Choosing an advisor

[michaelangelo]

This is a pretty stock question that a lot of people ask but I'd like to hear some perspectives on it: assuming that the school is a good match and the research is interesting, do you guys think its better to go with a 63 year old advisor who has a substantial reputation or a 35-45 year old advisor who may or may not have tenure but is at the apex of his career when you join and will be publishing many papers?

It seems that most of the professors I am most interested in working with are older than 50, many are older than 60. A lot of the 60-65 year old guys assure me that they won't retire before I graduate and they seem to be fairly energetic but its hard to tell. Any perspectives on working with older advisors?

[chaospaladin]

This is a pretty stock question that a lot of people ask but I'd like to hear some perspectives on it: assuming that the school is a good match and the research is interesting, do you guys think its better to go with a 63 year old advisor who has a substantial reputation or a 35-45 year old advisor who may or may not have tenure but is at the apex of his career when you join and will be publishing many papers?

It seems that most of the professors I am most interested in working with are older than 50, many are older than 60. A lot of the 60-65 year old guys assure me that they won't retire before I graduate and they seem to be fairly energetic but its hard to tell. Any perspectives on working with older advisors?

When you mean advisor, do you mean "Principal Investigator"? Are advisors and principal investigators pretty much the same type of people with different titles?

[michaelangelo]

When you mean advisor, do you mean "Principal Investigator"? Are advisors and principal investigators pretty much the same type of people with different titles?

Yes. In context I think the terms are synonymous.

[aventinus]

I'm struggling with this question also. I really enjoyed having a relatively young research advisor during my undergraduate years, so I'm looking for something similar for my PhD. In my opinion, other factors are more important that the age of the research advisor. For example, the level of involvement of the advisor and the size of the group are much more important to me.