[subxero]

Originally Posted by Mocha Man

Thanks for the tip.

I've been doing research in school for a while. If I'm not at work/school, I'm usually at home trying to learn more about my field. What you've done sounds similar to how my schooling has been, what with all the variety and all. In a few weeks I'm going to start working in a genome sequencing lab with a professor that's well known in the community for his work in genetics.

I'm thinking I want to get my PhD after graduating and then teach in a university. I like having access to all the equipment and being around the people that have common interests. Any thoughts? Thanks again!

Sounds like a reasonable plan and you are off to a great start.

Sounds like you have your foot in the door for NGS which is great especially if you are interested in the bioinformatics side of things as well. Being able to not only generate the data but process it all by yourself as well is a life saver.

The great thing about genetics and sequencing is that it can be adapted to just about any particular area of interest so finding grants to apply for and or collaborations is not as difficult as being locked into a specific type of research.

If you want to teach at a university, going for a PhD is not a bad idea, you have an end goal and that is what matters. It's just that I have seen lots of people who are just good at school, and that is what they know just keep going for that next degree. Eventually it gets them a PhD in some type of research, sometimes with a background in something they have little interest in, they just did it because that's what was studied at their university. Next they never thought about what they were going to do with a PhD after they received it, going for it was just want everyone supported them to work towards and they were decent at school so they did it. Now that they have a PhD based in research they realize they don't want to write and apply for grants, and or head their own research and most of these people end up teaching or getting out of the field entirely. All of which is fine but if you didn't want to be a teacher in the beginning it kinda seems like an odd end point for all that hard work.