PhD Biomedical/Bioengineering/EE Fall 2016 Profiles

[Nallapar]

Let's discuss, and help each other out.

 

GRE:

Domestic/International (TOEFL/IELTS):

UG GPA:

(If you did Masters)

Masters GPA:

Research experience:

 

Research publications, patents, conferences:

 

PHD intended specialization: 

 

University list:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Nallapar]

GRE: 1450 (800 Q, 650 V, 3.5 AWA)

Domestic/International (TOEFL/IELTS): International with US Master's TOEFL: 114

UG GPA: 3.61, 3.87 (Major) (Both WES converted)

(If you did Masters)

Masters GPA: 3.86 (Top 10 school for EE)

Research experience: 1.5 year at top university in home country, 1 year at my current school

 

Research publications, patents, conferences: No journals, 4 conferences (Top conferences, 2nd author), 1 Poster at top CS conference

 

PHD intended specialization: Medical Imaging (MRI)

 

University list:

1) Stanford EE

2) MIT EECS

3) UCSF/UC Berkeley Bioengineering

4) U Mich EE

5) UIUC EE

6) UVa BME

7) UCLA BioE

8) USC EE

9) U Toronto IBBME

10) CWRU BME

11) U Iowa EE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[lethalallele]

Undergrad Institution: Missouri Western State University 
Major(s):  Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Minor(s): 
GPA in Major: 3.48
Overall GPA: 3.01
Position in Class: 
Type of Student: Female, Non-traditional (27 when I graduate)

GRE Scores (revised/old version): revised
Q: 155
V: 158
W: 4.5

Research Experience: 

1.           Spring 2015 (5 months): Biochemistry undergraduate research - expression, purification, and analysis of GST-fusion proteins from E.coli; no publications or presentations, more of a learning experience

2.           Spring 2015 - Spring 2016 (1 1/2 years): Computational biology/chemistry/drug design - Using artificial neural networks to analyze and test sequences found in a novel exonic splicing enhancers motif recognized by the human serine-arginine rich protein SC35; will be looking at anticoagulants as well as taxol starting this fall; will have minimum one first-author paper in JBS

3.           Summer 2015 (3 months): Internship with NASA at Johnson Space Center in Microbiology lab - The effect of simulated microgravity on the microbial physiology of Ralstonia pickettii isolates from the international space station: studying bacterial response to simulated microgravity environment, development of silver biocide system for Orion spacecraft, immunological imaging, collaborated with engineering team on heat exchanger system for Orion spacecraft

4.           Spring 2016 (5 months): Microbiology research, identification of novel antibacterial compound in marine bacterium

Awards/Honors/Recognitions: 

Presentations

ASBMB 2016 Annual Meeting (April 2016) – accepted for oral presentation

251st ACS National Meeting & Exposition  (March 2016) – upcoming oral presentation

2015 Heartland Undergraduate Biochemistry Forum  (November 2015) – 2 posters, 1 award

ASC Midwest Regional Meeting  (October 2015) - 1 poster, 2 oral presentations

Space Life Sciences Exit Presentations  (August 2015) – oral presentation

Scholarships/Awards

Larry L. Lambing Chemistry Scholarship                                                                                        

Undergraduate Research Poster Competition – 2nd place: 2015 Heartland Undergraduate Biochemistry Forum, University of Kansas-Medical Center    

American Chemical Society Commendable Award: ACS Student Chapter                                                                                  

American Chemical Society National Meeting Travel Grant: ACS Student Chapter                                                                     

American Chemical Society, Honorable Mention Award: ACS Student Chapter    

Pertinent Activities or Jobs: Chemistry mentor and lab assistant in lower level chemistry labs; Vice-President of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology Club (ASBMB Student Chapter; will be 4 semesters at graduation), chemistry tutor

Any Miscellaneous Accomplishments that Might Help: 

Print and Media Broadcasts (May 2015 – present): Office of Public Relations and Marketing, Missouri Western State University

“Outstanding student” used in admissions publications, university advertisements, and radio advertising

Special Bonus Points: Great LORs, connections within NASA, Pfizer, ASU

Applying to Where:

The Graduate School at the Stowers Institute: Biology (applied 12/01)

University of Kansas - Medical Center: Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (applied 12/01)

MIT: Biological Engineering (applied 12/07)

University of Kansas: Bioengineering (applied 12/07)

University of Nebraska - Lincoln: Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (applied 12/10)

Yale University: Biomedical Engineering (applied 12/10)

Brown University: Biomedical Engineering (applied 12/10)

[lethalallele]

Intended specializations:

Tissue engineering, biological imaging, drug delivery, biomaterials, cancer biology, nanoscale engineering

[Nallapar]

Solid research profile. I think the only downside are your grades and GRE. Why have you limited your applications to 7 schools? I think 10-15 would have given you better odds at making to a higher ranked school.

Edited December 29, 2015 by nallapar
Clarity

[Edotdl]

Posted in the EE thread, but I'll post here as well.

EE major interested in (comp.) neuro stuff like BCIs, neuromorphic chips, cognitive computing, etc.

