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168 CAREER ADVICE FOR LIFE SCIENTISTS II

To Eurodoc or Not Eurodoc?

Sigrid Reinsch

National Aeronautics and

Space Administration

W

hy go abroad for training when there

are so many opportunities here in the

United States? Perhaps you would like to

finally capitalize on your wild success with high school

French and can’t seem to nip the urge for wanderlust.

Maybe you gravitate naturally to Europeans in a crowd.

Whatever the reasons, you can buck the trend of the

European “brain-drain.” European scientists are frus-

trated by the tendency for European postdocs to head

to the United States—often permanently. European

governments and scientists believe this adversely

affects the quality of European science. The European

Union has several organizations whose mission is to

increase pan-European mobility so that scientists will

choose other European countries for training alterna-

tives rather than the United States. Does this brain-

drain mean that European postdoc training is “worse”

than in the United States? The Eurodocs I queried

believed their European training was as good as that of

their U.S.-trained counterparts, and claimed innumer-

able benefits from their overall experience.

Planning Your Eurodoc

It’s relatively easy to plan a European postdoc. E-mail

makes communication with potential sponsors rapid

European labs are happy to host American

postdocs, especially those with a good

pedigree. Having a native English speaker

in the lab can also boost the overall

productivity of the lab simply by having a

ready editor for manuscripts. Be prepared

to serve as such.