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Job Title: Scientist
Type of Company: Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School I'm part of the Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Psychiatric Neuroimaging Department. We work to find the brain mechanisms responsible for psychiatric conditions such as schizophrenia and autism.
Education: BSc in Electrical Engineering, Ben Gurion University, Israel •• PhD in Neuroscience, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA
Previous Experience: Postdoctoral Fellow, Children's Hospital Boston & Harvard Medical School
Job Tasks: I am a research fellow, which is a training position people usually get between the completion of a PhD and running their own lab as faculty members. I use neuroimaging techniques such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and electroencephalography (EEG) to study the neurological basis of cognitive deficits in autism. I'm particularly interested in a part of the brain called the anterior cingulate cortex, which is responsible for functions such as attention and memory. fMRI measures blood flow in the brain, so you can see which parts are involved in different functions.
I'm also interested in how genetic factors influence brain activity in autism. For example, I study the gene that regulates chemicals called "neurotransmitters" in the brain. My time is divided between scanning the brains of patients and analyzing the data. I use a lot of computer programming in my daily work for sophisticated data analysis. I enjoy my work a lot and hope to discover something that would lead to a cure for autism.
Best and Worst Parts of the Job: Best part: Discovering something really exciting and interacting with the patients. All my colleagues are highly educated people and I learn something every day.
Worst part: The salary is not very high, and you have to apply for grants all the time to keep your research going. Also, some experiments don't work as well as you expected.
Job Tips:
1. Take a deep breath: It takes many years of training to be a scientist, so you have to really want it. You should first go to college, then get a PhD degree, then usually a few years of postdoctoral training.
2. Take a lot of science classes in college.
3. Do a senior thesis in college.
4. Programming skills are extremely helpful in almost any field of science, including "soft" sciences, so take computer classes in college.
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