SCIENCE

The smokers chitchat about a principal investigator (PI) who is so focused on getting her next grant and publishing her next paper that she never has time to mentor her assistants. "She treats me like a drone, expecting me to enter data all day. I don't feel like I'm learning anything new from her," says that PI's hopeful protégé. Cross that lab off the list, too, Amy thinks. Another smoker has gotten wind of a rumor that a department chair is interviewing at another university and may not be around that much longer, turning the conversation to what that might mean for the department and the medical school.