PhD adviser moving to another school - Should I follow? I'm a doctoral candidate in Biomedical Engineering. I've finished my coursework and I'm in my first year of PhD research currently - I had 3 more yrs. to graduate. My PhD adviser has decided to move to another university (50 places lower-ranked). I will not need to be a TA after the move, and can fully concentrate on my research, a perk offered by my adviser.

Setting up the equipment all over at the new place will cost me 6 months. But since I can concentrate only on my research, I am expecting I will make up for it.

In my current university, there is no other adviser working in the same field as my current adviser. If I choose to find a new adviser at my current university, I may spend an yr. extra, learning about the new subject area. I will also have TA duties all throughout, which will ultimately push back my expected graduation date by at least 1.5 yrs.

I am unable to decide between


a more valuable peer group at the current university (better overall experience and exchange of ideas) and
earlier graduation possible at the new university.


Please share your advise and help me decide (I see the benefit of extra 1.5 yrs. towards post-doctoral experience, but I may be missing something).
Having a good advisor and working on a subject you're interested in are the most important things during a PhD in my opinion. I've seen many fail because they were fed up or just didn't click with there advisor for whatever reason. 

Also consider your long term goals. If you moved, set up a new lab and worked closely with your advisor for the next few years, could that be the beginning of a research group at the new university, which you could be a part of? Otherwise if you're looking to move out of academia afterwards, does either university have partnerships or close contact with employers that you'd be interested in?