What are the most important factors evaluated when applying for Phd position?

The answer is, as usual, "it depends". JeffE provides a perspective for a top US research university (Research, research, research, recommendation letters, research, baked beans, and research.). In my lab (small-but-good swiss university) PhD admission certainly works a bit differently.

First a bit of context: our lab usually consists of less than ten members, 2 of which are professors and one to two more being postdocs. We select our PhD students ourselves (there is no department or faculty-level hiring). Hence, PhD student selection is not something we do all the time.

Generally, the single most important factor for hiring for us is whether we already know the candidate. Broadly, potential students come in four tiers:

Tier 1: students that we personally know to be good, for instance because they have done courses or their thesis with us. This means that we mostly hire from our own university, but as I only moved recently from a different university, we currently also like to hire from my old institution. Generally, if you know somebody in the lab (even other PhD students) and the other person vouches for your qualities, you are almost certainly in.
Tier 2: students that people that we know know. If we need a position filled but don't have a strong internal candidate at the ready, we reach out to our personal networks. Usually, we don't cast the net particularly wide -- the recommendation of a professor that I met once at a conference likely isn't enough. We mostly contact personal friends and close collaborators here.
Tier 3: students that applied because of a job announcement we put out. We generally only do that (putting out job announcements) if we really  need a position filled and we could not find somebody in our network. In most cases, my lab head is more ready to leave a position unfilled than hire somebody that does not come with a strong recommendation.
Tier 4: students that applied with a cold email. As far as I know, we have literally never hired somebody that applied cold.

Which of those "tiers" you fall in is the single most important factor that leads to whether you will be hired or not. In the rare case that we have multiple students that come with strong personal recommendations, and we cannot hire all, we usually select roughly following these criteria (roughly in order of importance):

Research experience. A master is a prerequisite for PhD studies in my current country. However, most master students don't publish. If you did, it is certainly perceived very positively as long as the paper is at least ok. (publishing in predatory journals or other really bad venues might be perceived negatively actually)
Relevant industrial experience. We do research on software engineering, so if you worked as a software engineer before, this will be perceived positively. However, note the "relevant" here. Standard internships or jobs may not help much (most have done those at some point) -- it needs to be something that we think will clearly give you better insight into our area of research.
Technical skills. We don't expect future students to know how to do research yet, but we expect a strong programming background and fluency in standard tooling.
Perceived compatibility with the team. Finally, we also typically consider whether a student is a good fit for our lab culture.

The last two bullets are typically assessed in interviews. We generally interview candidates via Skype beforehand, and (when we are almost certain we are going to hire a student), we also fly her/him in to give a talk in our group and spend some time with us beforehand. (both things we only do for Tier 2 - 4 candidates)

We don't ask for letters of recommendation (of people we do not know), research statements, statements of motivation, or anything like that. Neither do we look at previous grades (except maybe in a corner case, but to the best of my knowledge it has not happened yet).


When do journal invitations for computer science conferences typically come out?

In my experience, this varies widely, even for different iterations of the same confernence.  Sometimes invitations go out two months before the conference; other times they go out two months after the conference.

Write the PC chair and ask.  Unless you have good reason to believe your paper is likely to be invited (based on the reviews or other feedback, not just your own personal opinion), you should probably ask when and how papers will be selected, not whether your paper is being invited.


There are many assumptions bundled up in your question which I think need to be addressed.
Firstly, a bachelor's thesis and a research paper in physics are very different, in almost every aspect (content, length, aim, purpose, style etc). It is perfectly possible to write a bachelor's thesis on a topic and then rewrite part of it as a paper that you then submit to a journal for peer review and publication, and it is also possible to incorporate the findings of a published paper in a bachelor's thesis. However, I do not know of any journal (in physics at least) that would simply publish a bachelor's thesis as it is.
Secondly, it is extremely rare for a bachelor's thesis to contain actual novel research. In some countries, it's rare for a Master's thesis to contain novel research. The main purpose of a bachelor's thesis is to give the student a chance to develop their literature review and writing skills. Typically you would write about the history of a certain topic in physics, and perhaps discuss some recent findings or developments. In my bachelor's thesis, I wrote about Noether's theorem, describing its history, showing a couple of basic proofs and talking about how the theorem can be applied to orbital mechanics. Obviously I am not Emmy Noether; none of this was my own original research.
Thirdly, I expect you will find it extremely difficult to progress without supervision. You mentioned that you have contacted various professors. Are they all at your university? Have you tried contacting professors at other universities to see if they would supervise you remotely? And have you considered contacting PhD students or postdocs instead of professors? They may have more time to devote to you and could possibly provide more hands-on supervision.
If you do write a thesis but your university does not offer it as an official part of your degree (i.e. it will not appear on your transcript in any way), then the best "proof" that I can think of would be to show the finished thesis to whichever of your professors you are closest to (do you have a personal tutor or equivalent?) and ask them to mention it when they write reference letters for you. That way you have their word as well as your own that it is your work.
Alternatively you could consider posting it on your own website, or putting it on arXiv as a preprint. I would think carefully about the latter option, however, as you cannot delete things from arXiv and, as your personal standards improve and you move on to more in-depth research, you may not want your bachelor's thesis to remain public five, ten or twenty years down the line.
Edited to address the new details provided:
It sounds like you have some ideas for a research paper and you want to publish it when you have finished it. Your professor told you that it's better to publish your paper in a journal rather than on arXiv, which is true. ArXiv is a preprint server and does not provide peer review, unlike a journal.
Submitting your paper for publication is fairly easy. Firstly you need to identify an appropriate journal for your submission. I'd suggest asking your professor for advice on this, but it sounds like they are not the most helpful. A good way to decide on a journal is to look at the papers you cite in your paper and the journals those are published in.
Be aware that journals have different standards for submission and for some journals, it is common to receive a "desk rejection" i.e. your paper is rejected by the editor before going out for peer review, either because the editor thinks your paper does not fit within the topic of that journal, or because it is insufficiently novel or otherwise of low quality.
Once you have identified a suitable journal, navigate to the website of that journal. There will be an obvious link to click called "submit" or something similar. Click that link and follow the instructions given. Then, if you do not receive a desk rejection, you will have to wait (perhaps a month or two) to get the referee report. You may have to make corrections or alterations to your paper based on the referee report. If you do that satisfactorily, your paper will be accepted and published in the journal.
In physics, it is typical to upload a copy of your paper to arXiv. In my subfield, it's common to post to arXiv, wait a couple of days for the inevitable "you didn't cite me" emails, then submit to the journal. Once the paper has been published, you can then update the version on arXiv. You can check the arXiv help page for information on how to get endorsed: https://arxiv.org/help/endorsement.


In-press article, what happens if I don't pay the fee

Can anybody recommend me what to do?

Apologize and retract the paper.

What happens if I don't pay the fee?

Your paper will not be published by this journal.

Will it affect my chances of future publications in other journals of the same publisher?

Probably not.  I doubt they track this behavior.  Many of Elsevier's journals are edited independently, and will not care about a mistake made in a different journal.


Authors in proceeding are dominated by one university

Conference reputation is essentially the experiences of the people who have attended the conference.  You have established that only a narrow group of people have attended.  So you know that the conference has an exceptionally narrow reputation.
I would not attend such a conference.
Proceedings for conferences during the COVID-19 pandemic should be disregarded as atypical.


Let me suggest something other than imposter syndrome and that if any such tools exist they probably won't help you.

One common reaction to completing a major piece of work is letdown since your life now seems empty. What was filled with work and the expectation of success now is filled with a big blank.

Another possible aspect is fear of the unknown. You have put something out there, hoping for wide acceptance, but it hasn't yet come, not having time enough yet to be really seen.

But, the reviewers thought enough of the work to recommend its appearance and the editor(s) agreed. So you do have a bit of evidence that you haven't failed.

And even if it can't be reproduced, it needn't be the end of your career if you have done due diligence in your research.

The cure, is easy, actually. (Well, maybe hard.) Just go back to work. Talk to any collaborators and come up with some ideas that might be developed into the next big piece of your career. Then, just get it done. Simple.


How to highlight original work in a talk where it is not expected?

First, make sure that you are referencing the works of others that you build upon. This way, the audience should be able to easily distinguish the results that belong to you vs. the results that belong to others.

For a published work of yours, I'd prefer a Carter, 2017 citation, including the name of the journal or a conference, and some of the following: name of the article, DOI, link or issue and page number.

For an unpublished work of yours, I'd use an own work or own data notice. This way, you do not make a false impression that this work is already published. Your audience will possibly infer that these data are fresh from the lab bench. If I were to attend your talk, I'd pay more attention to these data, because these are ones I wouldn't be able to found in the literature (yet).

For an unpublished joint work, still use an own work notice, but add in collaboration with X, University of Y to give credit both to you and the other person.


