Training at the NIMH Posted on January 14, 2008 F. Xavier Castellanos (bio) talks about the training atmosphere at the NIMH.

The NIMH, and the NIH in general, is unique in all the world. It's this amazing community that is so rich in so many ways that it's hard to compare it with anyplace else.

It's hard to say what the disadvantages would be, other than it's almost impossible to remain there because of the way it's set up. It's really very hierarchical, and so there are a large number of trainees that are there for a period of years, and it's almost, it's not designed to keep those people there as faculty and move up from assistant to associate to full professor, that kind of thing.

So it's difficult to leave the nest, and sometimes people aren't ready and they don't want to or whatever but, increasingly, people are being very successful when they go elsewhere. So I think it's still one of the most amazing places to be trained.

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