success in academia... - an interesting study (Nov/16/2007 )

Abstract

Success in academia is hypothesized to require specific phenotypes. In
order to
understand how such unusual traits arise, we use mutant clones to
identify the molecular events that occur during the transition from a
graduate student to professor. A pool of graduate students was subjected
to several rounds of random mutagenesis followed by selection on minimal
money media in the absence of dental insurance. Students surviving this
selection were further screened for the ability to work long hours with
vending machine snacks as sole carbon source; clones satisfying these
requirements were dubbed "post-docs".

In order to identify assistant professors from amongst postdocs, this
pool was further mutagenized, and screened for the ability to turn
esoteric results into a 50-minute seminar. Finally, these assistant
professors were evaluated for their potential to become full professors
in two ways: first they were screened for overproduction and surface
display of stress proteins such as Hsp70. Assistant
professors that displayed such proteins (so called "stressed out"
mutants) were then fused to M13 coat protein, displayed on phages and
passed over a friend and family members column, to identify those that
were incapable of functional interactions. These were called full
professors. Although these mutants arose independently, they share
striking phenotypes. These included the propensity to talk incessantly
about their own research, the inability to accurately judge the time
required to complete bench work, and belief that all their ideas
constituted good thesis projects. The linkage of all these traits
suggests that these phenotypes are co-ordinately regulated.

Preliminary experiments have identified a putative global regulator.
Studies are currently being conducted to determine if overexpression of
this gene product in post-docs and grad students can speed up the grad
student-full professor evolutionary process.

Wow!!!!!!
Who wrote that????????

It’s really great!!!!

I would like to see the full paper!

Its so good...............

I'd try a fast-track publication in nature with these data!