<p>I'll try to make this short.</p>
<p>I worked with a visiting scholar (to be honest, I'm not sure what his "title" in the lab was when I worked with him. He says he was a post doc. But he shows up on the lab website as "research scientist" in a lab a year ago. I know you shouldn't ask postdocs for LORs, but I'm not sure which category he's under, but we'll assume he's classified as a research scientist.
We worked under a PI, who is a professor at my university. </p>
<p>I'm not sure if the PI would be able to write me a LOR, I haven't asked him yet. He's very shady, I'm not even sure if I would even want to ask him for a LOR. I had a great relationship with the visiting scholar, but the problem is he was only at the lab for a year and moved back to his university where he will eventaully become a prof. </p>
<p>I have a few questions.</p>
<p>1) Are research scientists appropriate for LORs?
2) Would it look bad that I'm getting an LOR from someone from another country?
3) I don't know how the LOR process even works. I'm assuming that they're submitted electronically which means distance wouldn't be a problem right?
4) This is off topic, but regarding the PI. I don't like saying bad things about other people, but it's the internet so oh well. The guy is shady, as mentioned earlier. His wife helps him with the lab, but me and a few others think it's not even legal for her to be there because she just bosses people around doing irrelevant stuff that has nothing to do with the research conducted in the lab. I think they both have some emotional problems. He gave me a job so I appreciate that very much and even tried to help me find an internship for the past summer. I volunteer for a different lab now because he doesn't have enough funding to keep me in the lab.
Should I even ask this guy (the PI) for a LOR?</p>