I've recently embarked on my PhD studies (cancer, structural biology) and have yet to publish. Currently, there are some 200 papers in my name and several thousand under my surname. Because of this, I am considering switching my surname to an old, rare, surname in my family, which is only used by one active researcher.
My question is this: are there any reasonable alternatives that does not include legally changing my name? I personally don't mind changing it, but the old surname happens to be "noble", and may come off as quite pretentious. I would be able to change to another, less pretentious, surname, but in terms of rareness, no alternative comes close.
In short, what are my alternatives?
Answer
I also have a very common name (usually quoted along the lines of "Smith, J.") and despite the fact that I have worked and published with two different institutions there has never been a problem assigning all my papers to me personally (ORCID and other system let you take your institution(s) into account). As long as there isn't a person with the same first and last name in your institution (and even then, it usually a couple of clicks to rectify the situation and I am speaking of someone who had to contend with a Joan/John Smith situation).
My university makes all researchers from post doc onwards keep a list of their publications on their official university homepage, so even google will associate my publications correctly. So if you come across a paper from my old affiliation you can get my current contact data from this.
And honestly most subfields are specialised enough that people roughly know that John Smith at institution A is working on a certain topic (because that's what your group does) and John Smith at institution B will probably not have published a particular paper. If people want to talk to your about your results, they will find you, even with a common name.
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