Is there something like a "peer-review paper"?

Depending on whether you want to leave short comments on papers you weren't invited to review or make public full reviews of papers that you were, you might look at http://www.pubpeer.com and http://www.publons.com respectively.


Will having multiple published work in well-established journals increase my chances for acceptance to a master's program?

Yes! It shows you have experience with (and are good at) writing and research. It would be even better if you could get a letter of recommendation from someone you worked with on these research works.


How to include showcased work at a conference in a resume?

I assume that your showcased work was not published in the conference proceedings either online or offline.

If you did not receive any written acknowledgement about this showcased work in the form of a certificate, then it is not wise to write this in CV. There are many activities we do while studying, but not all go to CV.

If you have any proof for the same (in the form of a certificate), you could add the following information into your CV:

(Author, Year, Title, Conf, Venue) e.g.

Lastname1, Firstname1, Lastname2, Firstname2, (2018) "A demonstration on the XYZ Game," in International Conference on Funny Games (ICFG), January 22-23, University of ABCD, Country. [Showcased work, unpublished]


Can I add a link to my ORCID Id in the statement of purpose?

Your ORCID would be better off placed on your CV, either next to or below your name. You can certainly cite your published paper in your statement of purpose, if it is relevant to the work you want to pursue in your PhD. You should also list your publications on your CV. It might be worth looking at the websites of a few professors in your field, to find examples of how they structure and format their CVs.


Although you can split a paper in two, it is often not the best choice, known as salami publication.

There are, of course, papers revisiting a certain topic, sometimes tens or hundreds years after the first publication. Revisiting a topic is not the same, as simply splitting a paper in two. There is no specific structure for a revisiting paper - the term refers to its relation with previous research only.

In academic publishing, we call a revised paper a version of the manuscript which underwent a peer review process (i.e. in a journal), received feedback and was already corrected (revised) based on the feedback from peers. This term refers to the stage of the publication process and not to the structure or purpose of the paper.


Repetitively emailing old lab group about a paper constantly on the backburner

It's naturally to everyone's benefit to get the paper published. However, it may also be the case that your former PI and co-workers may not have the time and focus to work on it themselves.

Perhaps the best way to get things moving again is to change your question. Instead of asking a variant of

  Will the paper be submitted soon?

try asking them what will help them:

  I know you're very busy. What can I do to help get the paper submitted?


Is it possible to do PhD in Computational Social Science without CS background?

Based on your question and your comments (this and that), I do think you need to take more math and statistics before you apply for PhD. I don't think MOOC courses, such as Linear Algebra and Statistics with R are enough for you to be considered qualified to get into good Computational Social Science programs (You didn't even taken Calculus).

I would suggest you to apply for an MS in computer science first. Once you receive formal and rigorous math and CS trainings, then you apply for  Computational Social Science PhD programs. You will have much better chance to get in first or second tier schools this way.


Shared office is messy to the point that I can't do any work, how to proceed?

To add another perspective: You write that everyone else is doing fine, and in fact is doing productive work. I know that people have very different working styles (in our department, all office space is 'flex-space', i.e., no-one (including full professors) has an 'own' office and people have very different preferences whether they want to sit in a more quiet place or a more social stting), and it can very well be the case that you are not productive in a setting where others are.

Nevertheless, I think you should consider the possibility that it is actually you who has the problem, not the setting that is the problem. If there is no easy solution (i.e., a different space for you), then, in fact, I guess it would be unreasonable to expect 11 people to adapt their working style rather than you (1 person).

I do not mean this negative at all, but there are solutions to work in a busy place, like putting on headphones and the like. Have you considered such options?

Good luck!


Faculty positions: What to say in a statement on diversity?

This should not be a statement about your personal diversity ("I am from Africa"), but rather a statement about how you can contribute to creating a diverse academic community, and how you can help students from diverse backgrounds succeed at the university.  As Noah Snyder rightly points out in the comments, your personal diversity would be an obvious thing to include here with a discussion of how that will help you further the goal of attracting and retaining students from diverse backgrounds.  If you have no relevant personal experiences, then this should be a discussion of how you plan to further the university's goal of attracting and retaining students from diverse backgrounds.

UC San Diego, which requires such a statement, maintains a webpage describing what should be included.  The entire page can be found here.

A few bullet points from their document:

  What is the Purpose of a Contributions to Diversity Statement?

  The purpose of the statement is to identify candidates who have professional skills, experience, and/or willingness to engage in activities that would enhance campus diversity and equity efforts.

  Are there any guidelines for writing a statement?

  The Contributions to Diversity Statement should describe your past experience, activities and future plans to advance diversity, equity and inclusion, in alignment with UC San Diego’s mission to reflect the diversity of California and to meet the educational needs and interests of its diverse population. Some faculty candidates may not have substantial past activities. If that is the case, we recommend focusing on future plans in your statement. A more developed and substantial plan is expected for senior candidates.

As candidates may not have particular past experiences, there is also some advice on "planned activities:"

  Planned Activities:

  The first step is to gather information on activities you would like to pursue while at UC San Diego and how they might fit into the research area, department, campus, or national context. You may consider but are not restricted to current or ongoing campus activities.

  For each proposed activity you include, describe the role you envision having and what you would like to accomplish in the next two to five years. Who would you like to engage in your efforts, and how would you plan to engage them? Be as specific as possible, but realistic in terms of your effort and time commitment.

In addition to the quotes above they have more information, including several example statements, and additional resources.  They also have a section on how such statement are considered.

Of course, all of this is specific to UCSD, but I imagine it generalizes to other institutions reasonably well.


How to list academic courses and grades on a pdf form?

The two easiest approaches to this are:

Most PDF viewers have a "typewriter" tool that you can use to write on the document.  For example, the built-in Preview application on Macs has an "add text" tool for writing on the document.  It won't turn the PDF into the form, but you can just write the text where you'd write if it was a form.
As noted in the comments: print, write, and scan/photograph.


Feedback on "book summary" originated from master's thesis

Personally I would not refer to your master thesis in your abstract. Often books are recommended based on an author’s life long in depth experience in a field. In your case I would look for recommendations of professors and put those on the cover of your book.


Should I send a follow up mail to my potential supervisor

You are panicking indeed. Give it some more time.
This was last Friday, and I assume your response was also on Friday. However, that was only two working days ago, and this supervisor is probably now in the progress of furthering the application. This probably means filling in some form, possibly requesting availability from potential relevant others that should be involved in the process, HR/administrative tasks, there's lots of reasons why they didn't respond yet.
The fact that they reviewed you application positively should give you enough ease to just wait it out a few more days (weeks maybe even). If you haven't heard anything back in a weeks time you could consider following up and indeed asking what the next steps are. But for now, be patient and be happy that they want to continue with you.


I haven't worked at these campuses, but know some people who do pretty well. These comments are more in reference to regional satellite campuses, e.g. Penn State Altoona, CSU-Pueblo, UNC Charlotte. These are not the flagships, but have varying levels of research activity - some departments might have masters programs, or PhDs created to focus on an area that faculty specialize in, but not the generic PhD for the area.

To first order, satellite campuses should be thought of as independent from the main campus. You share similar funding trends and chancellor edicts, and some programs (e.g. faculty teaching/research awards) cross borders. But it is not common to co-supervise students at the main campus. Maybe this could occur if you had a really unique research specialization, so you were a critical collaborator, or if you were in the same city, or had a strong personal connection. But I don't think it is that much more likely that you would co-supervise a grad student as a satellite prof than as a prof at any other geographically convenient location.

What might be more common is that, as a research-active member of a satellite campus without a PhD program, you could supervise and train a Masters or undergrad student who then goes to the main campus. You might then continue to collaborate with the student and his/her new adviser.

Even things you might not expect can be separated between campuses, like journal access - satellite campuses may not have all the same journals as the flagship.


Should I dress up for conference banquet/gala dinner?

No. You do not need to wear a suit for presenting at a conference. Most of the times, CS conferences have the typical t-shirt (or shirt), jeans combination of computer / tech guys.

For the dinner, you can dress a little more formally (if you want) but still a suit is not required. In fact, if you are young (<30) , wearing a suit and a tie would probably seem a little weird.

Bottom line: Wear what you usually wear when you go to work for the presentation and a little more formal (nicer) wear for dinner.


Did mistake of doing PhD in a dead field. How to approach postdoc applications with hope of changing fields?

To some extent, it's expected that you're not an expert in the field of the post-doc. One of the points of doing a post-doc in the first place is to broaden your research profile.

The thing you should be worried about is your track record - from the prospective advisor's side, one of the most important questions is whether you're able to effectively finish up a research project. If one finished publication is way beyond in the norm in your field, then you should indeed be worried; if it is the norm you may be fine.

The other aspect is to put up a convincing job letter that will explain why you are the right fit -- you may want to emphasize relevant skills and experiences and explain how they will help in the job you apply for.


