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I applied to Columbia DBMI, which is somewhat different from Sys Bio. I didn't hear back yet.

Has anyone else heard from Harvard BIG? One person has reported on numerous channels (discord, Reddit, spreadsheet) that he/she received an interview invitation. I'm wondering how many people received the invitation. Or whether this is true. I tried to contact the program director and administrator but the latter is away for the winter break. I asked her the same question last Friday and she told me that the interviews will be out "latest by first week of January," which seems to imply that it won't be THAT soon.

I spoke to the administrator, Lisa, and she informed that all the invites have been sent out.

Still waiting. But I applied to Columbia Biomedical Informatics as my first choice and Sys Bio as second choice.

Correction: The Program Director told me that the interview invitations will ALL be sent out by next week.

I think all the interview invitations for Harvard BBS were sent out yesterday. I didn't get one.

It's a good idea to target professors-of-interest. However, keep in mind that some professors might've left their roles recently and still retain a dormant role in the university. In this case, we might not be able to work with them even though their names are still on the university website.

Fingers crossed. I'm applying to Stanford Genetics. BMI is my second choice. I made the switch between the two programs because hopefully nepotism will get me into Stanford. Hahaha

My boss, who is the HoD at Stanford, mentioned that we need at least three letters from full professors to be competitive.

Congratulations!!! I'm starting to get nervous because I have not heard back from any of the programs that I applied for.

Which university did you guys attend and who are you getting your LORs from?

Hi We have several overlaps. I ended up applying for 15 programs: - Stanford Genetics/BMI - Harvard BIG, BBS, - MIT CSB, Biology - Princeton QCB - Yale CBB - Columbia BMI - Tri-Institutional CBM - Skaggs-Oxford - WUSTL - Carnegie Mellon (CMU-Pitt) - University of Southern California - MD Anderson Stats (as mentioned in the first post): (1) International student (2) BSc and MPhil from an Australian University, and recently MSc Bioinformatics at Johns Hopkins (3) GPA: 3.91 for JHU MS (but very low GPA from my foreign BSc when converted to 4.0 scale) (4) LOR: Two senior professors (one HoD at Stanford and another was the Director of an Australian Institute for more than a decade). Two more letters from a post-doc (now asst prof) and a program director. (5) Research experience: 5 years of relevant research with one first-author publication. Question: Do you think my profile is competitive for those programs as an international student?

Existing thread:

Hello Henry, Thank you for your comments. May I know which program are you in? I've updated my list of target schools: - Stanford (BMI, genetics) - Harvard (BIG, SSQBio, BBS) - MIT (CSB, Bio) - Princeton QCB - Columbia Biomedical Informatics - NYU Vilcek - UPenn - Carnegie Mellon Biological Sciences - Scripps Skaggs-Oxford - Rice University Do you think my list of schools suffice or should I apply for more? Aside from Stanford, I think the remaining schools have a fair percentage of international admissions. While I do not have a quantitative background, I'm extensively involved in a deep learning project at Stanford University and will have a publication on the topic by Dec 2022 prior to grad school interview. I also have near-perfect GPA for my MS in Bioinformatics at Johns Hopkins University. Are there any direct admissions for PhD programs? How to apply for direct admissions?

Undergraduate: BSc (Immunology, Pharmacology) @ University of Sydney First Masters: MPhil Medicine (cancer research) @ University of Sydney Second Masters: MSc Bioinformatics @ Johns Hopkins University Minority status: International, female, Asian Relevant work experience and achievements: (1) Graduate intern at Stanford University (cancer bioinformatics) - ongoing (2) Founder of a digital health startup (3) Involvement in wet-bench cancer research for ~3 years (4) One manuscript, one review, one poster (5) Oncology research consultant Programs of interest (in descending order): Stanford Biosciences (Biomedical Informatics, Genetics, Cancer Biology) Harvard HILS (BIG) Harvard-MIT HST MEMP UC Berkeley (BCB) MIT CSB Tri-I CBM (backup plan) Questions: (1) Are any of the programs/schools "off-limits" for international students? (2) Should I cast my net wider? Is my profile competitive enough for the aforementioned programs?