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I see some papers use "research team" while others use "research group". Do they mean the same thing, a few of researchers that form a team dedicated to a research?

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  • The two terms seem to mean the same thing, unless an institution formally makes a distinction.
    – JRN
    Commented Apr 17, 2020 at 2:52
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    If they don't, it's certainly not universal enough to make an assumptions
    – Azor Ahai -him-
    Commented Apr 17, 2020 at 3:19

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I would use “research group” to describe the set of people that is the students that I advise and any researchers I employ (plus myself).

“Research team” to me would be primarily the set of PIs with who I am collaborating on a given grant or other project, and may also encompass the students and researchers who are directly involved in that project.

“PI” here would be anyone in a principle investigator role for the project. This would certainly include professors and researchers at government labs/museums/zoos with whom I set up the project and secured funding, and could also include people who joined the project later under their own resources at our invitation, rather than being hired by one of the existing PIs out of the original funds. A postdoc coming in with their own funding, but with the funding contingent on their having a supervisor, would be in a grey area between the “PI-level” sense of “research team” and the broader sense of “PIs plus their students and staff”.

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  • Thanks for you answer. Does "PI" refer to principal investigator, the holder of an independent grant and the lead researcher for the grant project?
    – WXJ96163
    Commented Apr 17, 2020 at 4:53
  • Edited to expand my definition of PI.
    – RLH
    Commented Apr 17, 2020 at 6:32
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Yes, they mean the same thing (or if they don't the difference is subtle enough that most people will not agree on what the difference is).

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  • I disagree that they mean the same thing — if I referred to people from research teams that I’m on as being “in my research group”, I would at least get funny looks from colleagues, and possibly hurt my standing in the community for being out of sync with accepted technical vocabulary. (This is not to dispute the fact that that the vocabulary might be community-dependent)
    – RLH
    Commented Apr 17, 2020 at 6:35

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