<p>At the beginning of a student's career, is it better to hold-off on the data until enough is there for a submission to a big journal (Cell, Nature, Science), or should one just take the data and go for 2 pubs in smaller journals such as Journal of Immunology?</p>
<p>Take the easy publications. The potential to be scooped is high in virtually every area. Nobody judges the quality of your career by your first publications.</p>
<p>btw, ji is still a great journal</p>
<p>Two Journal of Immunology papers != a Nature paper. The potential impact of your work and the novelty of the techniques you use determines whether you can get into better journals, not the quantity of work! (Well, maybe Cell.) Did your PI really present this decision to you in this way?</p>
<p>Write up your findings and submit them to a journal appropriate for their impact level. Then pick a new topic. Ask yourself, if I could answer this research question, would the solution be significant enough for Nature? Assuming you have the freedom to design your own work (a fair assumption since you're even writing your own papers), you really don't have to settle for a cookie-cutter project.</p>
<p>It may be a little late, but here's the advice my adviser gave me. You have to design your projects in advance to have clear beginnings and ends. There will always be unanswered details, but you shouldn't "just keep going," chipping away at minutiae or going off on a tangent. Plan your exit in advance so that you can move on to a new, interesting problem.</p>
<p>snowcapk, appreciate your great input, just PMed you.</p>
<p>It also depends on your field. While Nature, Science, and Cell are all high impact journals, journals that are more field specific will have a lower impact score but will still be very credible and quality publication sources. At this level of your career you wouldn't be expected to have publications in Nature or Science.</p>