Q&A for How to Be a Good Scientist

To become a professional scientist, you will need to successfully complete a doctoral degree (Ph.D.) program in your subject of interest at an accredited university. If you'd like to remain in academia, you will then move on to complete a post-doctoral fellowship at a different institution. There are many professional scientists that end up working in industry, such as for a pharmaceutical company.

Good scientists are organized and hard-working. The most important quality to have as a scientist is perseverance, as many of your experiments will fail. You must also be adept in communicating your work to a lay audience.

The knowledge or education needed varies by job, but an undergraduate degree would be required for most jobs. If you are in high school, take math as much as you can. Take the science courses best suited for your branch.

It all depends whether they're working for a large corporation or are independent researchers struggling for grant money for projects. However, the best scientists are more focused on exploration and discovery than profit.

Of course, yes! There are many sites in the world that offers this facility. One of my favorite sites is Whitehat Jr, it also provides classes to become one. If you don't find it useful, you can always search for one. Each site has its own specific requirements.

Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization is a method of creating ions without destroying the molecules from which they are created. Further description can be found in Wikipedia's article on the subject.

See Join NASA .

See Become a Scientist .