Choice of lab

[JETER]

This is maybe for the older, wiser students:

I think that I have found my PhD lab (first year MSTP). The problem is, it is in the area that I want for my career. To explain, I finished my MS a year ago, and the subject of my research makes me want to vomit now. After two years of reading every paper, and spending 100+ weeks running experiments, I have grown tired (understatement) of the subject. I don't want that to happen to a field that I currently find interesting. So, should I maybe try a lab (i.e., a different one) that will provide the training that I wanted (or why else am I here?), and apply that to a career path? Or, should I expect that I will continue to enjoy the research area of this lab that I am interested in now, and take advantage of the close parallels with what I want to do for the next 20+ years? Please discuss.

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[tr]

You should do what most interests you right now. If you have already found what you want to do for the rest of your life, consider yourself lucky and start building your knowledge base now. Alternatively, you may find that your opinion changes as you go through the process (as happened during your Master's), in which case it will be good that you figured out what you don't like about the field in time to change to something else.

There certainly isn't any point in purposely doing something that you don't find as interesting, right??