Hi,

I am currently doing my PhD at a university in the USA, however I will be moving to Europe for a year to do part of my dissertation research with a collaborator who is the head of a fairly prestigious institute in Northern Europe. I haven't been able to find much information on what it is like to be a PhD student in my field in Europe (I'm in molecular biology). I am a little confused as to what the 'role' of the PhD student is in a European lab...do students regularly interact with the head of the lab? If a student has a question can they talk to the head of the lab or should they go ask a postdoc instead? The lab I'm going to has many technicians - which is not typical in my university in the USA - do the technicians help students with setting up experiments? Are projects assigned to people in the lab, or is there freedom to go your own way?

American PhD programs are structured differently from European ones so it is difficult to say how 'far along' in my program I am compared to a PhD in the UK for example, but I can say that I have already written a literature review and passed comprehensive written and oral examinations. I will be going to this lab only to conduct experiments. I expect that I will probably be assigned to work with a particular postdoc whose research is similar to my own (but in a different organism).

Any info/tips would be appreciated!