Choose any PhD

[wwulf2k13]

Hello SDN,

Did some searching, but I couldn't find an answer to the following question.

Can you choose any PhD in an MD/PhD program as long as you have sufficient reasoning?

For example, I have a chemistry background (i.e. no engineering), but pursuing a bioengineering/bme program is in line with my career goals. Would this be possible or do schools want students to go into fields they have more experience in?

Thanks in advance!

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[fantasty]

Hello SDN,

Did some searching, but I couldn't find an answer to the following question.

Can you choose any PhD in an MD/PhD program as long as you have sufficient reasoning?

For example, I have a chemistry background (i.e. no engineering), but pursuing a bioengineering/bme program is in line with my career goals. Would this be possible or do schools want students to go into fields they have more experience in?

Thanks in advance!

Maybe things have changed a little, but in general, it's helpful if the program you are applying to has experience with the faculty in that graduate department.

For instance, folks in my program had a little bit of difficulty reaching into atypical PhD department s, but made progress when the student and faculty opportunities seemed right (for me, it was epidemiology, but we also had engineering and chemistry in recent years).

But the drawback usually seems to come from the grad department not knowing how to handle a dual degree student, and possibly not being as flexible as necessary to get you out in a reasonable amount of time.

 

[wwulf2k13]

Maybe things have changed a little, but in general, it's helpful if the program you are applying to has experience with the faculty in that graduate department.

For instance, folks in my program had a little bit of difficulty reaching into atypical PhD department s, but made progress when the student and faculty opportunities seemed right (for me, it was epidemiology, but we also had engineering and chemistry in recent years).

But the drawback usually seems to come from the grad department not knowing how to handle a dual degree student, and possibly not being as flexible as necessary to get you out in a reasonable amount of time.

Thanks for the response, but I think I didn't ask the question clearly.

If the departments have experience with the MD/PhD program, can a student from any background go into any PhD program? Like bio or chem undergrad to something more engineering related.

 

[fantasty]

Oh, I see. Again, you might get better answers but my $0.02

I don't think it's that much of an issue to switch fields from your ug major. The most important thing is picking the right mentor and lab. Most faculty are associated with multiple departments or programs, so you might be able to do the same research with the same mentor and have a choice of which graduate field to join.

And if the fields have markedly different pre-reqs or expectations, they can let you know when you interview, or suggest some extra coursework to bring you up to speed... like essential engineering foundations in your case

 

[eteshoe]

It will likely come down to how finicky the engineering department is about some of the foundational pre-reqs a chem or bio prospective student would have. Some programs are more open than others but remember, you'd essentially have to have all the pre-reqs required to get into the PhD program on its own (at least that's how I understood it). Going in the opposite direction seems to be much easier (my experience anyhow).

 

[numbersloth]

It will likely come down to how finicky the engineering department is about some of the foundational pre-reqs a chem or bio prospective student would have.

This. I have a friend who went from a Bio major to a BME PhD, but she had to take a ton of the pre-reqs during her senior spring as a condition for acceptance, such as linear algebra, differential equations, and thermodynamics. If you were to have to make these up in the first few years of your PhD, you could be in grad school for a long long time.

 

[wutwutwut]

I have this exact same problem because I am a chemistry major and all my undergraduate research is in chemistry but I am thinking about microbiology for my phd because I think I want to do infectious diseases. My plan though was to apply for MD/PhD programs for chemistry (because I don't think it is binding) and then once I start my md phd program do rotations in chemistry and microbiology and see which I like better. That's what I did because I am not positive if I want to go into chem or microbiology though so if you are positive you want to bioengineering what I did might not make sense. Also my logic was for this that I know way more about chemistry than microbiology so I will actually know what I am talking about if they ask me about what interests me about chemistry in an interview or something. I am applying right now though so I am not an expert so feel free to take this with a grain of salt.

 

[Neuronix]

Agree with eteshoe. Bioengineering tends to be picky. Molecular departments tend not to be. But it's institution specific. You'd have to check with them.

