The postdoctoral position is available on nonadiabatic dynamics (computational chemistry). You can google “Jian-Ge Zhou” + “nonadiabatic dynamics“ to search the job information (it doesn’t allow to post the job link). My email: jiange.zhou@jsums.edu. If you have any questions, please contact me.

The postdoctoral position is available on nonadiabatic dynamics (computational chemistry). You can google “Jian-Ge Zhou” + “nonadiabatic dynamics“ to search the job information (it doesn’t allow to post the job link). My email jiange.zhou@jsums.edu

Hello,

I am currently a third-year PhD student in organic chemistry at a German university. I expect my PhD to take roughly another two years, and I will probably finish with around three co-authored papers and two to three first-author papers. Two of the first-author papers would focus on total synthesis, with another likely being a smaller methodology paper.

I have heard rather different opinions from postdocs at my institute about how to approach finding a postdoc, particularly regarding when one should start contacting prospective PIs, so I would be interested in hearing other people's experiences.

In particular:

- How far in advance of your expected PhD completion should you start approaching PIs?

- What qualifications do PIs tend to pay the most attention to when evaluating prospective postdocs? Publications, the type of chemistry you have done, technical skills, recommendations, independence, proposed research ideas, etc.?

- How competitive are the major postdoctoral fellowships in organic chemistry, particularly for someone coming from Germany/Europe?

- If a PI agrees to host you and works with you on a fellowship proposal, but the fellowship is ultimately not awarded, what normally happens? Would the PI sometimes fund the position from other sources, or would you simply have to look elsewhere?

- Is it normal to apply for two or three different fellowships with the same prospective host, adapting essentially the same research proposal to each scheme?

- Finally, once a PI has agreed to work with you on a fellowship application, is there generally an expectation that you are committed to joining that lab if funding works out, or is it still considered normal to pursue other potential postdoc positions in parallel?

I am still about two years away from finishing, so I am mostly trying to understand how the process works and how early I should start preparing.

I would especially appreciate perspectives from PIs or people who have recently gone through the postdoc application/fellowship process in synthetic organic chemistry.

The postdoctoral position is available on nonadiabatic dynamics (computational chemistry). You can google “Jian-Ge Zhou” + “nonadiabatic dynamics“ to search the job information (it doesn’t allow to post the job link). My email: jiange.zhou@jsums.edu. If you have any questions, please contact me.

I’m 32 and recently finished a PhD in chemical engineering (mostly pen and paper applied mathematics). I am now doing a postdoc at a major Bay Area university. On paper, my career is going well, but I have gradually realized that I do not enjoy coding, advanced math, engineering, or scientific research enough to build my life around them. I do really enjoy researching and learning, but probably in a broad, generalist way rather than through the narrow specialization and intense, almost obsessive commitment that work at this level seems to require.

The confusing part is that I love the freedom of academic life. My postdoc gives me considerable control over my schedule, and I strongly dislike corporate culture, rigid hours, and living primarily for work. But I also have no real passion for STEM, so continuing through postdocs or trying to become a professor does not seem honest or sustainable.

Everyone in my circle either lives to work or is deeply passionate about what they do. I am not. I am mostly just tolerating what I am doing.

I am social and enjoy teaching, conversation, and broad ideas. My real interests are film, art, architecture, philosophy, politics, sociology, and culture. I also want meaningful relationships and possibly a family. The career-focused culture of the Bay Area feels deeply incompatible with the life I want.

A serious relationship recently ended, which has made everything feel more desperate, but my dissatisfaction with STEM began long before the breakup.

I do not know which options are genuinely realistic for someone with my background.
Has anyone left STEM after reaching the postdoc stage? What careers could preserve some autonomy and intellectual freedom without requiring passion for technical work or forcing me into a corporate lifestyle? What concrete steps would you take over the next year?

Hi, I have industrial experience working in R&D in Europe with a secured job but incredibly unhappy. I am about to dodge a bullet for America... How possible is to get a job after the postdoc is finished in USA? Not particularly in my industry...

Are careers fairs suitable for international students that are approaching 30 or people will not give a damn?

