How to survive your first research lab

Pro tip: Act like you know what you’re doing and figure it out ASAP


Catapulted into the unfamiliar world of research as an unexperienced high schooler during my sophomore-junior year summer, I had a lot of catching up to do in a relatively brief amount of time. Here are some survival skills I learned along the way.

Talk nerdy to me

Even though I was in a lab full of postdoctoral and medical students with way more experience and knowledge, I was still expected to be able to eventually “talk science” to effectively collaborate and pull my weight in lab. What does that mean? Asking a multitude of questions, constantly searching for answers, and a lot, a lot of reading.

My principal investigator (aka the boss) constantly checked in and asked difficult questions on the science and protocols involved in my project to make sure everything was going smoothly. He even “quizzed” me in the elevator (kept me on my toes). As a result of the snowball effect of one unfamiliar interesting concept leading to many, many more unfamiliar equally riveting concepts, “a little bit more reading” turned into binders on binders and a textbook chapter on the side.

This is a picture of all of the reading I had done after two summers of conducting research. It looks more intimidating than it actually was since the more I read, the easier it was to read efficiently and effectively.

Be cautious and clean because pretty much everything is germaphobic

Many, many things in lab are temperature/light/acidity/anything/everything-sensitive. So it was very important to keep things clean. Actually, most things are either sterilized or single use only in lab. It was insane to me how much even water had to be “cleaned.” In fact, although cells and other biological materials could be pretty sturdy in the body, they are pretty fragile outside the body. Thus, trying to grow or maintain them in an incubated petri dish took quite some finesse. I couldn’t put too much or too little. However, once I got the hang of it, I guess you can say that I obtained a clean and green thumb (for growing cells at least).

Above is a picture of the “cleanest” water you can get – good old deionized autoclave-sterilized (think: extremely filtered cooked in a hot and high pressured cooker) dihydrogen monoxide (sounds pretty fancy right? but it’s just water/H2O, don’t let scary sounding science jargon intimidate you).

In the lab world, not all trash is equal

Laboratories produce a lot of waste, from glass or plastic to radioactive or biohazardous and more different types of trash. With radioactive, acid/base, biohazard stickers are everywhere, it was always extremely important to be mindful of where waste went or what chemicals are being handled (i.e. never mix acids and bases), or else dire consequences may ensue. I always double checked with a veteran lab mate whenever I wasn’t sure where things were supposed to be dumped since it’s always better to be safe than sorry.

Of the non-hazardous trashcans, most of them constantly overflowed with used gloves.  Gloves had to be constantly changed and always worn. Although they sometimes felt uncomfortable or annoying (especially after wearing them for a long time, sweaty hands and all), gloves became my second skin as a researcher. Gloves + lab coat = time for an experiment.

To be a researcher, first dress like a researcher (for safety sake!): Me repping my lab coat, a mandatory lab personal protective equipment (PPE).

Protocols control life and the passage of time

Protocols were powerful. They could make or break a researcher’s day. Detailed, organized and continuously improved upon as they are passed along amongst lab members, great protocols were extremely crucial for successful experiments. However, having bad protocols was extremely frustrating as it was always difficult to try to optimize one on your own (there’s too many variables) but every researcher has to do that eventually. Protocols often became anchors of other parts of researchers’ daily lives. Many researchers plug steps into calendars to restore order to the hustle and bustle of lab life.

This is a snapshot of my calendar taken over by research (probably the scariest it ever looked). Getting sucked into the research life, time seemed to be anchored by the successive alarms signaling the end of each step. Sometimes, lunch, breaks, and chats had to be strategically mushed into a lull or waiting time of a procedure. As one might say, I was living, eating and sleeping by the experimental protocol.

The finale

All in all, these are but a few key lessons I have learned working in a biological research laboratory. I am forever grateful that I was able to conduct independent research as a high schooler. Being able to talk with PhDs and people so passionate in their fields allowed me to gain not only some of their wisdom, but also their trust and friendships. Furthermore, I gained numerous valuable skills, such as mastering the pipette, as well as improving presentation and communication skills applicable for any future career path. I learned to be proactive and constantly pushed myself outside my comfort zone. It was by no means easy and took a lot of commitment and dedication, but overcoming the obstacles allowed me to gain truly invaluable experience. Most importantly, no matter what, I remembered to keep calm and research on.