About the Department
The Department of Biological Sciences has 58 tenured/tenure track faculty members who are recognized internationally for their excellence in research and teaching. The annual departmental operating budget totals around $20 million dollars of expenditures with an approximately $21 million dollars under administration in the research portfolio. The department includes 235 graduate students currently enrolled and 1,835 undergraduate students in honors, specialization and general programs. The department teaches approximately 147 sections, with between 7,000 - 12,000 individual registrations. The Department of Biological Sciences is also home to ten museum collections and five research service units and state of the art facilities to support the research and teaching mission.
Our Research
Research in our department spans a wide range of themes in biology, including:
- Ecology and Evolution
- Entomology
- Genomics
- Immunology and Infection
- Marine Biology
- Microbiology
- Model Organisms
- Molecular and Cellular Genetics
- Paleontology
- Physiology and Development
- Plant Biology
This size and breadth of research interests has allowed the Department to build world-class facilities that would be difficult to maintain by a smaller unit.
The Department's Research Facilities Include:
- terrestrial, freshwater and marine field research facilities at the Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre on the west coast of Vancouver Island
- extensive collections in
- plants (Vascular Plant Herbarium)
- bryophytes (Cryptogamic Herbarium)
- vertebrates both current (Mammalogy Collection, Ichthyology Collection and Ornithology Collection) and extinct (Laboratory for Vertebrate Paleontology)
- insects (Strickland Museum)
- excellent facilities, complete with support staff, in the
- FACS facility
- Drosophila Unit
- Limnology lab
- Molecular Biology Service Unit
- Microscopy Facility
- Low-Level Mercury Analytical Laboratory
- Digital Teaching Resources Laboratory
- Fermentation and Protein Production Unit
- as well as a comprehensive facility-the Biotron-that supplies and maintains growth chambers for plants, animals, and microbes.
Our Undergraduate Program
The Department of Biological Sciences offers more than 130 courses to undergraduate students. Our programs provide students with a breadth of knowledge across biological and related fields. We emphasize experiential learning through substantive offerings of lab courses, independent research opportunities and field courses. Interested students can pursue either an honors or specialization program within the department in three areas of concentration: (1) Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Biology, (2) Integrative Physiology, and (3) Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology. In collaboration with the Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology (Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry), we offer honors and specialization programs in Immunology and Infection. General program students in the Faculty of Science may choose from our rich selection of courses to pursue a major in biology.
Visit our undergraduate program website for more information
Our Graduate Program
The Department of Biological Sciences is one of the largest and most scientifically diverse departments of its kind in Canada. Six Research Interest Groups with overlapping memberships (Ecology, Microbiology and Biotechnology, Molecular Biology and Genetics, Physiology and Cell Biology, Plant Biology, and Systematics and Evolution) provide expertise in all areas of biological sciences.
We offer research-orientated, thesis-based graduate programs at both the MSc and PhD levels. Study programs are tailored individually to graduate student needs and emphasize interdisciplinary thinking. All students accepted into our MSc and PhD programs have guaranteed funding for 3 and 5 years, at rates of ~CDN$18,500 and ~CDN$19,100, respectively. Teaching training is provided and is mandatory for all students on graduate teaching assistantships. With ~270 graduate students, >70 full-time faculty, excellent support facilities and ample research funding (totalling more than CDN$16 million in 2003), a vibrant and exciting learning environment is provided. Our students are highly productive (averaging 1.3 and 5.6 thesis-related refereed publications for MSc and PhD, respectively). They are also very successful in obtaining major scholarships and awards during their graduate programs (50 new major scholarships won in 2003), and have successful careers following graduation.
Visit our graduate program website for more information