{"id":7448,"date":"2025-12-22T12:38:26","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T18:38:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/webid2-test-lsweb\/?page_id=7448"},"modified":"2026-02-05T13:48:19","modified_gmt":"2026-02-05T19:48:19","slug":"phd-program","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/biology\/students\/graduate\/phd-program\/","title":{"rendered":"PhD Program"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Department of Biological Sciences offers Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) programs in biology with areas of concentration in botany; microbiology; cellular and molecular biology; genetics; physiology and morphology of plants and animals; terrestrial and aquatic ecology; behavioral biology; conservation biology; and evolution. Prospective students are encouraged to visit faculty webpages in their area of interest<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Admission Requirements<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Upon acceptance to the program, students will be notified of any curricular pre-requisites that must be completed as perceived by their advisor\/committee. Extra programmatic requirements (physics, organic chemistry and calculus) will be determined by the student\u2019s major professor. All basic requirements must be remedied by the end of the student\u2019s first year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Graduate School Requirements<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

There are a number of general Graduate School regulations and requirements for the doctoral degree that are described on the\u00a0Graduate School website<\/a>. The student\u2019s program is governed by the rules in the\u00a0Graduate School\u2019s Academic Policies & Procedures<\/a>\u00a0issued the year in which the student enrolled in the graduate program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Research Requirement<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The doctoral degree is a research<\/strong> degree. The most important requirement is that a student must make an original, publishable contribution to their field of study. PhD students are required to have submitted or published at least one primary authored manuscript in a peer-reviewed journal prior to<\/u> graduation. PhD students are also required to present a Colloquium in the Department of Biological Sciences prior to graduation<\/em>.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Doctoral Student Status<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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  1. Doctoral Student<\/strong>
    The Department considers students admitted to the doctoral program with a BS, BA or MS degree to be doctoral students. However, the Graduate School considers as doctoral students only those in the PhD program that already have a MS degree or those who have completed 24 credits of graduate work.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Doctoral Candidate<\/strong>
    A doctoral candidate must complete the University residence, formal course, and language\/data analysis proficiency requirements and pass the entire PhD Preliminary Examination (see below).<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n