To my students

(or those who are interested in joining my group)

First of all, there are people who choose to stay in the academic field because they do not want to interact with any human beings. I acknowledge that this is part of the diversity and I fully respect their lifestyle.

However, I try to maintain an inclusive and cooperative working style. Due to the interdisciplinary nature of our works, we are exposed to an extremely wide range of knowledge/skills/technology, and it is unlikely for one Master’s or Ph.D. student to be fluent in all of them. Therefore, being cooperative would be extremely critical for you to become successful in my group. For those who prefer not to be socialized, please consider other supervisors (there are supervisors who welcome such kinds of students).

I on average spend 5~10 hours on each of my student every week, to discuss with them about their projects, read and revise the English document they wrote, or read the papers they both of us need to read. I take supervision seriously. Therefore, you may feel pressure, and I will not supervise too many students at the same time. When I am too busy to work with you in person (e.g., when I am having multiple international travels in a short time period), I may introduce somebody else to help you (e.g., my former students or my long-term collaborators). In that case, you should trust me and the person I introduce to you, cooperate, and interact with that person nicely and politely.

Timeline

Here I am giving an overview of what typically will happen. Make your own plan. Discuss with me your plan. We can once in a while review your actual achievement, and revise your plan based on that. Try not to make me urge you to do something.

  • Master’s student
    1. First year: You may spend most of your time taking courses. The first winter vacation will be a window for you to kick off some research work. If you can start doing some research in the summer before you enroll in the school, the timeline may be a little more relaxed.
    2. The end of your first academic year, starting from late June: If you want to apply to Ph.D. programme abroad, it may take you 3~6 months full time to prepare for the exams (English and subject) and 1 month full time to check schools and compose your application. The application deadlines are typically in October-December. If you need me to write good recommendation letters for you, let me know at least three weeks ahead of the deadline. And by the time you submit the application, you need to accomplish some tasks that are worth mentioning in a recommendation letter. If this is what you want to do, I would encourage it. Plan your time very carefully (including the first year or even before your first year), and be ready to overwork yourself. I help those people who help themselves.
    3. The 2nd half of the 2nd year: A preliminary draft of your thesis should be ready for my revision by late April. I will make you write down what you do immediately after you do that. Do so. Do not defer the writing task; do not try to write up the whole thesis at once in the 2nd half of your 2nd year. If deferring writing is the main reason why you cannot accomplish the thesis on time, you may not get a degree on time, or you may not get a degree.
  • Ph.D. student (under construction)
  • Postdoc (under construction)

Useful General Information

A minimal skill set you need would be: Linux operation system, LaTEX, one programming language (e.g., Python), general physics, and general communication skills in English (reading/writing/speaking/listening). I do not expect you to know all these at the beginning. But you need to be mentally prepared to pick up the first three shortly, and develop the English communication skills as time goes by.

  • Proposal deadlines
    1. Submillimeter Array (SMA): mid March and September. More in SMAOC.
    2. Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (JVLA): Feb./Aug. 01 every year. More in My NRAO (please register an account).
    3. Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) Around Apr. 20 every year. More in ALMA User Portal.
    4. Various optical or infrared telescopes: Mostly in March or September every year.
    5. Others : I may once in a while notify you (by E-mails) something worth trying.
  • List of Star-formation related conference and workshops
    1. Star-Formation News Letters.
  • (Sub)millimeter molecular line tools
    1. Splatologue: Complete, but no visualization.
    2. SMA Passband Visualizer: Handy, if you are proposing to the SMA or ALMA Band 5, 6, 7, and 8.
    3. The CDMS database: More details about the quantum numbers are explained. Can check partition function.
  • Other tools for planning observations
    1. target source visibility: STARALT
  • Literature
    1. New papers : Browse arXiv/astro-ph everyday is a good habit.
    2. Existing journal papers : You can use this interface NASA/ADS to find them.
  • Data Analysis Environment
    1. On Desktops : We use the Cent OS Linux distribution, which is very similar to Redhat but is free. If you want to learn Linux, a good Chinese documentation can be found at 鳥站. If you do not read Chinese, this page may be workable but there should be others.
    2. On Laptops : You can either use Cent OS although I usually recommend Ubuntu.
    3. Other OS : If you insist on using Windows or Mac OSX, you will likely encounter many problems that I have no idea how to solve. This is particularly bad when you need to visit other observatories and tentatively work there. I strongly un-recommend using Windows. In general, I do not recommend using Mac OSX.
  • Editing
    1. We use LaTEX for text editing. A good introduction to Latex can be found here. But I would recommend simply downloading a template and then starting working with it instead of following through the introduction. Please register and use this online interface Overleaf such that I can directly revise your works online.
    2. Please use Grammarly to check through your text to make sure there are no typos or grammatical errors before inviting me to work on it.
  • Programing and Project Management
    1. You are very strongly encouraged to use at least the basic function of Github to maintain your programming projects. You can include some Jupyter notebook in some repositories and pass the link for me to preview. If you are confused about how to generate SSH key, a Chinese documentation can be found here. If you are not paying for an Overleaf account, it is good to use Github to maintain versions or backups of your papers and thesis.
    2. You can use the Markdown language to make comments or explanations on your Jupyter notebook. A good Chinese introduction can be found here. The official cheet sheet is also handy.
    3. You can do your work with Python. I used to be using something else but am switching over to Python. For astrophysicists, the most frequently used packages are astropy, SciPy, Numpy; we use matplotlib or aplpy to produce publication-level figures. Those plotting packages are very poorly documented. If you have trouble using them, please ask other senior students in my group or ask me. Since all packages are dynamically evolving, it is necessary to maintain your packages using Anaconda. Start using Anaconda from day-1. Otherwise, you will encounter infinite troubles in the future.
  • Career Planing If you need some advice, you may either discuss it with me or try to contact my former students.

Attitude

You are assumed to be a mature person who is able to be responsible for your thesis and your own future. A bit of general advice is to treat people nicely and be helpful, such that people (e.g., me) would feel happy to help you want you need the help. No one is responsible for treating you extra nicely. You better earn it. For a more detailed guideline, see this page.

Requirement

This should be defined case-by-case. But a general guideline can be found in this page.

Specific to Students in Various Research Areas

Embedded for some information that I think can be useful for students on certain topics. It will look like there is a whole lot of work and learning for you, which is true. It is possible to accomplish them. Many of my former students have done so. Please routinely discuss with me your plan and schedule to ensure that you can accomplish what you are supposed to.

Tips of Using Certain Telescopes or Software

I try to provide some of those in the Telescope Tips and Software Tips pages. Please let me know when any update is necessary.

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