While some seniors are still struggling over how to begin researching their theses, one of their peers has been working on hers for the majority of her college career.

Anna Greka '98, a neurobiology concentrator, came to Harvard from Greece with the specific goal in mind of taking "advantage of the research opportunities available here."

Greka began her thesis research in the summer following her sophomore year and has been working on it since.

Like many other senior science concentrators, Greka currently spends about 20 to 25 hours a week in lab doing research for her thesis.

But in many departments, such as physics and chemistry, a large proportion of students are doing lab work without the intention of writing a thesis.

With three quarters of all chemistry concentrators actively pursuing lab work, research is a high priority in the chemistry department, says James E. Davis, Head Tutor for the chemistry department.

And even though only "a small handful" of concentrators do theses, Davis says that students publish their findings in other forms.

"We have lots of students doing research, lots [of students] publishing papers," Davis says.

According to Davis, the chemistry department wants students to have the experience of working in a lab and not be pressured by the time constraints posed by writing a thesis.

But in the physics department, students pressured officials to allow them to write honors theses based on laboratory research, says physics department Head Tutor Margaret E. Law. According to Law, the policy was recently changed and now about three out of 50 physics concentrators submit theses each year.

In the biology department, however, almost one-third of the seniors opt to write theses, says Head Tutor William M. Gelbart.

While a thesis is not mandatory, Gelbart, who is also professor of molecular and cellular biology, says that about 45 to 50 of the department's approximate 150 senior concentrators write theses each year.

"We encourage it if people are interested in it," he says. "[But] we think that it's not for everyone so we provide other completely legitimate alternatives. I think the one case where arguably it's encouraged is that you can not get a summa recommendation from the department without having done an honors thesis."

Gelbart says that while the department does allow its students to do a "library thesis," seniors rarely choose to do it because "it's actually much harder than a research thesis." Gelbart adds that "about exactly zero" students opted to do a library thesis last year.

"In a research thesis you really develop the project together with your mentor, but you're expected to execute it and really elaborate on the plans," he says.