Many investigators have insights perhaps five years down the road from divergent work that they did. The traditional system of unidimensional training still has advantages. In the past, postdocs have put the blinders on and have not strayed far from their original fields. Those are difficult issues. If you poll chairs across the country, you would get a variety of opinions.
Students can obtain help before deciding on the direction of their postdoctoral research.
We also have a monthly lunch at which individuals talk about life in industry. That helps students to understand the type of training they need for their chosen careers. This is the first of two articles this year on postdoctoral opportunities. The second will appear in the 7 September issue of Science .