I doubt that it would have any effect. People learn and change and others recognize that. However, the only way to know is to actually apply, or at least make contact with some of the other universities.

You will want to be able to explain your reasons, of course, and be pretty sure you aren't making a mistake by changing.

But you don't have to abandon your current studies to explore other opportunities. Find and contact a professor or two in the new discipline and ask them if you would be a good candidate in their program, or even working under their direction. You could also just make application a few places.

However, if you are currently funded, and/or other people are depending on your research to complement theirs, you will need to deal with the consequences of that so that you don't put yourself or others at a disadvantage.

But, as you are early in your studies, I don't really see much of a problem. Just ask at the institutions you are considering.


In physics, does the order of authors on a paper matter?

Physics has two broad conventions: the closer you are to high energy physics/particle physics/string theory/mathematical physics, the more likely you are to see alphabetical ordering. However, within condensed matter and biophysics, you generally see "First author = trainee primarily responsible for work." (I think astrophysics is more mixed).

There is actually some empirical data on alphabetical authorship by field here: Waltman arxiv:1206.4863 which confirms this general impression.

In quantum information, you might be at the edge of the condensed matter and "mathematical physics" conventions. Take a look at your advisor's other papers - are they alphabetical? Or are grad students and postdocs within the group usually listed as first?

Also, within fields where author order matters, the implication of "second of two authors" can be very different than, say, "second of five authors." With two authors, there is often the presumption of nearly-equal contributions. However, someone who is second of many may have, e.g., provided a figure's worth of data.

Your description would be broadly consistent with being a first author in most fields. (This assumes that there are not other people who contributed, who you have not mentioned - sometimes undergraduates are not given the best picture of what contributions are there.)

If this does not clear things up, I think it is fine to ask your advisor why he set the author order the way he did.


How to pull back my paper from conference?

It depends on which conference you have submitted. There are several interfaces (the most popular one being easychair), and each of them has an option to withdraw paper before notification of acceptance (or rejection).

Just log into the website and click withdraw paper button.


Have to give a talk soon but I no longer believe in my research

Do a practice talk with your advisor before going to the conference. Do it early. It will be a good time to discuss how the talk should be organized in order to  highlight the context of your measurement in the whole project and its relative importance.

It is common for a student working on a small piece of problem (and not necessarily looking at its entire context), to go back and forth between feeling A) the piece is obvious or unimportant; to B) the piece is pretty cool after all; then back to A again.

At worst - if it seems as if your piece really is not so relevant, then I expect he will help you organize the talk so that it still engages the audience. (Not a bad skill to practice. And, if you don't pull it off - at least in my field, if the topic of the talk seems unimportant to the audience, the bad smell lingers longer on the professor/advisor than on the student).

(Of course, also in my subfield, giving a talk at a conference or workshop usually means that we are giving a talk about work-in-progress still unpublished. So strategies may be different if there is a required paper involved for every talk).

But more likely, with working on the practice talk and the discussion with the advisor - you will develop more of an appreciation of how that small piece of work fits and may even develop an appreciation of its other subtleties that interest the professor. In a situation as you describe, I place my bets on the professor instinct on the topic.


Should I thank the professor for forwarding me webinar/seminar invites?

I would suggest not for each of the emails. He probably just has a forwarding list and does this as a matter of course. Since you describe it as happening in a research group, he is probably trying to make sure everyone sees things that might advance the work of the group generally.
However, if you find any of them particularly useful for your own work, thank him for those, individually, and say why.
You could, in fact, return the favor when you see something that works for you and might for others in the group. Send them to the prof. and let him pass them on if he agrees on the value.


Finishing my BSc while working - asking help to professors and future academic chances

I`d like to know how does such a twisty academical career affects my chances of getting accepted in a good Master program around 2 years from now.

Overall, the point of the admissions process is finding candidates who will succeed in higher study.  Your ability to overcome obstacles to get a degree, as well as your success in industry, both provide evidence that you will also be able to tackle a master's program.  Overall, your story is a positive one.  Taking a long time to complete a degree won't matter at all under the circumstances.

If there are some slight negatives to your story, they are:

Low GPA this does matter, but how much is dependent on the institution.  Also, your success in non-academic activities may offset this somewhat.
Will you continue to struggle to have time for your studies in the master's program?  This is something admissions committees may worry about.  If the circumstances that caused difficulty are going to change (for example, you will stop full-time employment in order to get a master's degree, or the family issues have now been resolved), then you should be sure to amke that clear.

  what is a legitimate level of "help" that I could ask for to a
  professor of a mandatory course that I am finding extremely difficult

There is no harm in asking the questions that you suggest.  Your professor can always say no if they don't want to provide the information.  Also consider simply going to your professor and saying "I'm finding this class extremely difficult, are there any resources I could take advantage of for extra help?"


Can I force my professor to give me a copy of his powerpoint presentation?

You wrote:

  Students need the presentations to review

Back when I was your age (of course I have no idea of your age but I am guessing you are a traditional undergraduate student), we had to take notes using these two antique tools called pen and paper.

I don't think even one of my professors gave me anything, other than pausing so I had time to write down the important points.

You have to take some responsibility for your education - don't just blame the professor for not handing you what you want.

There is teaching research showing that students who take notes retain much more information than those who do not. It could very well be that the professor is trying to take advantage of this knowledge to force you to learn more.

dmckee's answer is also great. The prof might be using this as leverage but in the end, you did not create the slides, they are not yours to demand. While many profs do freely give out their slides, it is actually unreasonable for you to demand them.


As multiple comments have suggested, contacting the organizers appears the appropriate option. Although the symposium is strictly titled 'doctoral symposium', the organizers may be more interested in allowing you to showcase your work and to practice your presentation/dissemination skills (I am guessing it is for the latter).

But, will you be physically and financially capable of attending the meeting?


Someone gave a talk proposing the idea; Should they be an author?

I think inviting the student to collaborate on a paper is only fair. Whether or not the person should be a co-author depends on the person's contribution to the final product. Originating an idea may well be enough but can only be evaluated when considering the total amount of scientific input towards the manuscript. Proposing an idea can mean anything from just a lucky shot to a question based on deep understanding of the topic. Where "your" question resides is for you to consider. There are many posts covering contributorship (a development from authorship) here on acadmia.sx so I will not repeat what these responses discuss. But, it is clear that one should require any author of a manuscript to fulfil certain criteria and not just add names without thorough consideration.

So as a summary, yes, ask the person to contribute but do not give away authorship without a contributions (and the idea may well be enough).

And a final note, if you have not done so, also make sure you have not independently duplicated the other persons work if the person has continued working on the idea after graduation.


Text between a Topic and Subtopic in a Thesis

This likely depends on the style guide that your field or your program follows. For example, I know that the first option is preferred (but not strictly required) in APA style.


Are there major obstacles to completing a thesis Masters program if I'm not funded/working in a lab?

It strongly depends on your school, your department and your topic. Ask your advisor and/or PhD student what is the policy of the department.

There are theses where student work for a lab or factory and the thesis is part of this work (optimisation tasks, design of custom experimental apparatus), there are also, mostly theoretical, theses that can be succesfully defended and continued in PhD without strong bond with the department.

There are also topics, ususaly narrow-focused, where student is not skilled enough to work for the lab. Or there may be legal issues.


Submitting a paper without having a review from the supervisor

It is usually (I'd guess it depends on the institution, but I haven't encountered any that doesn't adhere) the case that advising a student is sufficient ground for co-authorship. Depending on different fields and individuals, there are cases when the adviser encourages or even insists on students publishing at least something by themselves (I observed it usually in theoretical fields).
If the work passes the peer review, the journal will accept it. It doesn't matter whether you are a "simple PhD candidate" or a part of a team of researchers. There are even double-blind peer reviews, where the reviewers don't know your identity.

All that being said, it is often the case that you, as a student, are more familiar with the narrow thematic of your PhD research than your adviser (perhaps more than anyone in the world) and that is part of the PhD. However, your adviser guided you and it is partly due to his experience that you are able to publish something let alone to work on original research by yourself.

You said that he "hasn't really said anything, nor provided advises", could that be an indicator that you are on a good track and that he only intends to intervene if he feels you are sidetracked?

Further, I don't know any details about your research, but I can assume that you used your adviser's lab. Perhaps you were funded by his grants or worked on his projects?

Advising PhD students is a hard job and your whole PhD experience largely depended on your adviser. If you don't want to include your adviser, I would think very hard if that is merited. You could even discuss it with him. The ethical thing for your adviser is to insist on you publishing by yourself, if he feels that this is your independent work. If he does not, however, due to the lack of experience and perspective, you might not agree. At that point, it is really up to you and (the preservation of) your relationship, but I would definitely err on the side of caution and trust in my adviser's judgment (after all, he got me so far, didn't he).


