Doctor of Philosophy in Biostatistics

The Biostatistics Doctoral Program offers students a program which emphasizes biostatistical modeling and inference in a wide variety of fields, including bioinformatics, the biological sciences and veterinary medicine, in addition to the more traditional emphasis on applications in medicine, epidemiology and public health. This feature takes advantage of unique UC Davis strengths, including the unparalleled diversity of the UCD campus in the life sciences. Biostatistics group faculty are researchers with widely varying backgrounds, espousing a wide variety of methodological approaches. Biostatistics applies quantitative methods to study problems related to life sciences that arise in a broad array of fields. Biostatistics provides stochastic models and methods, algorithms, and graphical tools for the analysis of data from genetics, bioinformatics, and the medical, biological, agricultural, and environmental sciences. Students gain advanced knowledge of survival analysis, statistical methods for genetics, bioinformatics, epidemiology and environmental research, longitudinal data analysis, analysis of biological shapes and trajectories, generalized linear models, estimating equations, model selection and bioassay, and design for biological and medical studies. Students graduate with the qualitative and quantitative skills necessary for professional research and teaching in providing stochastic models and methods, algorithms and graphical tools for the analysis of data for a variety of life-sciences fields.

An undergraduate major in Mathematics, Statistics, Biostatistics or Biological Sciences with a quantitative orientation is typical for Biostatistics graduate students but is not required. However, because of the mathematical nature of some of the graduate coursework, students should be able to demonstrate good mathematical ability and should have taken coursework in mathematics. Students preferably would have had some exposure to courses in the life sciences (biological, environmental, medical, and agricultural sciences). Students without sufficient coursework in mathematics or life sciences may be admitted on the condition that deficiencies will be corrected during the first year of study. Applicants for the Ph.D. must have completed the course requirements (or their equivalents) for the M.S. degree in Statistics.
The minimum requirements for the Biostatistics PhD program are as follows:
Bachelor's Degree with overall GPA of 3.0 or above
Demonstrate good mathematical ability
Exposure to courses in the life sciences (biological, environmental, medical, and agricultural sciences)
One year of calculus
One course of linear algebra
Familiarity with a programming language
Upper division coursework in Mathematics and/or Statistics. Upper division coursework in Biology and/or Biostatistics is strongly recommended
TOEFL iBT Scores (in-person or online exams): minimum of 80
IELTS (in-person or online exams): 7.0 or above on a 9 point scale