Graduate Opportunities

I am accepting graduate students into my lab. My primary priority is to see that graduate students develop into critical, independent thinkers, become strong communicators, and receive rewarding employment after leaving my lab. All my students are expected to develop their own projects and to become autonomous researchers by the time they graduate. My philosophy is to function as a facilitator and advocate for my students. I hope to learn as much from them as they learn from me, and I try to approach the relationship as collaboration rather than one of supervisor-supervisee. This in no way should give students the impression that their experience in my lab will be, as my advisor once put it, “a relaxing interlude in one’s life”. On the contrary, the expectation is that students work extremely hard toward well-thought out, practical, and justified scientific and career goals. Indeed, the minimum expectations for Masters and Ph.D. students are to strive to generate one and two published papers, respectively, in high quality journals by the time they graduate. However, greatly exceeding these minimum expectations is strongly encouraged and will benefit all in the lab. After all, the work ethic established in graduate school will reflect your probability of attaining desired jobs and desired successes.

If you are interested in applying to pursue a Masters or Ph.D. in my lab:

Please read some of my publications (see the Publications page) to get an idea of the type of research we conduct and the approaches we take. Use these papers to stimulate questions you might pursue if you were to join the lab.
Contact me by e-mail and include information about:
- any previous research experience
- research interests
- your GPA
- your GRE scores
Check out University of Notre Dame Department of Biological Sciences for information on minimum requirements for admission and application procedures and deadlines. When you apply be sure to mention that you would like to work in my lab.
If you have additional questions on the application process contact Bridget Lautaru (Phone: 574-631-5205).