Would it be possible to publish a journal paper about data-visualization website?

This would entirely depend on the contribution your website and techniques involved add to the state of the art. Is any element of it new and novel? I.e. something done nowhere else. It may be worthy of a conference paper for example, if he contribution is weaker.

What is your supervisors opinion? Have they hinted at this possibility?

Edit: The company's data may also feature as an issue during publication. Would they be happy for it to be used and if not can you describe your work well enough without it? i.e. if you use a figure in your paper that shows their data, such as a screenshot.


What exactly defines an invited speaker?

There are a number of different forms of invited talk, but to me, a clear distinction can be made by considering whether the decision to have a person speak comes before or after any associated submission.

If the organizers of the event have decided they want Dr. Smith to speak, based on Dr. Smith's record, and then afterwards negotiate the particulars of topic and content of the talk, then it's an invited talk.  There might or might not be any publication associated with it, depending on the particulars of the venue.  This covers keynotes, seminars, symposia, and many other forms of talk.
If the organizers ask Dr. Smith to submit something, and then decide whether they want the talk based on what's been submitted, then it's not an invited talk.  This is the typical case for conferences, workshops, etc.

What can make things confusing is that the word "invite" is often used in solicitations for submissions of the second type, particularly by low-quality or predatory organizations that are trying to trick people into thinking it's an invited talk, rather than just another request for submissions.

If the judgement comes after the submission, however, it's definitely not an invited talk---and if the judgement comes before because it's a terrible venue, then you shouldn't go even if it would give you an "invited talk" line on your CV.


What content should be on a CV vs. LinkedIn when applying to graduate school?

Academics don't use LinkedIn, so it doesn't really matter what you've put there.


The Daniel Biss case is one example where the retraction is due to legitimate mistakes (not misconduct). These retractions are rare because much of the time, incorrect proofs can still be salvaged with some work (recall Wiles and Taylor) and even papers with wrong results often contain enough correct material to be considered useful. Also, there are much fewer people that have the time to properly evaluate a paper in mathematics than in (say) psychology, where anyone with a decent understanding of statistical fallacies can find half a dozen bad studies per day.

There are also, quite likely, some cases where plagiarism has led to retractions.

Then there is the Ted Hill GMVH controversy (Quillette, Gowers's blog 1, Gowers's blog 2, Retraction Watch). NYJM has removed that paper from its archives, which can be construed as a kind of informal retraction, albeit easier to construe as a mess-up in the face of unexpected hostility from parts of the community. (The explanation given for the retraction is that the paper did not fit the journal's scope and level; note, however, that this is an extremely unusual grounds for retraction in academic publishing.)

RetractionWatch has a tag for retractions in mathematics.


How are international graduate applicants perceived by universities in the US?

To answer your specific questions, schools are generally trying to admit the best applicants (who will choose to come), not just a group of people of the right size over a certain threshold.  So if an international student appears to be a stronger candidate (evaluated the same way any other applicant would be), the international applicant is likely to be preferred.

Graduate students are generally funded based on packages that don't take into account where the student's from, so it's not generally more expensive.  (International students may be less likely to accept because the funding is less likely to enough, but that's no reason not to admit them.)

Finally, why would international applicants be any less trustworthy or appropriate than domestic ones?


I have to present a poster in two weeks and data analysis is going nowhere

Don't worry. Poster presentations often showcase early work that needs further development. Think of it as a beta test to get some feedback, in order to develop a complete product. Negative results are also results, and they help deciding future directions of work.

You could mention what you attempted to do/prove, and why that would be important. List out what approach/analysis worked and didn't work,. You could spend time understanding why those things worked/didn't work, and put those on your poster. Based on these learnings, you could chalk out some directions for future work.


How do I write the methodology part of a paper if I use commercial software?

Since my background is also CFD, maybe I can help.
It is really important to mention what type of scheme you are using and what is the commercial software. Is it based on the finite volume method or finite element method? Is it a cell-centered or vertex-centered scheme? What is the order of convergence of the method you are using, are they first, second or third order in space? Which transient time-stepping scheme are you using? What is the order of convergence of that scheme? Is it implicit, explicit? Etc.

In the end, the commercial software is just the implementation of a numerical scheme that you are using to solve the Navier-Stokes equation. It is important that you highlight the equations you are solving, the type of turbulence modeling you might be using and also the properties and details of the underlying numerical scheme. Then, even if you are using a commercial software package, people will have sufficient details to understand the context of your numerical resolution.

Also, please do not forget to carry out grid-independence studies!


Where can I find statistics about international movement of students/academics?

I don't have the statistics at hand for the case of students. But there was recently a publication of mobility statistics for scientists on 16 countries:

The report is here

The IEEE also made an infochart that was a bit more explicit using some of the data in the report.


Does Joseph Campbell's advice work for the natural sciences?

While this might be a strategy, I think it would be a mistake if it were your only strategy. Normally a lot of people contribute to a discipline and each of them have slightly different insights and thoughts to bring to bear. Even though you want to delve deeply into the topic of interest, it is likely a mistake to get too closely involved with the thought processes of that one person, unless they are the subject of study itself.

Interesting idea, though. But I wouldn't use it extensively.

However, going back to the influences on a researcher can be fruitful, especially if it gives you insight in to their insight.

I think the fields that are overwhelmingly interested by one person are rare, though there are a few. Stephen Hawking comes to mind, of course.


I have worked in China as a postdoc for two years, recently. I have come to know a lot about Chinese academic culture. Thus, I will try to answer your question.

As someone mentioned in comments, we don't know anything about your field. In my field, a [conference] abstract is usually not important per se, but provides a thermometer about potential authorship conflicts when it comes to the actual paper publication. So, bear this in mind while you see my points below.

Chinese culture is very conscious about hierarchy status. They take that seriously, so mind to make sure they understand you're striving to honor the Chinese senior author in your decision. In principle, granting corresponding authorship status is desirable for a Chinese PI. I should remark that multiple corresponding authors are common among papers coming from China. This enables the "humble first author" to honor all senior PIs included in the authors list. (Honorary authorship is exceedingly common in China.)

Coming out as the last author is also seen with good eyes, but not as important as being corresponding author. This way, I think your plan is good.

Finally, a word on publication awards in China. As you may have heard, researchers in China are paid cash awards over published papers. Cash is also an honor in China. Different institutions have slightly different rules about awarding cash prizes. Perhaps you'd like to ask them whether "the authorship status & position are fine with their university rules" or something to that effect, referring to such $$ award rules without asking directly.


How to cope with unfavorable GPA algorithm

My university has the same (default) GPA policy.

There is a reasonable argument that the effect you describe is actually desirable. Especially for graduate school, what people are looking for in your grades is not mastery of calculus but rather success in mastering new material.  By that standard, a student who gets an A in calculus on their first attempt has a stronger record than a student who gets a D the first time and an A the second time.

I don't really agree with this argument, in part because I don't think GPA is either so important or so fragile that a single bad grade is actually dangerous.  Grad schools won't care about one D in a freshman calculus class, and your improved grade on a second attempt is good evidence of your ability to recover from setbacks.


Can I payoff student-loan debts working as a professor after getting a Ph.D. in mathematics?

Since nobody else has offered a direct answer to the title question...

  Should I take on debt in order to get a Ph.D. in mathematics?

Absolutely not.

If a PhD program isn't willing to waive your tuition and offer you a stipend (in the form of an assistantship or fellowship), they don't really want you.  Go somewhere else.  If they decide not to give you more funding after a semester or two, you're done.  Go somewhere else.


Adviser-Poaching and the Politics of Graduate School

The damage has already been done in this situation, and your boyfriend should move on with his future.

Basically, at this point, I don't see any way in which the relationship with his current advisor can be mended. The name calling and guit tripping makes for an impossible working environment. Even if he were to stay, he would have to deal with the cloud of the previous attempt to leave hanging over his head. Therefore, it is in his best interests to find a new advising situation as quickly as possible.


Short-listed, but no interview invitation after three weeks - should I follow up?

Congratulations on making the short list! There is no way to tell from the outside what the school is doing, but there is also little that you can do to change it at this point.

If the school's answer would change something for you in the short term - for example, if you have another job offer and want to know if the school is still considering you - then it would be very appropriate to send them an email.

If you are just emailing them to check on the status of your application, I would wait a few more weeks to see if you hear anything from them. This part of the application process is often a waiting game, unfortunately.  On the other hand, I think that a very polite, short message would not be likely to harm your application, particularly if you let them know that you are still very interested in their department.


High impact PhD thesis? Or just incremental improvement?

AFAIK, to have a PhD you must make a significant original contribution to the field. Therefore, I'm inclined to agree with your advisor. Incidentally, your advisor has considerably more experience at this, trust him.

