How to get involved in research and/or publish articles?

Question

So, I'm a university student, my program is life science, and I'm in need of some extras in my record to apply for a masters program. I've read that it is very important to have publications and be involved in research. I just can't seem to get started on it. How do you publish an article? Do you just come up with a topic, write it and once is done give it to a prof or someone for approval? do you send it to a journal or what? in a university, who are the people you look for when it comes to this stuff?

And research also. I'd like to be on a research team for a prof. I don't care what position but to be doing something involving research. Where do you look for positions like that? do you simply walk around asking random profs if they do research and if i can join their team? that sounds kind of amateur. Pleeaasee help! =D

Answer 1

It's very difficult to come up with a topic on your own and research it at your level - you don't know what's been done, so you don't know if you're repeating something.  Even advanced graduate students have that problem.  You need to find a research adviser who can help you pick a topic, get the resources to investigate it, and help you with research in general - it takes a while to pick up all the nuances.

The best thing to do is to talk to a professor about getting involved with their research team, or the team of someone else in your department.  Check out your dept website to see which professors are doing what before talking to them - do a little background research so you know a bit about the topic first.  If they don't have a spot on their team, maybe they know who does.

Next fall, start looking into REU (research experience for undergraduate) programs in your field for the following summer.  These are paid positions at universities all over the country, as well as national labs, that give you valuable research experience and sometimes a conference poster or a publication.