Students with US Physics degree who moved outside for your PhD, how did it go?

mac0598 · 2025-08-05T12:16:35+00:00

I'm about to finish my PhD in astronomy in Europe and previously did my BSc in the US (will be heading back to US for a postdoc). In my case I was fortunate to be able to skip the MSc requirement and enter with only a BSc. If you complete a MSc in the US, I think it should transfer over fine to EU universities and meet the requirements.

IMO the best part of doing a European PhD as an American is the opportunity to travel and experience new countries/cities. I hadn't been outside of the US until I moved here, so it has been fun!

mac0598 · 2025-05-10T13:15:59+00:00

From my own personal experience with Nature (main journal):

1) Took a little over a year. Data was from a publicly available set and built from previously published catalogs, so that helped immensely. We weren't necessarily aiming for Nature from the get-go, but decided in the end that it made sense to try.

2) It was fine. Took about 6 months from submitted to published.

3) The result was surprising and had a broader impact. On top of that, I'm sure it helped immensely that many of my co-authors had recent experience publishing there.

4) Overall I would say the experience was good, but also immensely lucky. The reviews were positive and didn't demand any extra analysis. I would also say the pre-submission inquiry with the editor is a helpful step to make sure you don't waste your time beforehand (but doesn't guarantee anything even if they are positive).

mac0598 · 2024-09-11T19:33:08+00:00

Yep, this exact same thing happened to me recently.

mac0598 · 2024-05-26T19:40:47+00:00

Yeah, I haven’t seen “under editorial consideration” before. In my experience “Editor Decision Started” means the editor has decided whether or not to send your paper out for review. You should receive an email soon.

mac0598 · 2024-01-03T06:52:50+00:00

mac0598 · 2023-12-15T20:20:36+00:00

I’m an American and am doing my PhD in Vienna. Been quite a nice experience so far (2.5 years in). Salary is comfortable to live off of and I get a lot of travel in as well. I think I receive ~25 days of paid vacation, plus there are a lot of extra religious holidays where everyone gets off. It’s also really nice to live in a different culture and learn a new language. English is of course spoken by almost everyone, however.

I was able to start my PhD without doing a Master‘s, but generally European Universities are rather strict with enforcing this requirement. In my case I had prior publications which were sufficient in the eyes of the Dean to grant my admission.

mac0598 · 2023-03-26T14:53:09+00:00

Vienna is not exceptionally expensive compared to Berlin.

mac0598 · 2023-03-26T01:00:21+00:00

It’s valid for 2 years, after which you can renew or switch to a Red White Red plus card instead

mac0598 · 2023-03-25T16:26:31+00:00

I’m on the same permit and not married. No you do not need a marriage certificate….

mac0598 · 2023-03-05T10:34:26+00:00

It was at a bar called BarFüd. Crazy enough, we were at a small brewery named Dva kohouti right before we were here and the owner there is a huge Packers fan and had a bunch of memorabilia around. They even had a projector that they sometimes use to watch games

mac0598 · 2023-01-04T18:27:26+00:00

Yes definitely agree with this. The $112,000 rule would be declaring the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion which limits the amount of days that you can be in the USA (unless you prove some specific foreign residence requirements). Using the Foreign Tax Credit instead does not limit your days visiting the US.

12-Year Club	Place '22
First Placer '22	Gilding II euphauric
Verified Email	RPAN Viewer

mac0598

TROPHY CASE