Keep in mind just because you do research in a bioengineering lab, you can often get the PhD awarded in a closely related, non-engineering discipline. This could reduce the requirements and time to PhD, which in general is recommended.

 

[dl2dp2]

^ I second this. I looked into BME and such, and realized that their PhD requirements are much more onerous and unnecessary and inflexible. It's advantageous to do your PhD with a program that has an existing relationship with MSTP, because they are by definition more streamlined. Usually if you want to work with a mentor in a different department, it can be arranged with a collaborating mentor in the primary department.

Whether you have the skill set after PhD to do the work (i.e. in a grant proposal, or for a job requirement) is a separate issue. Nobody will think that you can't do the work if your PhD is on that topic but you didn't take a BME pre-req class a million years ago. I find that students are often obsessed with the label associated with the PhD, like "I did PhD in X". But that is basically just a label. I know people who did PhD in "neuroscience" who have wildly different skill sets because of their actual PhD work spans vastly different topic domains.

 

[numbersloth]

^^ Exactly. A lot of research that might be in the BME department could just as easily be in a biochemistry, biophysics, or computational molecular biology lab.

 

[Penn-mdphd]

Coming from experience, UMichigan is very NOT open to switching into any engineering if you do not have an engineering degree and specifically apply to their engineering PhD in your MD/PhD application. They send your app to the engineering department for review too.

However, Penn is very open to switching, baring the part about clearly stating your reasons for switching, taking necessary pre-reqs, and/or showing the people in the BE department you have a qualifying background.

I'm talking about post-acceptance though. Pre-acceptance is probably a different strategy. It's best, in my opinion, to stick to the research area you know best while applying (for various reasons like being able to concretely talk about your research expertise/interests in your field rather than abstractly talking about research in a similar, but different field...it just comes off as stronger). Then after acceptance, do what you want and talk to directors about switching like I did.

This is not in the school's best interest beforehand (they want "what you see is what you get"), but it is in your best interest (in terms of getting any acceptance somewhere and hopefully more than one so that you can choose the one best for you). I mean ideally, everyone should only apply to programs that align best to you, but come on now, in reality, that's hard to tell before you go through the whole process. Some places that I thought were on the back of my list beforehand turned to be great fits, and others that seemed to be great fits beforehand, after interviews and learning more about the school/second look, turned out to be not so great. This is where I learned most about departmental regulations, university policies, MD/PhD relations and its fluidity/communication with multiple departments, etc...

The point most important to remember, however, you can still be in an engineering lab, but be in a different grad program, at least at Penn. Like I can be in neuroscience grad group, but be in a lab that does neural engineering with other engineering grad students. This is because Penn usually have PIs affiliated with multiple grad programs, and if they're not affiliated, Penn will be like, we'll get them affiliated! Who cares what your diploma says exactly, because at the PhD level, it's really your research and skills that matter, not some title. At UMich, universtiy regulations are more stringent though, and I think you have to be in the grad program that your PI is affiliated with and some engineering PIs are only affiliated with engineering. soooo that might be a problem.

So again, it's program specific, but in terms of a general, blanket approach, it's best to apply to a program that aligns with your background and then talk about switching after acceptance. It may be hard to figure out how open each specific program is beforehand, so that's why a single approach is easier. I did different strategies with different programs, and at least for me, it helped to do the above.

 

[aldol16]

For the graduate admissions part of the equation, it's very important that you show that you have the skills required to successfully do research and complete your degree in a reasonable amount of time. For the PI, this is the equivalent of hiring an employee. Would you hire someone who you had to train for a year before being productive or someone who already had the required skills? So a psych major would likely have a very hard time trying to get into BME without having had a rigorous math curriculum in undergrad. Bio would also be hard unless that person was in a quantitative bio discipline. Chem and physics majors have it easier but for chem, you're still expected to have a strong mathematics background. PIs also tend to choose people who have prior research experience in the field. This is again because they then have to spend less time and money training them if they already know all the techniques/instrumentation.