What is going on here? What kind of publication could this be?

[Gauss44]

Here's what happened:

I have been out of school for several years and I am a non-science major who has been wanting to do scientific research for what seems like forever. I wrote a letter to a former science professor of mine expressing my desire to begin doing research in his field. He responded to my email by saying that he could use help on a research paper and that I could come in to discuss. So we set up a time and I came to his office.

In our meeting, he said he was working on a research paper and could use my help. We had a long discussion about the general subject matter of what he was working on (which was a disease and how the disease worked), AND we discussed an already published very old (decades old) research publication from another country (not done by the professor). The professor handed me his partial draft with an incomplete introduction that summarizes the content (primarily numerical data) of the published decades old paper we discussed. Professor asked if I would help him complete that paper. The plan was to continue where it left off in summarizing what the other paper said. I thought he asked me to then write about his idea of what caused the trends in data on the other paper, and to find additional support for those trends. The professor told me that he thought he figured out what caused the data presented in the decades old study.

Topic: What caused the trends in data found during a previous study.
Basis: Professor says so. I, perhaps naively, offered to do online research to find support.
(Maybe, despite numerous clarifying questions and repeating instructions back, I still misunderstood what was being asked of me. Maybe the professor was intentionally being vague, but too vague given my lack of knowledge.)

I felt confused at first and attempted to clarify. So I tried to repeat back topic by topic of what he wanted me to write about in order to complete the paper, "Okay, so you would like me to continue by explaining figure 3, figure 4, and then get into what caused those trends." He said, "X caused the trend. I'm pretty sure of that. What else could it be?" So, I said, "Okay, I will discuss the theory that X caused the trend." I asked the professor if this would be considered a research publication and not only said, "yes," but said he would make me first author (in a completely serious tone, not a hint of sarcasm or humor or anything). I thought it was either good or too good to be true. I was expecting a more straight forward, perhaps lower level project as my first research project. I asked the professor if he is currently doing research in a lab with lab assistants and he said, "no."

I still want to do research, and would like to do a good job on this publication. I feel like I asked the professor every question I possibly could, and for a while, felt like I understood what's going on. After looking into things, I'm back to being confused again.

This is a science professor and unambiguously a science subject matter. A part of me wonders if it would be too skeptical to suspect that he might just be messing with me for some reason. I have no idea what reason. It's just that this seems very odd. I am also about ready to spend A LOT of time and money on this (printing costs, tutors, etc.) since it's my first publication, supposedly. Plus this is the end of September when research jobs are probably filling up fast, a bad time to waste time, if this isn't a legit project.

Does this sound like any kind of a research publication anyone is familiar with?

At this point, I am also considering writing the professor back and saying, "Thank you for the opportunity; however, after a great deal of effort and consideration, I have decided that this project is above my skill level." I would hate to do that with a potential LoR professor the year before applying to medical school, but if this is not possible for me, better to back out sooner than later, I suspect.

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[sameas]

I'm not a scientist, but a medical writer who helps faculty publish and edit their NIH grants.

You are smart to turn this down. If you want research experience, find a lab that's running actual experiments. Publishing without actual research experience will teach you nothing. Don't hire tutors and pay out of pocket for a pub that, at best, will end up in a junk journal. The professor is probably well established and resting on his laurels. He's writing theory papers after decades on the bench (presumably). You won't learn anything from this.

Or, the professor is just assigning you busy work. He pulled some manuscript off the shelf and said you should have a go at it. Of course, he'll give you first author. He has no lab. You're the only person working on this. He probably doesn't care because if this project mattered he could have banged out this manuscript quickly since there's no research involved. He's just riffing off somebody else's work.

Publishing is usually a slow process. Not every paper is accepted and good papers usually require revisions. Don't yoke yourself to a project like this. It'll be a project that will never end. Get your hands dirty with actual data.

 

[Gauss44]

I am thinking that I would like to "bang this article out" for the professor, but I cannot visualize how an article like this is suppose to go. Does anyone know of a similar article that starts out discussing a previously published paper and then goes beyond the previous paper to speculate on why the findings were what they were? Or similar?

My thinking is that if I show hard work and do a decent job, that I might or might not get a positive LoR from this professor and that he might or might not recommend me to someone who does have a lab. (To be wise, I might limit the time, effort, etc. I put forth until I can somehow figure out if this professor is still a good guy, and not subtly being a jerk because he's fed up with students in general or something.)

 

[Labkid]

The only thing I can think of are review articles but those use many articles that have vast amounts of data in order to build a well connected idea about one topic from many smaller theories in the individual papers.

This sounds like the professor has nothing else better to do which is exactly what it will look like on your CV... like you had nothing else better to do but google up some data.

Sameas is right, go to a lab that will have you doing the most basic of procedures and then work your way up to starting a project.