[pmoriarty]

"The enzyme assay has to get done after you prep, and the prep is an 8 hour block of time after your cells are ready, and you have to do 10 hours of enzyme kinetic work... So you stay up all night."

I don't get it. Why can't this be done by multiple people in 8 hour shifts?

The medical profession is also pretty insane for making its residents work crazy hours and get almost no sleep for 24, 36, or even more hours a shift. It never made sense to me, especially as these people are risking their and other people's lives by going without sleep for so long.

[throw_away_777]

Of course it can (and should) be done by multiple people, but there is an essentially unlimited supply of postdocs and graduate students from China and India who are willing to work long hours. A graduate student salary is peanuts for a US citizen compared to industry, not so for someone from a third-world country. This isn't hyperbole - more than half of the graduate students at my University were not born in the US. Graduate students 3-4 years into their PhD face tremendous pressure not to quit, and you usually make the decision to go into graduate school very early in your career.