How do I become a great experimental physicist? originally appeared on Quora, the place to gain and share knowledge, empowering people to learn from others and better understand the world. You can follow Quora on Twitter, Facebook, and Google Plus.

I don’t claim to be a ‘great’ experimental physicist, and my answer is based on my observations of scientists who are senior enough to enter that echelon. Nevertheless, I hope that most of this is applicable to junior scientists. In addition, these observations are probably most applicable to lab-based experimental physics—condensed matter, soft matter, AMO, biophysics—in which a single principle investigator can hypothetically control all the verticals of their research program.

There are some commonalities that most great experimental physicists share—commitment to finding the scientific truth, meticulousness, patience, perseverance. But beyond these basics, there are many ways to distinguish yourself from the rest of the field, and this diversity of strategies highlights the diversity of skills and personality types that are represented in experimental physics. Some of the roads to greatness in lab-based experimental physics I have seen are given below:

* Being a huge gear-head and ‘inventing’ a new experimental technique or pushing an existing one to have non-trivially improved capabilities. Pushing experimental technology forward is one way of distinguishing oneself as an experimentalist, and perhaps the one that physics PhD programs ‘teach’ most commonly.

* Having a strong grasp of the theory side of your subfield. This can allow one to design a more targeted experiment, to write more ‘complete’ papers, and to control the narrative of one’s research field better.

* Having strong and strategic collaborations. Although the physics subfields at the focus of this answer are not comprised of thousand-person collaborations, it is still crucial to have collaborators to fill in the holes of what is likely a very specialized research program. Leveraging these collaborations in a way that puts one consistently ahead of the competition is another route to greatness.

* Inventing a new subfield or sub-sub-field. Sometimes, this subfield is an interdisciplinary one at the intersection of several different fields (e.g. Photonic crystals combine concepts of condensed matter, optics, and electrical engineering). Other times, this new field is fully ensconced in one discipline, but represents a route not previously taken which (most importantly) engenders ample follow up research by many others (e.g. Topological insulators). This path towards greatness can stem from being an expert in more than one field, having great insight in one field, or sometimes by sheer luck.

* Being able to attract and nurture other talented people. Having many academic ‘descendants’ who continue to do physics research is an important way that some of the ‘greats’ perpetuate their techniques and ideas well beyond their own laboratory.

* Being able to ‘sell’ one’s ideas and research program better than others in the field. Nowadays, persuasiveness is important for all researchers who want their program to be funded, but some can leverage this tool better than others for elevating the impact of their results and ideas. For this category of greatness, one should not picture a used-car salesman aggressively hawking an inferior product; one’s successes in research, including distinguishing oneself in one of the ways listed above, contribute strongly to their ability to ‘sell’ research.

As a young researcher, you probably can’t/won’t plan to excel in each of these categories, but it is a good idea to have a strategy for how you might distinguish yourself from the pack based on these ideas or from observations in your own field/experience. Another good resource (for condensed matter specifically) is the list of Oliver E. Buckley Prize winners. Not all of them are experimentalists, but by looking at the various citations you can get a good idea about the variety of successes that are rewarded.

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