Undergrad Institution: Ivy
Major(s): EE
Minor(s):
GPA in Major: 3.8+
Overall GPA: 3.8+
Position in Class: top?
Type of Student: Asian Male

GRE Scores (revised/old version):
Q: 170 (98%)
V: 162 (90%)
W: 4.5 (80%)

Research Experience: Multiple semester long experiences in not super related areas during freshman and sophomore year. Sophomore summer did research program at Big 10 school in Neuro. Started in lab beginning Junior year in another Neuro lab at my current school (in this lab now). Amgen scholar doing Neuro research summer after junior year.

Awards/Honors/Recognitions:

Dean's list, GPA stuff

Pertinent Activities or Jobs: 

TA one semester.

Any Miscellaneous Accomplishments that Might Help:

Special Bonus Points: Letters from PIs that did PhD at MIT

Any Other Info That Shows Up On Your App and Might Matter:
Recs from the two summer programs and the lab I'm in now at my school. At least 2 are relatively famous in their fields (which is not exactly what I want to do in grad school though)
Applying to Where:
All PhD

MIT- EECS

Stanford-EE

CMU-ML

Princeton-EE

Columbia-EE

JHU-BME

UCSF/Berkeley-BioE

[lethalallele]

13 hours ago, nallapar said:

Solid research profile. I think the only downside are your grades and GRE. Why have you limited your applications to 7 schools? I think 10-15 would have given you better odds at making to a higher ranked school.

My husband is in the Army and we own a house in Kansas City area and we also have a 4 year old son. The only realistic areas I can apply to are within a short radius of either Kansas City, or from Connecticut where our family lives. There's no way we could afford to move to somewhere where we don't A. already have a house or B. have family to stay with. I have a few schools I am still looking at to decide if I want to apply as well.

Yes my old grades are not great, I switched majors when I was younger and I was also not yet diagnosed with ADHD so I would stop taking online classes in the middle of the semester. FML. My last 60 credits are great! Haha. This is the only thing I'm worried about, hopefully they see that the reason for the low GPA is due to unrelated courses years ago. Hopefully my research will outshine that. 

I met personally with the PI at Yale I hope to join and toured the lab and he said he will personally look at my application so hopefully that gives me a better chance. I know a large portion of the faculty at KUMC, I'm fairly confident I will at LEAST get into that school. MIT I don't really have any hope lol. We shall see!

[Nallapar]

I think the admission committee will take into consideration the difficult situations you've faced. Your research definitely trumps your grades from when you were younger.

Best of luck with Yale, and other colleges! 

[HopefulGrad555]

GRE: 169 Verbal (99%) 167 Quant.(94%) 5.5 Writing (98%)

UG GPA: 3.39 from JHU BME

Research experience:

2.5 years research in one lab, with on break for a summer of research at SNU in South Korea. Currently an NIH Postbac in a viral immunology lab, doing full time research for the year

Research publications, patents, conferences:

1 oral presentation at BMES Tampa 2015

 1 printed publication( 3rd author), 1 accepted publication (4th author), 1 in review (2nd author), and 1 in preparation (3rd author) (4 total)

PHD intended specialization: 

Immunoengineering, but if a lab with this focus is unavailable I'm more broadly interested in studying Cell-ECM interactions (how they influence cellular phenotype, and how to quantify and model them) 

University list:

Duke (applied)

UChicago IME (applied)

WashU (applied)

UMD College Park (applied)

NIH OxCam (applied)

UCSD (applied)

Harvard (applied)

Georgia Tech (applied)

Edited December 29, 2015 by HopefulGrad555

[Nallapar]

I am surprised they have already posted interviews and rejections. I have all my application status under review.

[lethalallele]

Yeah I know KU bioengineering has already sent out acceptances, Stowers seems to have sent out some interview requests possibly just to the international students (hopefully since I haven't heard back yet), but the other due dates haven't even passed yet besides MIT which usually send out invites first week of January or so. 

[HopefulGrad555]

3 minutes ago, nallapar said:

I am surprised they have already posted interviews and rejections. I have all my application status under review.

Did you see my signature before I deleted it? I applied to a bunch of schools last year, with no presentations and only 1 publication, and having no time to work on applications (working 25+ hours per week along with a very demanding senior schedule). I'm hoping this year is better. 

[Nallapar]

Oh I see. I think the papers are definitely going to help.

Best of luck with your applications

[Coefficient49]

Undergrad Institution: JHU

Major(s):  Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
Minor(s): Environmental Eng.
GPA in Major: 3.7
Overall GPA: 3.6

Type of Student: International
GRE Scores (revised/old version): revised
Q: 161
V: 161

W: 4


Research Experience: 

1x2nd Author paper, 1xfirst author Manuscript in preparation, 1 x paper submitted, 1x 1st author protocol paper in prep.  and a bunch of other projects with only presentations and posters. 1 US patent. 4 years of research experience in the same lab at JHU. 
Awards/Honors/Recognitions:  4 different undergraduate research awards and ~25k USD in undergraduate research funding.
Pertinent Activities or Jobs: Founded and running 2 start ups with around 50k USD of funding each. Designed a portable air purifying pillow for air travel and travelling in polluted nations. Designed a sustainable solar cell for a number of African nations. Designed a water quality monitoring device for a number of south American nations.

