<p>The entire idea of an undergraduate student doing engineering research is perplexing to me. I just can't understand how I could possibly have any knowledge to contribute to the research being done as I am currently a Freshman. Yet, many of my peers have done "research" in their high school years and are continuing to do so as a Freshman. The high school I went to wasn't as competitive as the college I am now attending (avg. public univ.). </p>
<p>I have always had an interest in creating experiments, collecting data and using this data to be more efficient. The problem is, my experiments are usually rudimentary and my knowledge isn't very deep. It's more than most people I know but still isn't much. </p>
<p>So, I'm wondering what exactly undergraduate science/engineering research entails. What type of knowledge do I need before I end up in a lab with a professor and look foolish?</p>
<p>So I will be doing very easy chemistry lab sort of things for the professionals? </p>
<p>If you have any experience with this, how long did you have to do that before you were allowed to make meaningful contributions to the research?</p>
<p>Meaningful contributions can be measured in all sorts of different ways. I contributed in meaningful ways my freshman year by writing a program to help run some experiments. I contributed my sophomore summer by running experiments and comparing our measurements to published models. Senior year I was doing heavy data analysis and interpretation. When I went to grad school I designed my own experiments, tried to figure out how to best achieve what I’m looking for, and interpret, at a more fundamental level than before, what’s going on in my experiments, and having to write up the results in papers for publications.</p>
<p>Even something as simple as being a helping hand to the grad students in setting up/taking down experiments can be a very meaningful contribution. Grad students are essentially indentured servants so they are generally happy to have the help, and while we can be skeptical of undergrads at first, just show a willingness to learn and you will pick up on plenty of new things and soon be able to go and do things more independently around the lab. It is even possible sometimes (though rarely) to publish in a reputable journal as an undergrad. It is even semi-common to eve one of the secondary authors on a conference paper as an undergrad (depending on your school). All together it can be very rewarding an grad schools love to see it on your r</p>
<p>I have done a student research program (SRP) for undergraduate student in spring quarter in CS department. As a freshman, I have no idea what the program–a research in improving the security of wireless medical devices–fits my knowledge. However, I kept learning. My first task was to write a class in Python for encryption, but I failed. Then things got easier: I collaborated with a senior to contact medical devices producers for detailed technical specs. That did help me improve, but maybe not in CS though.</p>