Discussing work in progress
I think the following won't apply to you, but may be useful for people in other fields with the same question.  

If you work in a field where putting preprints online is an accepted practice, then write up your work and upload a preprint.  In this way you clearly establish priority without needing to wait for the article to be refereed.

For instance, in Physics, CS, and Math, most researchers put preprints on arXiv.org.