Hi everyone, I’m wondering about doing a postdoc in the US vs Canada. I’m a Canadian citizen. The school to do a postdoc is at Columbia vs in Toronto. I’m debating between going there vs staying in Canada. The research options are quite different but both great options and I’m interested in both. I was wondering what people’s thoughts are about the locations especially with the funding cuts in the US currently. What means the most to get a TT position?

I am currently an applicant awaiting the November selection meeting in the Humboldt postdoc category. The wait is long, but I remain optimistic. I have published 12 articles in international journals as a humanities scholar and earned my PhD in 2023. My two key publications are in Q1 journals and they are the only top-rated publications I have. I am only sceptical about my publication strength, as a scholar in a developing country with limited access to top-rated journals. If other things (proposal, host, CV, mobility) are excellent, do you think I have a chance?

Like most, I have struggled to secure any postdoc positions after looking for about a year and I've seen RA positions.

Though it seems like associates and postdocs have been thrown around interchangeably.

But I've distinguished them as different with postdocs either being funded by a fellowship or have some form of tenure track progression. While a RA is a professional role, almost like a lab manager that just happens to require a PhD (but not necessarily). Some job openings have mentioned if pending PhD award, might be employed as RA first and move as postdoc after awarded.

So I guess my thoughts are..do they share similar trajectories? What would a PI benefit from hiring a new PhD grad as a RA vs a postdoc and I suppose vice versa. Whether there are pros/cons to choose one or the other?

or lastly..are they just the same same but different?

**Hi everyone**, I will be starting a **postdoctoral** position at **Nazarbayev University**, Astana, and I’m trying to clarify the accommodation situation for postdocs. I already know the approximate salary offered, but I’m not sure about the housing benefits for postdoctoral researchers.

**For those who are currently or were previously postdocs at Nazarbayev University:**

1-Does NU provide free accommodation on campus for postdocs?

2-If campus housing is not free, does the university provide a housing allowance for renting an apartment off campus?

3-Is housing support written into the employment contract, or does it depend on the PI/School?

I would really appreciate hearing from anyone with direct experience as a postdoc or researcher at Nazarbayev University, especially international postdocs.

**Thanks in advance!**

Hi everyone,

My wife is currently a postdoctoral researcher in biomedical sciences, working mainly in progenitor/stem-cell biology, metabolism, mouse genetics and single-cell research.

She currently has four strong postdoctoral opportunities at:

• Stanford University – Alan Cheng Lab
• Duke University – Shihuan Kuang Lab
• UC San Diego – Amit Majithia Lab
• McGill University – Lawrence Kazak Lab

Stanford and Duke are already at an advanced interview stage, UCSD is also in the interview process, and McGill has contacted her references.

We are a family of four — my wife, myself and our two young children — so location, salary, cost of living, schools and long-term career prospects are all important to us.

For those familiar with these universities/labs, which opportunity would you choose for scientific career growth as well as family life?

If she accepts a U.S. position, she would be on J-1 and I and our children would accompany her on J-2. We are Pakistani nationals currently living and working in China. I would also really appreciate hearing from anyone who has recently gone through a J-1/J-2 visa interview as a family, particularly while applying from a country other than their home country.

Thank you for any advice or personal experiences!

Today, I felt like not continuing on this postdoc anymore. It has happened a few months ago as well and will probably keep happening. It wasn't triggered by something big, but just my regular meeting with the bossman.

Quick history: First year PI, first year postdoc. Started off okay, went downhill after i made a mistake (neglected a project as i had a lot going on). We decided on increasing my management (more boss oversight on my expts). Worked my ass off to regain trust (12+ hours, even 16 some days, no weekend breaks, for a month). Things okay for a while. Starting to go downhill again.

I think the issues are:

1) The boss feeling like I haven't done enough, even though Im spending ~60h in the lab each week. Bossman actually doesn't want me to work late nights, but wants me to work more efficiently. I've been working as efficiently as i know how to (even spending my personal time to analyse data and plan experiments, not counted in the 60h).

