Is there a specific field of research you are trying to get into? If so, pick a research paper/topic with practical industry applications, then implement and explain it in an easy-to-understand way. You can write a blog post (or series) about it and publish everything on Github. It may take a while, but personally I found that trying to explain a complex topic in a simple and practical way is the absolute best way to really understand it. Passively reading papers is not going to give you the same understanding. And using JS for this type of project is perfect, because lots of people are familiar with it. You will make research more accessible to everyone, which is something we need. Try to choose a project that's a good fit for JS. For example, something that heavily relies on optimized memory allocation and GPU operations probably isn't a good fit.

Be warned though, there are quite a few research papers, especially those coming out of Academia as opposed to industry, that are cryptic, lacking in detail, or not easily reproducible. And that's intentional. This isn't obvious when you read a paper, it will only become obvious when you actually try to reproduce it. These papers are the result of misaligned goals Academia in, where it's all about publishing as many papers as possible that look good on the surface. When In doubt, I'd recommend focusing on research that has a lot of interest from the industry. That's usually a safer bet.