Responding to e-mails from PIs

[Yuanyang]

From a long letter of interest sent to the PI of a lab participating in a PhD Program I'm applying to, I get this reply :

"Hi Y,

Thanks for your interest.  Yes, I’m accepting students.  Please let me know if you have any questions about the program.

H

"

How do I respond? I tried to keep it brief but I already told him my interests, why I'm interested in his lab, and sent my CV.  The only question I would have is "what should I put on my application?", but am I allowed to ask that in the first place?

[fuzzylogician]

You could ask but I doubt you'd get a satisfying answer. This seems like a totally generic reply so you might just respond with a 'thank you'. You don't need to feel obligated to continue the conversation, this reply doesn't really suggest that he is interested in that. (But of course if you actually have questions about the program, he has indicated that he is willing to answer them. Just make sure they're not clearly answered already on the department website.) Otherwise, I'd leave this alone and would at most follow up after submitting the application to let him know that you did.