A Rose By Any Other Name

How do we name research groups?

There was some discussion on naming conventions and practices of university-based scientific research groups: do you name the group/lab after the PI or after the field of research. Some surnames are more amenable to this than others particularly if people don’t spell or pronounce them correctly. At some point generic field lab names become either too common or too specific to be useful. How many ecology labs or biogeochemistry labs do we need? If the research could be done at a variety of universities or institutes then ought one include that name to be specific? Students often rely on the PI for reference letters so branding a group after the PI has some non-egocentric merit.

Now, about logos and acronyms …

What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet