What is science research all about?

What skills should I develop if I want to do research in computer science and/or statistics in six months?

• I am going to graduate soon and will probably join a research lab for a year or two and then move on to graduate school. What skills do I need to be successful at the research lab? I will probably work at the intersection of statistics and computer science in the cancer research domain. EDIT: I am a computer science student.

• Answer:

  There isn't a common set of skills that span even a large subset of Computer Science research topics.  If you're looking at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-order_logicand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automated_theorem_proving proving that's a very different set of skills than https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optimizing_compiler, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_computing, et cetera, et cetera. If you're thinking about heading into experimental computer science, learn R.