And yes, @jakebeal is right, likely duplicate of What makes someone deserving of a Ph D?


Differences between review Perspective and conclusion

I think that a perspective section of  a review at best offers material to reference to at best in the introduction of your work. The things likes "currently there is renewed interest in ..... and bla bla". Yes, cite it. Anyway you will cite the review, not a part of it.  As far the reference corroborates your claims (actual text claims, not results), you can cite what best serves the purpose.


Does having an MSc in a UK university increase chances of being accepted for PhD programme at the same university?

It depends?

I don't think there really is a straightforward answer to this - as there can be some institutional difference.
Though I would in general be a little bit surprised if it were required.

For people who have obtained a UK BSc (it may need to be an honours degree), it is possible to directly progress to a PhD, provided you get a First (maybe also a 2.1) in the BSc. (No idea about a BA - and all related types of Bachelor's degrees.)
This definitely applies to at least 3 universities in the engineering field.

Now: If I am not mistaken, I believe that the majority of people who were "doing a PhD" with a non-UK-education background had a Masters Degree before starting a PhD. (During my time at a UK university.)
However, this wasn't neccessary a Master's Degree from the institution at which these people were working towards a PhD. (Though one person was on some integrated course which was a 1 years Masters followed by a PhD.)

In this context, it may be interesting to note, that the "Student Loans Company" (i.e. the state) will loan the funds for a Bachelor's degree, but not a Masters. A PhD is typically funded (unless one goes for the self funded option).
This means, that unless you have wealthy parents or an employer paying for it, a Masters Degree in the UK makes little sense if you plan to follow up with a PhD and going Bachelors -> PhD makes more sense.

If we now look at the rest of Europe, it is pretty commonplace to obtain a Masters Degree before commencing a PhD. (Though some countries may have some different routes, such as the old German "Diplom" and the French Engineers that may lead to a PhD/Doctorate.)

And if you want a definite answer, the only method is to check the requirements on the university's website, as only they will be able to give you a definite answer.


The professor has been jerking you around (whether intentionally or not).

For now at least, you will need to check your email more often during the target dates.

It is fine to present your concerns to the department.  (In my view, being a good citizen of one's university includes providing constructive criticism that will help improve students' educational experience.)  I recommend presenting your concern in a calm way.


Host prof stole my Ph.D. topic during my visit

As someone who has more than a bit of familiarity with the German system, I have to say that your story is a bit baffling to me. Being able to show prior results—particularly in the form of an existing peer-reviewed publication—would be of enormous benefit in getting a grant from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG), the national funding agency of Germany. Consequently, working with you and being a co-author on your publication would help, not hinder, the professor's grant application.

On the other hand, it is entirely possible that the professor may have thought that he could use an alternate approach to generate your results. While that may look like "stealing" your PhD project, that is actually not the case when different techniques are being proposed.

My recommendation for you would be to publish a high-quality paper out as quickly as possible. Once it's established in the literature, it's a lot harder for someone to claim credit for basically doing the same thing.


Are there any particular grants or fellowships in the sciences specifically for non-traditional students?

In general, you're in a very tough situation. Most of the "big name" fellowships are moving away from funding older students, on the relatively flimsy rationale that they're making a bigger impact by funding less experienced students from the start of their program.

There are a few programs that do support late-term graduate students; these are typically known as dissertation fellowships. Examples include the Ford Foundation Dissertation Fellowships, but these also have other restrictions associated with them (for instance, a commitment to a teaching career). Similarly, the Fisher Doctoral Fellowship primarily supports environmental and energy-related research, while the Merck Fellowship Program is for African-American students in biomedical-related fields.

So there are resources available, but they are certainly very limited in scope, and you'll need to make sure you meet all of the qualification criteria. The other problem for you is that these fellowships are typically only one year in duration, so if, as you say, you are two years away from finishing, you will need to find some means to finance one year of study, either through TA's or other sources of funding. In the meanwhile, you should talk with your advisor if there are other resources within the group to help you—at least partially.


How long does one need to keep the original data of a study / publication?

This is a question you should ask the funding agency that is paying for your work. They usually have requirements for how the data that is produced should be handled.

As an example, this is what the main German funding agency DFG says:

  Den Regeln der Guten Wissenschaftlichen Praxis folgend sollen Forschungsdaten in der eigenen Einrichtung oder in einer fachlich einschlägigen, überregionalen Infrastruktur für mindestens 10 Jahre archiviert werden.

My rough translation:

  Following the rules of good scientific practice research data should be archived in your own facility or in a topically relevant national infrastructure for at least 10 years.

There are certainly different considerations when the research data contains private information, e.g. patient data. I can't say anything about the regulations there, I'm only considering public research data that doesn't have any privacy implications.

In general the scientific community benefits if the data remains available forever. And while the 10 years in my example are a minimum, many parts of the produced data like the publications and depositions of structured data into repositories like crystal structures to the PDB remain archived indefinitely. And many repositories like the PDB are steadily increasing the amount of raw data they would like to get along with the final output.


How is it like studying a Masters in Germany?

I studied in Germany, but a different master. However, giving a general answer to your question is very difficult, especially whether the professors are helpful.

You may end up in courses which are so large that the professor might only know a couple of students by name.
There are also other courses with only a few students where you are in closer interaction with your professor.
Please note that there may be a large number of courses which are taught not by the professor himself/herself but by employees of his chair, e.g., by PhD students.

I had courses from all those three categories listed above. This does not only depend on the university (some might have smaller groups than others), but also on the courses you decide to take.

It is accepted and encouraged to ask questions during or after the lecture.
However, interaction with your professor may not be that important in total and you should also be able to solve most issues on your own.

Even for your master's thesis this may apply: Some professors want to be involved in their student's work but I have seen different behavior: For example, the first and last time I saw the professor during my bachelor's thesis was during the final presentation. The work was supervised by an assistant and he was very good, so I was OK with this!


How to include text intended only for reviewers in main manuscript submission?

You mentioned the online e-companion approach which works well in some situations.

Another I've used is adding an Appendix to the paper so it is organically included in the initial submission only. We explicitly label it for the reviewers' convenience only and that it will be removed from the final version. After the first round of reviews, we typically remove it and place as an appendix in our Response to Reviewers. This has been convenient for us as authors and for the editor. It may not work for all situations.


Should I email my professor to clear up a (possibly very irrelevant) awkward misunderstanding?

If I were you, feeling uneasy about your previous conversation, I'd stop by during your professor's office hours rather than sending an email to express your concern.  It's more personal.  Pick a time when he appears free.  Tell him you've been feeling bad that you may have given him the wrong impression, that you want to make clear that you really like the class and really did find the readings helpful.  It's pretty likely he'll set your mind at ease, reassuring you that he didn't take offense and wasn't upset but appreciates your stopping by to discuss.


Abbreviating first names in the bibliography

At the end of the day this all boils down to opinion and you already gave the most important argument yourself: Usually, the only way to obtain consistency is to abbreviate all first names. If you try to use unabbreviated names even when the journal doesn’t, you will eventually run into a case where you cannot find out an author’s full first name by any reasonable means.

All journals that I am aware of adhere to such a citation style, so you would be in good company abbreviating first names. Moreover, such a citation style would not arise if it would lead to any practical problems. In fact, knowing an author’s full first name rarely accelerates finding a cited publication, and if then only by a little. I cannot imagine a situation where the first name would actually be necessary to find or identify a properly cited paper – you always have page numbers or similar to resolve potential ambiguities.


How to follow specific journal or conference in google scholar for new paper?

Many conferences and journals have RSS feeds that you can aggregate with an RSS reader. Usually they are linked on the conference / journal website (though sometimes you need to search for "rss" in the page source because it is hidden somewhere).

Example: the arXiv math.AG site doesn't mention RSS anywhere, but the page source does.


Medically undiagnosed condition: how to inform?

I think you should inform your thesis comittee about your current situation. Best case, they are understanding, worst case they will ignore it for PhD-related matters. It might help to get a sick note from an independent professional even if the diagnosis is difficult.

As to your second question, I would suggest to not disclose any health issues in the hiring process for the same reasons as stated in your linked questions, unless the position is specifically advertised as 'disabled applicants preferred' which I believe is a thing in Germany, for example.

Regarding your third question, I cannot say in general whether discrimination is to be expected. Depending on your condition and country of future employment, there may however be laws in place to protect you from discrimination against your condition.
I can only offer limited advice on how to deal with discrimination otherwise, but coping strategies against pain may be of interest to you in case of chronic problems, and may be subsidized by (potentially employer-paid) health care.


Anyone dealt with "KEI Journals"? What about the journal "Quarterly Physics Review"?

KEI Journals was listed as a predatory publisher on the now-defunct Beall's List of Predatory Publishers. Looking at the description, "all disciplines of physics, with a focus on new research" [what research isn't new?] it doesn't seem like this new journal is filling any niche.

