A good career start can open doors: the plusses and minuses of an international graduate student program—a student’s perspective

Abstract

There are many Ph.D. programs from various funding agencies that provide excellent starts to a scientific career. Multinational Ph.D. positions attract students because they provide students with much-required exposure to the international scientific community at an early stage of the career. For this reason, multinational Ph.D. positions can be considered as a better career opportunity over Ph.D. positions confined to a single country. In addition, these multidisciplinary research programs connect different organizations to deal with the problems of global interest. One of these multi-disciplinary research programs is the viral and bacterial adhesion network training-innovative training network (ViBrANT). ViBrANT is a multifaceted platform that develops the required skillsets in young researchers and thereby also contributes to building a multidisciplinary research community. Is this the only parameter to be considered or are there other factors that can also stimulate one’s career development? In this perspective article, I will discuss the key reasons why I chose a multinational Ph.D. program along with the merits of being part of ViBrANT. I also discuss the challenges I faced while moving from India to the United Kingdom.