 When he was informed in his second year there that he was to be drafted, he found a government post with the United States Public Health Service, where he worked as a statistician on a tuberculosis research team, before transferring to the National Institute of Mental Health, where he worked under Seymour Kety.At the NIMH, Kopin began his research collaboration with Julius Axelrod.In 1968, Kety left NIMH for Harvard; Axelrod did not want to take on administrative responsibilities, and so Kopin took over the position of lab chief.