Looking at their archives, the journal has published a total of two articles since 2015 (both in 2015). Neither full text appears to be available anywhere. I would run the other way, and quickly.


IS impact factor around 2 good for bio-engineering field?

The go-to-place to look up Impact Factors (IF) is Web of Science's Journal Citation Reports (JCR). As it is a commercial product, you(r institution) needs a subscription to access it.

JCR puts journals into categories. In this case, Personal and Ubiquitous Computing is listed in the categories Telecommunications and Computer Science, Information Systems.

In Telecommunications, the journal ranks 53 out of 88 journals in Web of Science 2018 (the latest available). The first-ranked journal has an Impact Factor (IF) of 22.973, the last one 0.350, the median 2.274.
In Computer Science, Information Systems, the journal ranks 96 out of 155 journals. The first-ranked journal has an IF of 22.973 (the same as in the other category), the last one is 'not available' (the second-to-last is 0.282), the median is 2.170.
There is no category called 'Bioengineering' in JCR, but there is one called Engineering, Biomedical. It contains 80 journals, the highest IF is 17.135, the lowest is 0.452, and the median IF is 2.272.

Using these three categories as benchmarks to assess the journal's IF, one can see that the journal is always close to the median value, and therefore certainly okay. But whether it is 'good' or not for the purpose of your exercise you need to ask your instructor.


Will my supervisor be contacted by a conference if my submission is rejected or requires revison?

Some conference systems do, and some systems don't. If the system contacted all authors upon submission, one could speculate that it will also do this when a decision on the paper has been made. But it really depends on the system, and as there are so many, it's hard to predict.

But I'm going to add that it shouldn't matter: Whatever the outcome, you will have to tell your coauthors one way or the other. If they learn it from an automated email, then that is as good as if you sent them a personal email.


Submit to arxiv prior to a conference or journal

This differs by field. Your profile suggests you are a mathematician and in math, almost all journals will publish papers previously available at arXiv.

The life sciences seem to be an exception with many journals refusing to publish anything previously published, even if informally. Wikipedia gives some guidance.

I'll leave the issue of license to the other questions linked in comments.


Yes, it is a publication and should be included in the CV. You would be wise, of course, to mark it as an extended abstract.

You may want to publish a longer version as well, so marking the abstract as such will cause less confusion when/if that happens.


Postdoc interview presentation doesn't explcitly mention a research plan, should I include one?

Given that 10 minutes is very short, a quick mention about aspects for which you do have some ideas would be in order. But be prepared for questions about details if there is a follow up question period. You needn't spend much time on this.
However, if you have special expertise and interest in some particular aspect, then spending a couple of minutes outlining your ideas might be good to do.
In any case, spend some time/words on those aspects of the problem that appeal to you and that you would like to explore further, giving any quick insights you might have. But don't oversell yourself. They have probably thought about this more than you have and you don't want to give naive/facile explanations.


Is it common for a thesis-based master hasn't got the thesis topic?

This can happen. The formal thesis topic is quite an open field.

Perhaps, the supervisor doesn't want to spoon-feed and force a topic on to you, but rather would want to have you come up with one. By exposing you to various tools and techniques, and (presumably) side-by-side pointing to some useful literature, and asking you to dig for more works yourself, he/she is essentially doing a good job. Basically, what he's saying is - this is what happens usually in the field, tell me if you come up with any ideas regarding what you want to do. He/she is basically throwing the field open to you.

Since your master's is thesis based, I won't find it very surprising though if he/she has already planned something as a backup option, in case you don't come up with anything reasonable. But he/she will likely not reveal that unless he/she is absolutely convinced that you are struggling to come up with anything doable.

In my experience, this approach is not very common, but not very rare either. And of course, it is a good approach, the goal of course is to train you to think.

Hope that helps. :)


How to prevent my introvert nature from being a barrier to success in grad school and future academic life?

If you experience severe anxiety communicating with other people, then you should consult a licensed mental health professional.  If anxiety is preventing you from succeeding in your PhD, then it is severe.
Practice can help you overcome your feelings when communicating.  Practice in an environment where you feel comfortable, and gradually your way to more challenging skills.  Good academics practice communicating all the time.
There are organizations which will facilitate practice, such as Toastmasters.  Your supervisor should also do that.


When is it appropriate to ask whether relocation costs would be covered?

Reimbursement for relocation expenses is part of your compensation for the job.  The best time to ask about it is actually when you are negotiating over your salary.  Depending on the policies of the hiring institution, it may or may not be possible to negotiate over the amount of the relocation expenses.  However, whether or not you can negotiate for a larger reimbursement, you would probably want to find out how much your employer is going to be paying for you to move before you agree to take the job; long-distance and international moves can be quite expensive.

If you have already agreed to take the job, but you have not previously asked about relocation expenses, you ought to do so immediately.  I would contact the head of the department and ask them.  They may give you an answer immediately, or they may refer you to human resources.  However, there is no reason to hold back on asking about this.


My advisor tried to find my faults and kick me out of the research?

OK, well, you have a problem.  By the terms of your appointment, you are entitled to stay for the 24-month period.  The faculty you're working with made a commitment to support you for 24 months, and generally speaking, it is his duty to do so.  However, that's not the whole story.  You also have an implicit obligation to do good research that advances his interests as well.  And, depending on your goals, you probably also need his intellectual support and mentorship to achieve many of the benefits of a visiting scholar position.  So, you need to work out a mutually satisfactory resolution with him.  This is more a situation for interpersonal negotiation and compromise than a situation where standing on your rights and thumping the table is going to help you.

You might need to make some compromises, compared to how you thought this position was going to work out.  To help with that, to begin, you should start asking yourself some hard questions and figure out what your goals are.  What are your career goals after you finish this position?  What would you like to achieve?  Are you looking to get a good reference letter from the faculty you are currently working with?  Are you looking to strengthen your c.v. with a stronger publication record?  Do you think you can do good research on your own, with no mentorship, collaboration, or support from your faculty member?  What kind of job are you looking for after you finish?  Are you looking for a research position, or for an industry position?  Can you make productive use of the next 16 months (in a way that will help your longer-term career prospects)?  How strongly do you feel that you want to stay in the current position for the full 24 months if you have no support and no interest from your existing faculty member?  The answers will determine how you act at this point.

Keep in mind that there might be no perfect solution to your situation, so your job at this point is to try to guide things to the least-bad outcome that is at all feasible.  To do that, you absolutely must know what your priorities are and what your "nice-to-have's" are.

I can see a couple of possible options for you:

You could sit down and have a frank talk with the faculty you are working for.  You could say, look, you offered me a 24-month position, you made a commitment, now it is your obligation to fulfill it.  You can be polite but firm.  However, this might not win you any friends, so if you were hoping for a good reference letter from this faculty member or collaboration and mentorship for continuing research, you might be out of luck, and you could be stuck in a toxic environment for the next 16 months.  If you take this tack, you are basically offering the faculty member nothing positive in return, so the best plausible outcome is that the faculty member honors his commitment and ignores you for the rest of your appointment.  The worst outcome is that the faculty tries to find some way to screw you.
Alternatively, you could try to understand better your faculty member's situation and then try to find a way to make yourself valuable to him.  Personally, I think this is probably a much more promising direction.  You can always fall back to the "you have an obligation" option above if this fails.

From your position his actions might appear arbitrary and capricious, but there is probably a logic behind them from his perspective.  You could try to understand what is motivating your faculty mentor and then use that to see what you can offer him.  For instance, maybe he is under tight pressure to see results, and you are not contributing in the way he had hoped.  Keep in mind that you are biased; you might feel like you did an awesome job and met all of his expectations, but he might not feel that way.  Or, his goals might have changed.  So, you could try to understand his perspective, and then figure out how to make yourself valuable to him.  Basically, look for a way to make this a win-win situation.

You say the faculty seems more interested in working with your friend right now.  Well, that's a valuable clue.  Maybe your friend is making contributions in some way that you aren't.  Have you considered trying to find a way that you can contribute, that your faculty member would value and that would make him eager to keep working with you and make supporting you a priority for him?  Have you tried asking some questions to probe about that?  His needs can change over time.  There's an unwritten assumption, when you join someone's group, that you will act as a team: that you will both act in each others' best interests.  In particular, this is not a zero-sum situation (or it should not be); if you're doing things right, when you do great work, it should benefit both you and your faculty.  You need to be flexible.  If your faculty member's needs change, you might need to change your focus and your energy to support his direction.  If your faculty member's needs have changed and you are not adapting to make yourself a valuable member of the team as his goals change, then that could explain his reaction.

