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[bnpostdoc]

I am currently a post-doc in a biomedical field at an institution with a relatively new department.  My contract is ending soon, and I am not sure that I want to stay for a number of reasons.

I have a couple of options.  The first is a post-doc in a well funded lab at a prestigious university, and the other is a Research Assistant Professor at my PhD institution.  The Research Professor position is still in the works, but may come with some independent lab space and a small amount of start up funding.  My PhD institution is also prestigious in my field. Any thoughts on the pros and cons of these two situations.  My eventual goal is to move to a tenure track position at a research institution.

Thoughts?

[mindz]

Who funds the RAProf position? Is it your current advisor or the university? How much freedom will you have to choose your projects there? If you can be fairly independent, it sounds like the RAP position is a much better choice for moving towards TT position later on. It is good that they may also give startup and lab space. Go for it. Unless of course the other postdoc is sure to land you a nice job later on... depending on the area of research.

[quietly]

I'm also in the biomedical field.  I would say the pros and cons here depend on how likely your success is. 

I'm assuming the research professor position is a soft-money, run-your-own-little lab deal where you will be  expected to get grants quickly.  If I'm wrong, this may not apply. 

The funding environment is horrifically competitive right now and even established folks with years of grant success are sometimes struggling, as I'm sure you know.  New TT profs have trouble breaking in.  I don't know any non-TT well enough now, but I have known a handful in the past.  I suspect the funding agencies will be even more leery about that position due to its impermanence and lack of staff--even if you have the right to hire people, they won't be grad students or post-docs and may be less ambitious and skilled than you need them to be. 

And it's hard to judge for yourself how good you'll be at this, since the skills needed to fund and run a lab are unfortunately not at all the same as the skills needed to do good science with your own hands.  If your professional history suggests you will be competitive in this situation, and you have strong support from other PIs who will collaborate with and advise you, then it will go a long way to prove your viability for an eventual tt at an R01.  On the other hand, if you don't have a grant within, oh, 3-5 years?, your chance of tt will begin to dry up.  It's essentially like "they're" testing you as a tt prof, but without giving you a tt prof's resources.

The post-doc is safer.  It also has the benefit of you developing more connections at another university and possibly in another field, instead of returning to the place you already know, and that may be important as in reading between the lines here I assume things aren't going well colleague-wise at your present place.  But the post-doc offers less opportunity to shine.

I think it would also depend on how long you've been in your present post-doc.  If it's only been 2 years or so, fine.  If it's been 5, and you're talking about a second post-doc, then that's too long and you're better off taking the leap.

Q.