偷偷贴一个08届Yale生物本科的学姐给我的宝贵意见:
The way PhD applications work is that youapply for the PhD program at the school. Knowing some professors you areinterested in working with could help, but you should have good reasons forchoosing them. What is your research interest in general?
(。。。)Most gradstudents apply to a very general graduate program (like biological sciences),and then choose a lab and a more specific program later. It really depends onthe school.
Well, Harvard is pretty much good for everything...such a big place...but couldbe a scary/stressful place
Immuno: Yale (REALLY amazing for immuno), WashU (more microbio), maybe Stanford(not sure about this one)
More quantitative biology: MIT, UCSF, Stanford, Yale has some goodRNA/protein/crystallography work going on
Cancer: Hopkins, Sloan-Kettering
Neuro: Columbia, Hopkins has some big names (like Sol Snyder)
Biomedical Engineering: Hopkins (and definitely not Yale !!!)
Other places to consider:
Rockefeller: lots of top labs here, labs are rather hierarchical and large,though
Baylor: it is down in Texas, but it is a huge medical institution, veryexciting, lots of stuff going on
Caltech: if you suddenly felt like doing physical sciences research :)
Penn: I was not too impressed with the labs at Penn, but probably a place youshould consider too
Duke: a major biomedical research center...not sure what is there because Ididn't consider it, but you should look into it
首先,UTSW = UTexas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, 很牛的医学中心,出过n个炸药奖,生化和神经很强,但近来被挖走几个大牛(听过一说法,东西部发展趋势较好,尤其是东部,例如南部的UTSW和WashU St.Louis就有人才流失现象)。我们系几个老师和那边的若干人熟。此校一大好处是没有面试,春节期间刷邮箱直接刷出offer的感觉很爽:)
说下我第一份拒信,YaleBBS的MB&B。那个就是太专了,真的是core Biochem和做结构的Mol-Biophys。我Final Year Project的实验室确实是做Structural Biology的,但我以后并不想做这个,觉得chem出身的背景会更适合。不过我估计归根结底是Yale的医学院太难进了(外加他们近来钱也不富裕,外加看过一帖子说Yale重视研究经历)。
有个Cold Spring Habor Lab的项目,研究生院名叫Watson School of Biological Sciences,大牛如云,极其难进,本来就不该申,当时导师给了我一个免申请费的条子,临deadline时我一激动就申了。拒信是意料之中情理之中。该申请说的自动传给SUNY SB,其实好像是白说。
Wash U at St.Louis也是很早就寄纸质拒信了。申请Deadline极早。这学校很有个性,让写好几个essay,很麻烦,明说只有经过on campus interview才会录取。校园虽漂亮但在大中部in the middle of nowhere……听说她家注重真正想去的人,重视研究经历,对其他的倒是比较不拘一格。
Johns Hopkins U School of Medicine,非医学院相对来说就不值得申了,尤其是当时我去了Baltimore,从医学院去主校区的路上感觉治安不好。但我们系一个学姐去了医学院,所以我努力申了下。BCMB预申过了,再正式申就没信了,别人面试都发了,我后来知趣withdraw了不过过了n久还是收到了拒信,真是……