My experience with post docs in a science lab was that science was surprisingly tribal, and not in a completely bad way. Certain programs and labs trusted peop

My experience with post docs in a science lab was that science was surprisingly tribal, and not in a completely bad way. Certain programs and labs trusted people and papers from other labs they knew. They tended to accept PhD students who were recommended by particular professors. And this clustering seemed to exist along some theoretical or subject matter divides. The benefit is that there is some consistency and some short hand or "lab lore" in common. This article seems to be about a PhD candidate at a program that didn't really have people experienced in the field. If you want to get a science PhD, look at the papers by the tenured people in that program and see where they went to school. Look at who cites their papers. The schools that read their papers may be the ones that you can apply to later.