Any Miscellaneous Accomplishments that Might Help: Past military experience, extensive leadership experience, organized lab duties and lab orderings
 

Special Bonus Points: nothing special

Applying to Where:

all BioE PhD programs.

Rice , MIT, Harvard

 

I want to do tissue engineering, my experience are in cellular mechanics and my papers are studies of mechanosensing, mechanotransduction, cellular rheology and cellular migration.

 

 

[tuckbro]

For those waiting for news from MIT BE, word in the halls is that the interview invitations should be going out this week!  Good luck to everyone!

[aegis921]

51 minutes ago, tuckbro said:

For those waiting for news from MIT BE, word in the halls is that the interview invitations should be going out this week!  Good luck to everyone!

Thank you for this. To other MIT BE applicants: did you receive an official confirmation that your application was complete and will be reviewed? All other MIT departments I have applied to sent me one, while MIT BE did not. I only received a standard email confirming the submission of my application. 

[lethalallele]

I only got the confirmation email generated automatically when I submitted my application. There doesn't seem to be a "checklist" that shows the date materials were received either. 

[tuckbro]

On Monday, January 04, 2016 at 2:11 PM, Coefficient49 said:

Undergrad Institution: JHU

Major(s):  Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
Minor(s): Environmental Eng.
GPA in Major: 3.7
Overall GPA: 3.6

Type of Student: International
GRE Scores (revised/old version): revised
Q: 161
V: 161

W: 4


Research Experience: 

1x2nd Author paper, 1xfirst author Manuscript in preparation, 1 x paper submitted, 1x 1st author protocol paper in prep.  and a bunch of other projects with only presentations and posters. 1 US patent. 4 years of research experience in the same lab at JHU. 
Awards/Honors/Recognitions:  4 different undergraduate research awards and ~25k USD in undergraduate research funding.
Pertinent Activities or Jobs: Founded and running 2 start ups with around 50k USD of funding each. Designed a portable air purifying pillow for air travel and travelling in polluted nations. Designed a sustainable solar cell for a number of African nations. Designed a water quality monitoring device for a number of south American nations.

Any Miscellaneous Accomplishments that Might Help: Past military experience, extensive leadership experience, organized lab duties and lab orderings
 

Special Bonus Points: nothing special

Applying to Where:

all BioE PhD programs.

Rice , MIT, Harvard

 

I want to do tissue engineering, my experience are in cellular mechanics and my papers are studies of mechanosensing, mechanotransduction, cellular rheology and cellular migration.

 

 

SInce I applied to two of your choices, here is how two of the schools work (at least how it worked in 2014)

 

Rice will not contact you for an interview, they will accept you by the end of January  and invite you to an Open House kind of thing in the spring or reject you in the spring.  One of my favorite visits - they really show they want you to attend!

MIT will send invites to interviews probably this week.   They accept 80% of whom they interview.   If they interview you, they want you unless they discover you don't mesh well in person. I believe mine came via email this week on a Thursday, not sure if that will hold true this week.  Interview process is really amazing, you have to do a poster presentation and then sit around with world famous scientists and talk science.

 

[Nallapar]

Any idea about Berkeley/UCSF BioE? They should also be sending out invites soon right? 

BTW has anyone experienced a surge in LinkedIn profile views? I had 3 private profile views yesterday.

Edited January 6, 2016 by nallapar

[tuckbro]

4 minutes ago, nallapar said:

Any idea about Berkeley/UCSF BioE? They should also be sending out invites soon right?

BTW has anyone experienced a surge in LinkedIn profile views? I had 3 private profile views yesterday.

Yes, right before I received invites i had a flurry of confidential views.

[Nallapar]

Good to know

If you don't mind me asking, are you a current PhD student? If yes, where?

[tuckbro]

Just now, nallapar said:

Good to know

If you don't mind me asking, are you a current PhD student? If yes, where?

Yes, I am a second year at MIT BE.

[Nallapar]

Great! 

Do you know when does MIT EECS give out replies? Waiting sucks.

 

[tuckbro]

Looking at the results page and searching for that program, it looks like last year the acceptances all went out on Feb 2nd.  I don't see any interviews listed.

[buchephalus]

Hi all, 

GRE: 157V/163Q/6AW

Domestic/International (TOEFL/IELTS): International (it's complicated)

UG GPA: 3.9 OA / 4.0 Major

(If you did Masters)

Masters GPA: N/A

Research experience: 3 semesters, 1 in a stem cell lab, 2 in a lab with a very well respected PI in field... publication pending

 

Research publications, patents, conferences: BMES Conference presentation (2015, Tampa)

 

PHD intended specialization: Drug delivery and biomaterials...interest in chemistry of materials as well as engineering applications

 

University list: Carnegie Mellon (just had interview, acceptances to go out this week), Cornell University, MIT, Harvard, Lehigh University (tentative proposal, awaiting application deadline to close before I hear back officially), University of Chicago IME, Georgia Tech