Hi everyone,First a little of my background. I am about to finish my PhD in physics from University of Michigan, whose physics PhD program is ranked about #11 in the nation (therefore not top 10 ... oh well). I also hold a MS in Computer Science from the same school (it definitely is top 10 in this category). Now it's half a year away from my graduation. I haven't seriously thought about a quant career until recently, when one of my college friends got into a firm. What's attractive to me I guess is, of course, its high pay (tired of being a poor graduate student). But also I like challenging environment and working with smart people. Plus, quantitative research itself is interesting to me.So my questions aredoes a quant career sound right to me?how does one go about finding a junior level quant job that doesn't require experience?I've sent resumes to head hunters (got one call back so far), is it a good idea to use recruiters? any successful stories?any alumni here?is this Wilmott a UK site? any equally good US sites?Thanks a million.

the reason I mentioned ranking in my post was that it seemed to me that those firms only want people from, say MIT or Caltech.

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QuoteOriginally posted by: yiLiTeQuHi everyone,First a little of my background. I am about to finish my PhD in physics from University of Michigan, whose physics PhD program is ranked about #11 in the nation (therefore not top 10 ... oh well). I also hold a MS in Computer Science from the same school (it definitely is top 10 in this category). Now it's half a year away from my graduation. I haven't seriously thought about a quant career until recently, when one of my college friends got into a firm. What's attractive to me I guess is, of course, its high pay (tired of being a poor graduate student). But also I like challenging environment and working with smart people. Plus, quantitative research itself is interesting to me.I wonder if the ranking of "physics department" per se actually matters. People outside the field (physics), I suspect, hardly know these ranking. They all may have heard of Duke U, Caltech, Northwestern, etc. But as we people in this field know not all TOP 10 (overall ranking, heavily influenced by professional schools) schools have top 10 physics program. But does that matter to recruiter? They like big names. I am from a school with top 10 physics department, byt not top 10 overall ranking school. I do'nt think that gave me any advantage at all. Maybe even disadvantage.I agree with another response here, networking is probably most useful in this instance (maybe in all instances). I am and have been trying my best to dig out old friends that I know who are now in this industry. it is a bearish market (no matter stock or job) through and through