Scott Chamberlain (Includes introduction to using R to get data from the web)
- R Beginner Tutorial via Happy Belly Bioinformatics by Mike Lee
- R for Data Science by Garrett Grolemund & Hadley Wickham
- Getting Started With R When You Know Absolutely Nothing by Moin Syed
- Phylogenetics, Especially Comparative Methods available in R by Brian O'Meara
- phytools blog by Liam Revell
Genomics
Teaching
Interviewing
Postdocs and jobs
- ecology, evolution, & quantitative postdoc fellowship opportunities
- Unwritten rules of applying for postdocs by B. Duygu Özpolat
- Applying to a job in the U.S. Federal Government with a graduate degree by Shawn Taylor
- Recommended Reading for Career Options for PhDs by Jennifer Polk
- Tenure Track Faculty Job Interview Questions
Info for Faculty
- Faculty Resource Guide to Recruiting to improve Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Justice, and Anti-Racism by UMass Amherst
- How to write a letter of recommendation by Michael Ernst
- Tips for writing strong letters of recommendation
- How I write tenure and promotion letters by Jeremy Fox (Dynamic Ecology)
- How to interview prospective graduate students by Joan E. Strassmann