RESEARCH TRAINING IN BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES

University Of California Irvine, Irvine CA

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Abstract

The objective of the Department of Psychobiology's training program is to provide high quality research training in neuroscience to selected graduate students. The purpose of this program is to train neuroscientists who will contribute to our understanding of the basic biological processes underlying the complexities of human behavior and the major health problems associated with mental disorders. The program leads to the Ph.D. degree in Biological Sciences and provides a broad intellectual background in all aspects of neuroscience, coupled with high caliber research training in some aspect of neuroscience. The Department of Psychobiology is relatively unique in that it can offer balanced graduate training across the field of neuroscience with a relatively small number of faculty and within the confines of a single department. The training program has two foci. The first is the classroom and the second is the research laboratory. The classroom portion of the program emphasizes a core program for all students concentrating on the fundamentals of neuroscience and advanced courses and seminars tailored to the interests of individual students. Research training in faculty laboratories is the most essential element of the training program. A student is considered a "research apprentice" from the day he or she enters the program. All entering students are assigned to a laboratory and expected to devote considerable time to a research project, as well as course work. As a student progresses, more time is devoted to research and less to formal class work. The normative time to the Ph.D. degree in our program is 5.5 years.