You say your faculty has a DARPA contract, and that contract continues, but you are not a main person on that project.  Well, have you considered trying to make yourself a main person?  Have you considered making yourself indispensable to that project or finding a way so that you can make major contributions to the success of that project?  This is not something that is appointed or handed out; what makes you a main person is not a title that someone else hands to you, but rather your own independent action.  In the research world, people typically aren't going to tell you what to do.  Instead, they're expecting you to identify a way you can be valuable to the project, and then go do it.  You're a smart person; I'm sure you can find a way to make a contribution to that project that they will find helpful, and that will be beneficial to your career.  Go do that a couple of times, and before you know it, you will be a main person on that project, not because anyone else decided you are, but because you decided to become one and you put in the energy and hard work to be.

From your question, we only get your perspective, not that of your faculty member's perspective.  Personally, I wouldn't be surprised if you haven't fully appreciated your faculty member's perspective yet.

Overall, my advice is:

Enter this with a willingness to compromise and change.  Adapt.  Be prepared to find a compromise with your faculty member.  Don't start from the position that you're entitled to a great working situation; you may be, but realistically, at this point, that kind of attitude won't help you attain one.  Open your mind to compromise solutions you might not have previously considered, even if you have to accept something that's less than ideal from your perspective.
Find someone else you trust (a secondary mentor, another faculty member, something like that) and talk to them about the situation.  Ask them for advice.  Respect what they are telling you: be a good listener (if you find yourself arguing with them, time to back off and listen and try to understand what they are telling you).  See if this can get you any additional information about what might be motivating your faculty or ways you might be able to resolve the situation.  You're in an Ivy League school; odds are that someone else in your department cares about visiting scholars.
Go talk to your advisor.  Ask questions.  Listen.  Empathize.  Try to find a win-win outcome that both of you can feel like offers something positive.  You can be frank and honest that your relationship seems to have gotten off on a bad foot and you'd like to work out a way to improve the relationship and find a way to be useful to him that also benefits your career.  Ask him for help crafting a performance improvement plan that from his perspective would help you do a better job of meeting his expectations.

Do not start from a position that you are entitled to his enthusiasm.  Do not accuse or argue.  This is not a confrontation or a debate; this is a negotiation.  You start by trying to gather information and understand your faculty member's perspective better.  When you understand his logic and motivations, then you can try to brainstorm together ways that you can change your behavior in a way that benefits both of you (especially him).  What you can offer is your willingness to devote your time and energy to work on problems that are relevant to his needs, and your flexibility and willingness to change.  Maybe after having this kind of conversation, you will find some new project or new focus that both of you will be excited and enthusiastic about.  Or, failing that, maybe you can find some compromise solution that is tolerable for both of you: maybe neither of you walk away exactly excited about the collaboration, but you can both live with it.

Your job at this point is to make the best of the situation.  Realize that the resolution might not be perfect.  Sometimes, that's life.  You just have to roll with the punches and work with what you've got.


It sounds to me like the reviewers were requesting that you include a set of “Index Terms” or “Keywords” for your paper, e.g., for IEEE, pulled from the list of IEEE Taxonomy or Standardized Keywords.
Excerpts the second link:

Help readers find your article quickly by using the right IEEE standardized keywords.
using the right keywords in your article can make your article more easily and reliably discoverable—which leads to a broader readership for your article.


My advisor is giving my idea to his new student, what should I do?

What is going on may be entirely ethical, though questions remain. Multiple papers based on a single model is fine, even typical. Such papers can legitimately be written by different authors. Still not a problem.

But the originator of the model needs to be credited with its creation in any papers that result. Citations need to be given when possible. Otherwise it is plagiarism.

I don't think you need to be a co-author on the other student's work but you need credit for your work in anything that results.

And, you also need assurance that you won't be plagiarized and you need to deal with that issue soon, since the other student is not experienced, I expect.

Even giving editable documents to the other student may not be as big a deal as you think, since information can be extracted from pdfs as well.

Talk to your advisor and make sure that appropriate assurances are in place. If the other student is publishing a variation or an expansion of your work it can be completely valid. Perhaps a meeting of the three of you can provide assurance here. If everything is ethical, then no one should object to such a meeting.

You need to assure yourself that no one is "stepping on" your current work or plagiarizing it. But, in general, creating a model is not a "hands off" signal to everyone else.

The question of co-authorship may still be open if parts of your work need to be included in the work of another. But that might also require some additional work on your part to complete the work of the other student. That can be part of any conversation.


My assessor is giving me spelling advice - but he's wrong

First of all: ask for a third opinion, just to be sure you are right.

Anyway, the nice thing about science people is that they are usually convinced by evidence, even when it goes against their previous thoughts. Write them a polite, respectful e-mail explaining why you think you are right, and pointing out reputable grammar sources to back you up. Show that you have done some additional research. There are good chances that this will work.


Most universities have an office dedicated to helping students deal with disabilities of various kinds. Perhaps you should visit them. They can probably help with stress reduction. In extreme cases a doctor's help might be needed.

But, you might also consider asking your professor for an alternate way to take the exam than online. Perhaps taking it on paper would be helpful. Perhaps having someone else in the room with you would be helpful. But think about more options than just additional time. There is something going on in your life that suggests that time, alone, isn't the issue.

Even an oral exam is better for some people, though not everyone. But it requires a certain amount of empathy from the professor that not all will exhibit.

But if you need to ask, do so in person if at all possible. It is more likely to be successful and the professor might be able to suggest alternatives that won't come up in an email exchange.


Is there a tool to check citations over time across disciplines?

You may try Microsoft Academic for that. They have an interesting semantic-web approach to finding answers to your queries and they also aggregate a lot of context information. This includes citations that can be filtered in various ways.

Have a look at this search regarding your questions's example: https://academic.microsoft.com/paper/2067050450/citedby/search?q=Equilibrium%20points%20in%20n-person%20games&qe=RId%3D2067050450&f=&eyl=Y%3C%3D1956&orderBy=0 (you were right: initially, most citations were from mathematics).


Is it OK to select an editor if I solved his conjecture?

In fact, I think that is the best choice!  That guy is likely to know more about the subject, and be aware of previous attempted solutions.


What’s included in a press kit for a research project?

1. What is a press kit?

A press kit is usually a collection of information and resources that can be used by reporters and publishers. The idea behind a press kit is to make the reporter's job super easy. They are not experts in the field and require help translating your research approach and outcomes to something the layman reading their publication can understand.

2. Research press kit contents

Press kits usually include photos, graphs, and summaries of your work, in everyday language. It is a mini article with all the basics and explanations required for someone to take and write an accurate article on your work. The more effort you put in to clearly write your summary and link it to non expert concepts the better. The degree to which you need to simplify it heavily depends on the publication's audience, so often a few variants are produced for a press kit that is to be widely distributed.

3. Motivation

It is simple really, the more visibility your research receives the more likely it will be used, cited, or attract funding and the better it is for your university's reputation and visibility.


Should I take admissions to this phd programme?

To me this arrangement is the greatest chance you could get to work under the supervision of whom you requested in the future. Since you have such strong orientation towards that particular supervisor (at least the way I see it), I think you should take the offer.

However, if all you want is to secure a good Ph.D. position, you should take into account whether you are ready to accept the worst case scenario, which is she refuse to take you in and you have to work under the supervision of the other supervisor. If this is the case, none of us here can help you in the decision making.


If the article is an exact duplicate

Journal B has published text which is owned by Journal A without Journal A's knowledge or permission. In that case, write to the editors of Journal A and Journal B, purely to make them aware of the situation.

It is up to the editors of the journals to decide what steps to take. Journal B has claimed that what it has published is the original work of the three authors, and this is not true so it needs to un-deceive its readers.

Do not recommend any course of action to either editor. This kind of dispute can get nasty, complicated and damaging very quickly. And people detected in fraud (if it is fraud) will want to punish their victim. That is human nature.

But do write. If, believing that Journal B has published a fraudulent paper, you remain silent, you become part of the fraud.

Never accuse your co-authors of anything. Not to their face; not to the editors; not to your friends. If asked, report the facts only. Do not express judgements of those acts or those people. If asked to do so, refuse.


How you choose the literature you read (Advice)

Starting good literature habits at the beginning of your PhD is excellent. Here's the method I use:

-First, I created a publication alert for litterature highly specific to my study subject. I used Web Of Science for that, but only because my library subscribe to it. I think you can create similar alert using Google Scholar. I try to keep really up to date with that list because it is centered on my project.

-Second, I follow some journals relevant to my research using RSS feed. Each time there is a new articles in those journals, I get an alert. There is multiple RSS feed organizer software. I personally prefer to received them in my email inbox using Thunderbird. I'm not very good at keeping up with that list, but I try at least to read the article title, to know if something relevent wasn't find by my citation alert. I also got alert from BioRxiv.

-Finally, I follow researchers on Research Gate and thus I receive alert when they publish. I chose to follow the researcher I most often cite.

Keeping up with the literature is hard! I think organisation is part of the key.