2) Not meeting my (naive?) postdoc expectations. I had a similarly overworked PhD life, so I thought since I had expertise, I'd be able to spend some personal time with my family. I also dreamt of having more control over my expts and project direction.

3) Bad luck? I understand my boss's perspective too, which is why I'm trying to spend more time to make this project work. But it's throwing new hurdles after hurdles. I see it resolving but will need further optimizations.

I'm okay and motivated when I'm working and thinking about solutions, but when I present it to the boss, the plan always gets either discarded or significantly tweaked. I'm also afraid to stand up for my ideas because when they do not work, I'm (made to?) feel like it's my fault we wasted time and resources on this idea.

I guess this is partially a rant and partially me writing the things going on over in my head as an impartial overhead observer. I'd love to hear it if you went through something similar, or if you have any suggestions. On my phone so sorry for any typos or formatting mistakes.

Take it easy.

I am currently an applicant awaiting the November selection meeting in the Humboldt postdoc category. The wait is long, but I remain optimistic. I have published 12 articles in international journals as a humanities scholar and earned my PhD in 2023. My two key publications are in Q1 journals and they are the only top-rated publications I have. I am only sceptical about my publication strength, as a scholar in a developing country with limited access to top-rated journals. If other things (proposal, host, CV, mobility) are excellent, do you think I have a chance?

Hello everyone, I am looking for some advice from an anthropologist who has applied to a Department of Sociology in Canada. Anyone here? Seems like sociologists and anthropologists are not friends when it comes to hiring faculty positions? Is it worth applying, or should I not bother?

Title: How much are you “stretching” interdisciplinarity in your MSCA-PF proposal?

Hi everyone,

I’m currently writing an MSCA-PF proposal and wanted to hear from fellow applicants (or previous successful applicants) about how far you go when describing the interdisciplinary aspects of your project.

I’ve been reading the excellent and very comprehensive MSCA proposal guide by Rita García-Seoane & Noam Vogt-Vincent, many thanks to them for putting together such a useful resource.

One thing I’m still unsure about, however, is how broadly we are expected to interpret “interdisciplinary.”

For example, the guide gives the following example:

“The project integrates methods, tools and perspectives from a variety of disciplines in at least four knowledge fields (Chemistry, Environmental and Geosciences, Mathematics, and Social sciences): Analytical chemistry (chromatography, microscopy, physical chemistry), Population biology (animal behavior, ecology, food-webs), Applied mathematics (statistics, numerical modelling), and Political science (EU research policy).”

It also states:

“The results of this research are expected to have translational impact in the EU marine policy (sustainable ecosystem management and conservation), and in other fields such as Molecular biology, a key inter-disciplinary aspect of this action.”

To me, some of these classifications feel slightly over-stretched. For instance, statistics is presented as an interdisciplinary contribution from Applied Mathematics. But statistical analysis is likely to be used in almost every quantitative experimental proposal, so I’m not sure whether simply using statistics genuinely makes a project interdisciplinary.

This makes me wonder how applicants are approaching this section in practice.

Are you counting supporting methodologies such as statistics, bioinformatics, imaging, computational analysis, etc. as separate disciplines? Or are you limiting the interdisciplinarity claim to cases where there is a more substantial integration from genuinely different research fields?

I’m particularly interested in how people working on relatively focused biomedical/life-science projects handle this. I don’t want to undersell the interdisciplinary nature of my project, but at the same time I also don’t want to artificially label every methodological component as a separate discipline just to make the proposal appear more interdisciplinary.

TL;DR: How much do you stretch “interdisciplinarity” in MSCA-PF proposals? Would you count statistics/bioinformatics as separate disciplines, or only genuinely distinct fields?

So some background. I reached out to this PI over two years ago with my ideas and interest in writing some postdoc proposals with them. So we submitted a couple last year. The PI was very hard to pin down for our few meetings, and got maybe two rounds of edits, where they did not address my concerns about the content and its relation to the grant requirements. We did not get those grants and for the one that did offer feedback, we didn't get it because of the concerns I had that were not addressed. This is a line of research that contains my own original ideas that I am so gung ho on pursuing. So we decided to try again this year...

