So you've reached a point in your career
where you're finally ready to achieve research
independence. You decided to stay in academia
and move up the ladder to become a PI. Now it's time to
take action and build your career. But wait! You're not entirely
confident about your research focus. How do you decide?
For senior postdocs who want to establish their own labs, selecting a research
topic is the first challenge. New PIs may also need to come up with new topics or
ideas in order to apply for additional funding through the early stages of their career.
As trivial as it may sound, finding a good scientific problem may not be that easy. Maybe you really
like a topic, but find it's unlikely to be fundable. Or you want to apply a methodology in which you've
become skilled, but you don't know where to apply it. You may even have a head start in a field, but you
discover you'll be competing with bigger teams or even with your former boss.
So, how do you choose a research topic?
Here are a few questions to ask yourself to help you make a decision:
What do I like?
What do I know?
What is feasible?
What is fundable?
We'll explore how the PIs thought about each question.
Decide on the
focus of your
research
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