PhD Curriculum

Choice of PhD Mentor

All of the MSTP Training Faculty, their research interests, and recent publications are listed on this website in the faculty section.  Choice of potential mentors actually begins during the recruitment process, when applicants identify faculty they would like to meet during their interview days. Additionally, MSTP students attend the retreat(s) of the Program(s) they are most interested in, and thus learn more about the specific research opportunities and meet the professors, other graduate students, and postdoctoral fellows in that Program. Students further gain exposure to potential faculty mentors during the MSTP-specific Seminar and Molecules to Medicine courses during program years 1 and 3.

To help the students in their choice of laboratory, the MSTP Director meets with each student several times during the first and third year and encourages the student to visit with several investigators and their laboratories and to attend their laboratory meetings in the spring. 

MSTP students have the flexibility to choose one of the thesis advisor's Program affiliations, either departmental or interdisciplinary, in which to complete the PhD thesis requirements.  Once the choice of thesis advisor is made, the student formally transfers into the appropriate PhD degree-granting program. 

Comprehensive Exam and Thesis Defense

By the fall of the fourth program year (first thesis year), most MSTP students have accumulated the necessary credit hours required to take the Comprehensive exam.  In the majority of training programs, advancement to candidacy requires the successful completion of a qualifying comprehensive oral exam in which a student presents and defends a research proposal written in the format of a grant application. 

The Comprehensive Examination Committee is usually also the Doctoral Thesis Committee. The MSTP requires that every thesis student has at least one experienced MSTP faculty member on this committee besides their thesis mentor to serve as an advocate for the program. The occasional required course, and any upper-level elective course(s) that the thesis advisor and student agree would contribute to the overall training goals, are completed during the research years.  Other graduate program-specific requirements, such as annual seminar presentations, bi-annual thesis committee meetings, journal club, and Program retreat and seminar attendance, are also completed during the research years.

Foundations of Doctoring Thesis Years

This course allows students to work with a selected preceptor and follow patients over an extended period in order to maintain their clinical skills during thesis study years.  The goals of this course are to maintain and further the clinical skills learned during Phases I-III of medical school, provide opportunities to engage in clinical/translation scholarly activities related to their research interests, experience potential career choices, and minimize the anxiety often encountered upon re-entry into the clinics after an extended absence. Students are required to complete 32 hours of precepting in two out of three terms for each academic thesis year, except in their graduating year when they will complete one term.

PhD Programs Affiliated with MSTP