After finishing an accelerated Master’s program studying the role of evolution in invasive smartweed at Wesleyan University, Lauren Nichols planned to pursue a PhD, but wanted to take a break after three intense years of research. Additionally, because of this rigorous program, she felt she hadn’t had a chance to explore her options and didn’t want to pigeonhole herself into one topic so early. So, she jumped at the opportunity to investigate the effect of climate change on tree populations by joining ecologist Jim Clark’s group as a lab manager at Duke University in 2009.
When the lab partnered with Robert Dunn, a biologist at North Carolina State University (NCSU), and his team, Nichols transferred groups to begin exploring the impact of climate change on ant populations. It was exactly the kind of similar-but-different research she was looking for, and she planned to stay for a year and then apply to graduate schools. However, the research in this lab caught her in its web; twelve years later, the projects that Nichols worked on expanded well beyond ants and forests and led her to return to Duke University in the interdisciplinary role of a data visualization analyst.
A Whole Ecosystem of Research Possibilities
- Lauren Nichols meets with scientists, students, and staff at Duke University to help them pull the story out of their data.
Lauren Nichols
When Nichols joined the Dunn lab in 2010, she expected to study ecological phenomena. The group was beginning to branch out to explore the ecosystems and interactions of other insects, including the bark beetle and the microbes that it carried. As a fun extension of this concept, the lab swabbed their belly buttons to highlight the microbiome that each member carried with them. They displayed their findings in their department.
“All of a sudden, we were flooded by people being like, ‘Wait, why is this one different from that one?’, and ‘What’s in my belly button?’, and ‘I've noticed there's this odor in my belly button. Can you tell me why?’” Nichols recalled. She said that the researchers dove into these questions, where they found a scientific gap in the literature on the microbiome of the belly button.
These curiosities became an interesting side project that she and other members approached from an ecological perspective; this led to more questions about the environment of the human body and people’s interactions with microbes, insects, and their whole ecosystem. Dunn’s group began collaborating with microbiologists, statisticians—and even experts beyond life science research like historians and chefs—to answer these questions. “As we sort of collaborated with these people, our realm of what we could do really expanded,” Nichols said.
As a lab manager and researcher in the Dunn lab, Nichols was originally concerned about stagnating in one project, but soon realized that was far from the case. The projects that she worked on ranged from bacteria on showerheads and chimpanzee microbiomes to citizen science projects investigating human indoor climate preferences.1-3 “Whereas my goal had been to test out a few different fields within biology and ecology, my horizon was just blown open and I got to work with all of these different disciplines,” Nichols said.
She realized that, through this interdisciplinary research, she had become much more of a generalist. “There was this whole playground of different projects, and I was constantly learning how to communicate with people from different disciplines within academia,” she said.
“The real work is figuring out the most important stories, and then actually making simpler visualizations that tell those pieces of the story most effectively.”
-Lauren Nichols, Duke University
Additionally, despite almost leaving biology in her undergraduate years to avoid statistics, Nichols discovered a passion for coding and analyzing data with statistical programs, using these projects as a way to feed her curiosity. “I enjoyed the process of exploring data the same way I’d explored a forest, where I'd go in and just be curious,” she said.
This exploration of data led her to another realization: pursuing a PhD would force her to specialize. She didn’t want to choose just one topic to study and lead her own group, but she did like being involved with research. However, when Dunn was promoted to the senior vice provost of the university, Nichols found herself with a choice: transfer to university administration or find another research group to join, albeit at the expense of the breadth of research scope she enjoyed.
At the time, Nichols couldn’t think of a role that fit her interests and strengths. “I realized [that] I really loved learning about all these different disciplines and learning other people's perspectives, especially talking to people about their very niche sort of special interests that they are focusing their whole life on this one tiny fragment of a story that I didn't even know anyone was focused on,” Nichols explained.
Finding a Professional Niche in Data Science
One of the projects that Nichols worked on brought her into contact with librarians at NCSU. “I realized that their scope was way broader than I ever knew, and they were working on some really fun projects,” she said. Working across the entire university, the librarians’ work was also highly interdisciplinary.
When Nichols found the position of data visualization analyst at Duke University, she thought it captured all of her favorite aspects of science research, describing it as an “aha” moment in finding her own, still broad, niche. In this role, Nichols meets with individuals across the university, from students to faculty and staff, to help them communicate their findings in whatever format they need for their specific audience. This might involve helping a student create a diagram to capture the main points of their dissertation, troubleshooting a difficult piece of code for a researcher, or compiling data on university programs for administrators for stakeholder presentations.
“Often someone is so deep in their discipline that everything seems important, and they feel like they need to show all of it in order to convey the story,” Nichols said, admitting she did the same thing when she was first showing data. “The real work is figuring out the most important stories, and then actually making simpler visualizations that tell those pieces of the story most effectively.”
Alongside her data science consultations, Nichols teaches data visualization for a Master’s in Interdisciplinary Data Science program, where many of the students are professionals working in industry.
In all of these instances, Nichols says that the difference in outcomes is starkly different from those when she was working in the lab. “That has been a shift for me to let go of the need for some very quantitative, measurable metrics of success and accepting that just engaging with the community and trying to be as helpful as I can is my whole job, which is sort of liberating in some ways and exciting.”
Nichols explained that resource positions like hers are becoming more popular across universities, and while many are affiliated with the library system, not all are. For trainees interested in a data science resource role, especially one focused on data visualization, Nichols recommended building a portfolio to demonstrate one’s skills in communicating information. One online group people can get involved with is Tidy Tuesday, a community of data scientists and enthusiasts who post a new data set every week that members can create a visualization with and post to social media, where others will comment to give feedback.
Additionally, Nichols said that taking time to be curious and read about new things can help people find new topics that they enjoy and the opportunities that come with them. This can be great for exploring new ways to do things and finding questions and areas that haven’t been as well described. At the very least, it can help reignite one’s curiosity about science.
- Gerbert MJ, et al. Ecological analyses of mycobacteria in showerhead biofilms and their relevance to human health. mBio. 2018;9(5):01614-18.
- Bueno de Mesquita CP, et al. Structure of chimpanzee gut microbiomes across tropical Africa. mSystems. 2021;6(3):01269-20.
- Just MG, et al. Human indoor climate preferences approximate specific geographies. R Soc Open Sci. 2019;6(3):180695.
