How to get first authorships?

Pharmagal
Fri, 17 Aug 2007 19:48:30 +0000

Well! Having published a few first authored and 2nd /3rd authored papers in preclinical and clinical, I will put in my 2 cents here.

In my experience, I found out that your ability to get first authorship on papers tends to be directly proportional to the degree of your mentor’s security. One can literally live in a lab and produce large amount of results and still have the ‘top Postdoc’ or the ‘mentor’ take all credit while you end of up with an obscure 3rd authorship.

Conversely, you might be lucky to end up with a really psychologically and financially (grant) secure mentor who actually let’s you take the credit you deserve and prefers being in the shadows himself.

I have experienced both. It’s pretty tricky to figure them out.

Therefore, it helps to have a mentor who has been in research long enough to have produced considerable amount of papers without being an eminent KOL in the field. These mentors tend to be happy to give you the credit you deserve. If you work for an rising newbee prof, most likely, you will only get partial credit.

Scientists or MDs who have earned their grey, are pretty well aware that ‘first authorship’ is not everything it may appear to be.

I think getting your name in papers, irrespective of the order matters much more. Understand your research thoroughly…be so well prepared with background pubmed research that you ought to be able to defend your project as well as you would your dissertation! That’s what interviewers look for. The spark and the enthusiasm with which you discuss your research, innovative ideas you bring forth, and your passion for science!

Don’t get stressed out over the order in which your name appears.

First authorships only matter when you are applying to grants or to secure academic research positions in educational institutions.