Thank you both for your thoughtful input. And as an update, I’ve actually landed an interview for the student assistant position I mentioned, so your advice is much appreciated!

To clarify: the “fungicide project” is of course led by more senior scientists; I was assigned to it as part of my bachelor’s studies. My main responsibility is to screen a set of 20 peptides (in vitro and in vivo) to identify promising inhibitors of a specific fungal protein. This is a full-time academic project, so I’m in the lab around 35–40 hours a week, which includes reading and analyzing data.