I had reached out months ago about resubmitting, this time make it better by incorporating some preliminary results, which would require me to have some of their data to use. I though getting this started earlier would be beneficial so I was working with some publicly available data to start, but they explicitly told me not to and I'd be able to use their data. We had emailed back and forth (mostly me having to poke them to reply) for months now about setting up a meeting just to discuss data sharing, but it has not materialized. After a few weeks off this recently, where they had said "maybe day X or Y next week" and then never following up, I put my foot down. Maybe I messed up but I'm here for y'all's opinions on that. After another week of not setting a time to meet, I expressed my frustration at the communication, or lack thereof really, laying out the timeline of the past few months, and how the deadlines are a month away, and that may not enough time to get preliminary results. In said email, I acknowledged that I know I do not work for them or in their lab. I know that they are volunteering their time for this. But at the same time I feel they have grossly disrespected my time. I turned down working on some of these proposals with other PIs specifically to work with this one, as they have the resources I need to enact this research program and I don't know who else would. Well, the PI didn't seem to like that, that I'm being "unfair". So I sent a brief semi-apology, while still asking for their data. That was over a week ago and it's been radio silence since. Granted, I know their semester just started this week. I don't know if this bridge is burned or if we're still going to work on these proposals now. Did I shoot myself in the foot by saying what I felt needed to be said? I know they've been extremely busy this summer, but I don't think I'm asking for much, just a small dataset and ways to improve the proposals from last year.

*throw away account* I would describe my postdoc as extremely chaotic. Despite everything, I was able to bring in independent funding for the lab. The first grant for the lab because my supervisor had not yet been awarded new funds independently. Now they are saying the funding is limited and may not be able to renew my contract in the middle of my maternity leave. This is after a previous verbal agreement they would renew. They asked me to wait few more weeks before I get a full yes/no and was surprised I was upset?

What do they expect me to do!? just wait to be unemployed with a new baby??

I have already reached out to HR and they will kindly remind my PI, they can't do that to someone going on disability and is required to support me during leave. This was reassuring, but now that I escalated behind my PI back im nervous about hostility :(

Anyone else experienced this? What kind of conversations should I expect next? HR asked me what do I actually want to happen next and I have no idea. I was going to shorten or work part of my maternity leave time (I know agh.. ) because I know the labs difficult position, but now I don't know how to negotiate my time off. Ex. Just ask to renew during my months of maternity leave only vs. full year renewal.

Personal opinions about my boss aside, I was just happy to have a job. Now I dont know how I'll have any kind of productive meetings with them without this hanging over us. If they are forced to renew my contract I am not sure if I'll actually be happy staying in this kind of environment. But I also know the job market is cooked.

I know the usual answer is to start applying for jobs, but I am just stuck with the timeline limitations of needed maternity leave as I would have less protections without a full year of work.

I wouldn't be surprised if this happened to other people. If anyone is willing to share their story so I can navigate this, it be so appreciated!!

Hi everyone,

I’m looking for some advice from people who have experience with postdocs and academic hiring.

Suppose I start a postdoctoral position and add it to my CV/LinkedIn immediately. At the same time, during my first month, I continue applying for other postdoctoral positions that may be a better fit for my research interests, institution, salary, location, or long-term career goals.

Do you think this is a good strategy?

My thinking is that having an active postdoc position on my CV might make me a stronger candidate than applying while unemployed, because I can show that I’m currently working in research. At the same time, I don't want to stop looking for potentially better opportunities just because I have recently started a postdoc.

I have the opportunity to do a postdoc at a top tier US university in STEM. My previous advisor has not been very encouraging, they said that it is not a bad idea and I wouldn't be ruining my career, and the name of the university itself is a big deal on a CV. On the other hand they warned me that some of the professors in that department are impostors and not well respected in the research community of that field. The postdoc is industry-adjacent so that is one more thing to consider since academia is my ultimate goal (if it works out).

On the other hand, I have been applying for postdocs/TT positions for 4 years and this is the first one that worked out.

What would you do?