Listing an article which is under revision in your CV

It is not uncommon that a paper gets rejected after an "accepted with major revisions" and it will make a very negative impression if you get asked when your paper will be published after you got a rejection.

However, that should not prevent you from listing your pending submission, but better choose a modest phrasing. In this context, I have seen for example something like

  MyName. Paper title. Submitted to the International Journal of Foo.

or

  MyName. Paper title. Currently under review at the International Journal of Foo.

One reason to list your pending submissions can be to show what you have been working on in the last months, but it will not count as "achievement", even if you mention that it got an "accepted with major revisions".


What should I do if a Professor yells at me and a fellow student in class?

I recommend following up with the professor himself. Ideally by asking for an appointment, but e-mail will do in a pinch. You should (1) concisely and clearly explain what happened (much more concisely and clearly than you did above), and (2) state that you found his reaction in class to be humiliating and unnecessary, and you would like to request that he not do anything like that again.
I also recommend being polite and avoiding accusatory language; the goal is to smooth over a misunderstanding, not to assign fault. Hopefully, this will lead to a friendly conversation, and he will take the lead in acknowledging that he misjudged the situation and his reaction was inappropriate. Sadly, I cannot guarantee this; he may entrench himself further into an adversarial position. In the latter case, it would not be inappropriate to discuss the situation with the department chair or another trusted professor; however, I do not think that doing so is terribly likely to lead to a more favorable outcome.


Sharing content from thesis online, before submitting thesis

Ethically, I think you would also be fine. Theses in many fields include content from published papers; GitHub doesn't even count as 'published'.

Practically, it depends on how much blind faith your department places in the plagiarism checker.  Plagiarism detectors should only be used as a first-pass, and humans should evaluate the detected potential plagiarism. If the authorship of your GitHub documentation is clearly labeled, then they will hopefully see that it is your work.

Navigating the details of this in a department-specific setting is what your adviser is there to help you do.  If they've given their blessing, and they are aware of the policy, and they are a good adviser, then I would also expect them to be willing to go to bat for you if it does come up in thesis review.


Google's publications are available here: https://ai.google/research/pubs.


How to make the most of my time as a volunteer at a research-paper conference?

Based on my experience, attending in conferences as the volunteers often makes you perform some pre-defined tasks, based on the considered role for you, tightly. As an instance, you might be recruited at the reception desk of the conference and most of your time will be dedicated to the registration-based stuffs and the related matters. Or seemingly, you would be engaged with the support team to make the conference atmosphere more convenient for the participants.

So, you might conclude that most of your time would be dedicated to performing the tasks, as well as possible. But as most of the tasks might no fill all of your time at the conference, a good plan could be attending at the conference presentation sessions or conference lectures, are which within the scope of your interest.

Of course, based on your chance and smartness, you may be able to grab some special opportunities. Here is my own experience: Once, I was at the service of the escort team at a conference and was responsible for accompanying the guest lectures of the conference to the hotels and conference hall, back and forth. Within the 3-day period of the conference, I did succeed to talk with one of the big GURUs of the control systems on the planet and culminated my raw ideas by his deserving assessments.

So, just open your eyes and be on the edge of your seat to grab every sparkling opportunity.

Good luck


Where can I find academic CV samples containing minor research projects for PhD applications without publications?

There is no need to follow a standard or template unless the specific job you apply for explicitly states that you should do so (which is rarely the case).

I am a biophysicist, not a mathematician, but from what I have seen you can put on your CV whatever you want, especially in academia: it is your CV. You should definitely include your minor research projects. You can have a look at templates for some inspiration but it is up to you how you organise your CV and which sections you include or not.

Publications usually only count if they are published in international peer-reviewed journals or books. You can possibly stretch this definition a little by including conference proceedings, abstracts, application notes, and so on, but it may be viewed as strange if you call these a "publication" (mathematicians, please correct me if this is different for you). In any case, this is the topic of your other question and is better discussed there.


Fee discounts for full time PhD Students; is this discriminatory?

This is not discriminatory. A large number of full-time PhD students, mostly among top-tier schools, sign a non-compete type of contract that ensures that they will not have a job while attempting their degree. So for conferences awarding discounts on a financial need basis, part-time PhD students who typically have the liberty to work if they wish, do not qualify for this financial assistance. Of course corner cases exist etc. , but in general, this is the mentality.


Present model calibration results in methods section or results section?

IMHO It doesn't belong in your main results section, as it isn't the results of your study - simply an intermediate step similar to testing the correct functioning of a bit of lab equipment. Nevertheless, it may be a substantial achievement in its own right.

If you must stick to "method" and "results" sections, I'd add a "model validation" subsection to the Method one. You may want to refer to it in your conclusions as though it were a result, to highlight how trustworthy you believe the model to be.


Why does the copy editor want Nature to be “Nature (London)”?

For these journals, the copy editor is correct.  "Nature (London)" is listed in the American Physical Society's house style for abbreviations, which makes it the standard abbreviation for APS journals, and it is also in the American Institute of Physics's list.  It's not part of a general pattern of including locations, but rather a special case.

Presumably the inclusion of "London" was originally intended to avoid some long-ago ambiguity, perhaps with La Nature.  It sounds like La Nature was more of a popular magazine about science than a modern scientific journal, but then again so was Nature in its early history.

There is no serious ambiguity about the name Nature today, but publishers are reluctant to change abbreviations, partly out of fear that if you've been using a specific abbreviation for many decades, a careful reader may wonder whether a different abbreviation is a mistake or even refers to another journal.


What are the efficient ways of keeping track of research literature?

Here are two suggestions, but only the first relates to your question.
A simple way to keep track of things is with something as simple as a word processing document, though you can also use spreadsheets or databases in the same way. Simply enter the title and author(s) of the things you read along with a bunch of keywords that are meaningful to you and will let you find documents by keyword. You can also write your own short abstract of each paper, which will help keep the information in your head, not just in the document. This document will let you find them easily in the future. This should be an electronic document so that you can easily search it for keywords and such. Don't forget to do backups, of course.
Entries in this list should be numbered as well. And each paper can have a list of the numbers of other, related, papers. (also see below)
But, the other idea is to keep a research diary that has your own ideas for future papers or research threads that you don't have time for at the moment. Often when working on something and idea will come to you that you might want to work on later. Enter the idea in the diary along with the date and the numbers of any papers (from the list above) that seem to relate to the idea.
If you keep a research diary, keep different ideas on different pages so that you can add to it in the future. Review the diary periodically - especially when you want a new project.
If you are doing patentable work then the research diary should be bound (not loose leaf) hard copy and each page dated. You also want to have the ideas witnessed by someone who signs and dates your pages. This diary can provide evidence of "first use". It is (or was) typical practice at IBM Research for example.


Variance in academic fecundity during and after graduate school

I'm sure there are more reasons, but here are two positive reasons.

Some people get a job that stresses teaching more than research and so they put their focus there. It can be a rewarding life, actually. Lots of teaching and a bit of research. Maybe less stress. Of course this is an unlikely scenario at an R1 university.

Some people, after gaining tenure and leading a fairly large group of graduate students in a lab or research group, are willing to let the students gain the glory and don't add themselves as co-author, even though it might be appropriate. This isn't a good path before tenure, but can be afterwards. So they are doing research but, by feeding ideas to them, the students gain the credit for it.


Improving on a scientific paper (with source code) - publication of our work possible?

Yes: You can publish work that improves upon earlier results.

Whether changing the architecture of a Deep Learning Network will achieve better results is, of course, an open problem. Whether improvements are sufficient to merit publication is also an open problem.

In theory, negative results - e.g., we changed the architecture and didn't get better results - are publishable too. But, such results aren't published as often. I think you'd need a surprising-factor, e.g., if better results could be expected from such a change, but aren't achieved, especially if the reason they aren't achieved can be identified.


Why do universities require official confirmation of scores before admission?

The problem is that many students will resort to cheating, if necessary, to secure admission to graduate school. Just about any method or loophole that can be exploited will be. For instance, when I was an undergraduate in the 90's, one of the graduate departments stopped admitting students from China for several years because they had multiple instances where applicants had stand-ins for interviews to determine their English skills. Similarly, at my current school, we have recently had a rash of applications come in with faked English competency certificates.

Therefore, American graduate schools (and programs in other countries which ask for test scores) are increasingly (although not exclusively) relying on officially submitted documents. Scores reported directly from the College Board would presumably be less likely to be subject to manipulation.

As far as why not just ask for a paper copy: American departments usually only have one admissions cycle per year. Therefore, admitting someone who is ineligible because of fraudulent documents usually means denying someone else who is qualified the ability to be admitted. Therefore, schools want to know that the students are officially eligible before they are admitted, and will not hold up the process until later. Schools that do rolling admissions likely do not have this problem, and could perhaps use the method you have suggested.