Chemical Biology Graduate Program FAQ's

Yes! Many of our Chemistry and MCB students choose to rotate through labs outside of their home departments. If a student decides to join such a lab for their thesis work, we simply assign an additional co-advisor from their home department. For example, if a Chemistry student joins a research group in the Bioengineering department, they will effectively have two advisors. They will meet with their research advisor regularly for project advice and attend all of the group’s meetings and events. They will also meet with their Chemistry advisor once per semester (or even once per year) to answer questions about the graduate program and ensure they are progressing toward the program milestones. Both of these advisors will sign the student’s Ph.D. dissertation when the time comes.

You should absolutely feel free to reach out to them, but this is not strictly required before you apply to the program. If you wish to do so, the best approach is to send an email noting that you are a student applying for the graduate program and asking them if they have any times available to discuss their research over a Zoom call. As faculty tend to be quite busy, feel free to reach out again if you don't hear back from them within a few days.

Almost! Once you are admitted to the Chemistry Department, regardless of the concentration you specified on your application, you must still register to be a part of the CBGP cohort. This simple process includes choosing the rotation vs. non-rotation track, which helps us to plan for funding and other considerations.

All students who are admitted to the Chemistry or MCB department AND declare an interest in the Chemical Biology Graduate Program will be considered a part of the cohort. We simply ask admitted students to choose a track (rotation or non-rotation) to convey their interests appropriately. Unfortunately we cannot guarantee the ability to rotate through labs due to funding restrictions, but in most years we are able to accommodate all such requests.

A certain number of rotation-track students receive funding from an NIH T32 training grant. This covers a 12-month period starting in January of the first year (for Chemistry students) or August of the first year (for MCB students). Rotation-track students who are not eligible for T32 grant funding, including international students, may be funded by fellowships such as the Berkeley or Chancellor’s Fellowships or by philanthropic support to the department.  ALL Chemistry students in the CBGP are expected to teach in the fall of their first year and in the spring of their second year. MCB students are funded through their home department during this time. 

No. If you want to rotate through labs before committing to one, you may bring funding with you, but your own funding is not required. Your rotations may be supported by the NIH training grant, campus fellowships, philanthropic giving, or some combination thereof.

Many, but not all, rotation track students are funded by an NIH T32 training grant. Students may not receive any other federal funding while on the NIH training grant. If you have a pre-existing fellowship and want to participate in the rotation track, please let the Program Coordinator know when you apply to the CBGP.  We will either make sure that your rotations are not funded by the training grant or work with you to defer your fellowship award until the end of your NIH training period.

The Department of Chemistry Ph.D. program has three concentration areas:  Physical Chemistry, Synthetic Chemistry, and Chemical Biology. The Chemical Biology concentration is also known as the Chemical Biology Graduate Program and has two tracks:  The rotation track and the synthetic/physical non-rotation track.

ChemBio Rotation track students participate in three ~10 week lab rotations and join a lab in May of the spring semester. Chem Bio Synthetic/Physical track students do not rotate; instead, they join labs in October of the fall semester along with the other Synthetic and Physical students.  In this case, they meet with at least 5 faculty, meet students in those labs, and attend group meetings to find a faculty mentor match.  Both rotation track and Synthetic/Physical track students are part of all CBGP activities, including peer mentoring groups, Supergroups, CBBA Day, and poster sessions.

The rules of our NIH-funded T32 training grant require that all students in the program take Chemical Biology (Chem 271) and the ethics courses (MCB 293D and MCB 293C) during their first year. Most all CBGP students also take the Bioorganic Chemistry course (Chem 236) during their first year. Many students in the CBGP also take courses during their second year after they have joined their thesis labs. Some popular options include: Immunology, Cancer Biology, Cell Biology, Biophysical Chemistry, Synthetic Chemistry.

The course is divided into 3 "modules" that are 5 weeks each. Students should sign up for all three (e.g. 271A/B/C), which effectively enrolls them in the 3-credit-hour full-semester course.

Yes, after you join your thesis lab. Since new and rotating students do not yet have an official research director, they will normally sign up for research under the Department Chair's name. (Chemistry 299-section 1). Once a research director has been chosen, students should sign up for research units under their research advisor.

You should attend any seminars that involve a topic of interest, speaker of interest, or are recommended by your PI.  Seminars are a great way to keep up with scientific developments and often refer to research that has not yet been published. You should sign up for one seminar series each semester, which is most commonly the Organic (including ChemBio) or Structural and Quantitative Biology Seminar Series. Depending on your interests, the Inorganic or Physical Chemistry Seminar Series could also be a good fit. Of course you do not have to be enrolled in a particular seminar series to attend those lectures. Most people look at the College Seminar Calendar, choose the ones they want to attend each week, and go to those. Enrollment in any of the seminar courses will give you access to the bCourses page, which will allow you to view all of the recordings in the Chemistry Department. You should also enroll in the Graduate Research Seminar Series (Organic, CHemBio, and Inorganic) or the Graduate Research Conference (Physical Chemistry) each semester.

All seminars are posted to the EVENTS CALENDAR.  Departmental seminars take place on Tuesdays at 11:00 am (Organic) and 4:00 pm (Physical), Thursdays at 11:00 am (GRS) and 4:00 pm (GRC), and Fridays at 4:00 pm (Inorganic). In addition, the Structural and Quantitative Biology series is held at 4:00 pm on Mondays. Some named lectures and special seminars also take place outside of those times.  

A weekly email also goes out to all grad students, postdocs , and faculty promoting that week’s seminars.  A summary of the semester’s seminar speakers is announced via email at the beginning of the semester, but topics and titles may not be available until closer to the seminar date.

Yes, with exceptions. All Chem Bio students participate as a cohort in all activities. Though not all students’ stipends are paid directly by the NIH T32 program, the training grant does support all Chem Bio events such as supergroups and poster sessions, as well as general student training and career development. Participation in the ethics training courses is a shared community responsibility for us to maintain this program. If you are not funded by the training grant and your spring course load is too heavy, speak with the faculty director to determine whether it would be appropriate to defer enrollm