> A related issue is that there really is no such thing as a senior researcher. Instead, professors are turned into research managers, responsible for helping t

> A related issue is that there really is no such thing as a senior researcher. Instead, professors are turned into research managers, responsible for helping their charges' careers, who then also turn into research managers. Actual research appears to be mostly a still not entirely avoidable side-effect. Although this is a bit depressing and one of the reasons I left academia, is this not partly a reaction to the changing nature of science? With many fields well established with strong foundations there are arguably fewer revolutionary ideas required. It looks like science is going to be more evolutionary and less revolutionary, with emphasis shifting from the individual researcher to large teams. Take for example the LHC where managing the huge teams and technology is (I imagine) significantly more of a challenge than interpreting the data or deciding what experiments to run. A bit of an extreme example perhaps but large projects are probably going to become more prevalent as most of the lower-hanging fruit is claimed.