Hi guys,
I've just finished reading ALL your posts and let me congratulate all of you for your PhDs& the jobs u'r doing on the forum...

I'm not doing a PhD myself, but was planning on starting one in 2008. I'll have a degree in BioInformatics but I'm mostly interested in medical genetics.
I was wondering what is in your opinion the best way to find a PhD.
I know you can apply for positions at different Universities or institutes...

But has any of you contacted a researcher directly, asking whether he would have a position available in his/her lab? I'm asking cuz this is how I got accepted to some really cool placements in the last few years so I was wondering if any of you did this for a PhD as well...

Also, I was wondering how safe it is to start a PhD in a lab where you don't know anybody... What if u don't get along with your supervisor/other lab members or if u don't like the atmosphere there?
Has any of you tried going for a PhD in an unknown land?

Thanks for your help. I could really use some advice from you guys...
Alex

While I was looking for PhDs around September I did contact some researchers directly. To be honest this didn't really prove very useful!! Although quite a few got back with polite emails the response tended to be 'We will let you know if anything becomes available' or 'projects will be advertised early next year'.

Findaphd.com seemed to be by far the best place for me!

I'd say be careful about how you choose your PhD. If you ask
high profile people directly you could be lucky and end up working in an excellent lab with some brilliant people.

Alternatively it could mean the person who takes you on squeezes you into their lab in a position that hasn't been funded, planned or resourced. Getting into a properly funded and organised PhD position seems to be the smart way to go.

I got my PhD by emailing my supervisor, just looked into what her topic was, experience, what the dept was like etc. and thought it looked really relevant to what I wanted to do. She was keen to take me on, dept helped me sort out my funding, and its all gone really well (she does my head in sometimes, but what did I expect!). There's always the danger you wont get on with your supervisor, but then there's always going to be that danger. Even if you knew them from undergrad they can be very diff as a PhD supervisor! Reckon you should get in touch with people and say you're v interested in their work, its always worth a go and you can keep an eye out for advertised positions too. Good luck!

Hi, im in a similar position to you. I have found that making a list of all the universities that do research into the subject you are interested in and then e-mailing the relevant person has been quite successful. If you write out a short letter saying why you want to do a PhD and asking what is available, it can be easily adapted for each university. Also might be a good idea to include a CV. Im also going to visit one of the departments at Bath next week so that I can hopefully get a feel for what everything is like.