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Detailed Information

Programs of Study

The Department of Biology offers a program of study that leads to the Master of Science degree in biology (with thesis) or the Master of Arts degree in biology (nonthesis). For the Master of Science degree, a minimum of 30 semester credit hours is required, up to 10 of which may be contributed as research credits. Course work is determined by the student, the research adviser, and the student’s advisory committee. Thesis research may be undertaken in the areas of behavioral biology, biogeochemistry, cellular physiology, developmental biology, ecology, endocrinology, evolutionary morphology, genetics, genomics, herpetology, immunology, microbiology, molecular biology, neurophysiology, ornithology, phylogenetics, plant ecology, plant physiology, protozoology, or virology. For the Master of Arts degree, a minimum of 33 semester hours of course work is required. Certificates of Graduate Study (16 credit hours) and Advanced Graduate Study (24 credit hours) are also available in cell, molecular, and developmental biology and ecology, evolution, and organismal biology.

Research Facilities

The laboratories of the Department of Biology are well equipped for graduate instruction and research in many areas of biology. The Department maintains a research-equipped greenhouse, field vehicles, and an electron microscope facility. Available equipment and resources include: automated sequencers; liquid scintillation spectrometer and gamma counter for work with radioisotopes; still and video imaging systems; scanning and transmission electron microscopes; biomaterials testing apparatus; cabinet X-ray facility; cell-culture laboratory; and a diversity of chromatographic, electrophoretic, spectrophotometric, photographic, bioelectronic, and other instruments. Extensive computer facilities with GIS and high-end imaging capabilities are available within the Department.

Financial Aid

Teaching assistantships carrying a stipend of $13,100 and waiver of tuition were available in 2007–08, as were federally supported work-study funds and loans. A limited number of research assistantships are awarded on a competitive basis. Additional summer support is also available to qualified students.

Cost of Study

Tuition in 2009–10 was $700 per semester credit hour.

Living and Housing Costs

Privately owned rooms and apartments are available along the Main Line and in other nearby communities. Costs for rooms start at approximately $100 per week, depending on kitchen privileges. Apartments range between $550 and $900 per month, depending on their size and their location. Students who share apartments may have costs as low as $300 per month.

Student Group

The Department enrolls approximately 50 graduate students a year. Nearly 2,000 students from the United States and abroad are enrolled in various graduate programs at Villanova.

Location

Villanova University is situated in Villanova, Pennsylvania, on U.S. Route 30, 6 miles west of the Philadelphia city line. The University can be reached in half an hour from central Philadelphia by two commuter rail lines; each of these systems has a station at the University. Buses pass the campus, which is 1 mile east of I-476 and easily reached by car from I-95, I-76 (the Schuylkill), and the Mid-County exit of the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

The University

Villanova University is a Roman Catholic university, sponsored by the religious order of St. Augustine. It benefits from more than 160 years of excellent educational tradition. The University recognizes its responsibility to disseminate knowledge and to seek new knowledge through research and scholarship. It has been the University’s tradition to foster close and warm relationships between its students and faculty members. Villanova is an equal opportunity employer.

With more than 220 landscaped acres in a beautiful residential section, the Villanova campus is one of the showplaces of the Philadelphia area and is a registered arboretum. The campus has facilities for a variety of athletic activities.

Applying

Graduates of accredited colleges who wish to work for their Master of Science or Master of Arts degree in biology must have completed a minimum of 24 semester hours of undergraduate work in biology and 6 to 8 hours each of calculus, physics, general chemistry, and organic chemistry. The selection of applicants is based on academic record, supporting letters, and Graduate Record Examinations (GRE) scores on the General Test. The GRE Subject Test in biology or biochemistry, cell and molecular biology is strongly recommended but not required.

The Faculty and Their Research

• Ronald A. Balsamo, Ph.D., California, Riverside, 1994. Relationship of leaf architecture and biomechanics to drought tolerance; whole plant response to environmental stress.
• Anil Bamezai, Ph.D., All India Institute of Medical Sciences, 1987. Regulation of CD4+ T-lymphocyte development in the thymus and responses to protein antigens in the peripheral lymphoid tissues; focus on set of glycosylphosphatidyl-inositol (GPI)–anchored proteins housed in lipid rafts that function as signaling foci on the plasma membrane.
• Aaron M. Bauer, Ph.D., Berkeley, 1986. Phylogenetic systematics of squamate reptiles, especially geckos and skinks; evolutionary morphology of reptilian integumentary and musculoskeletal systems; historical biogeography of tropical and Southern Hemisphere reptiles and amphibians; herpetology of southern Africa, islands of the southwestern Pacific, India, and Sri Lanka; eighteenth- and nineteenth-century history of herpetology.
• Samantha Chapman, Ph.D., Northern Arizona, 2005. Ecosystem ecology and microbial ecology; biotic influences on ecosystem processes; impacts of plant biodiversity on carbon and nutrient cycling and microbial diversity; herbivory and chemical ecology; effects of nutrient eutrophication in mangrove ecosystems.
• Robert L. Curry, Ph.D., Michigan, 1987. Vertebrate behavioral, population, and molecular ecology; ornithology; conservation biology; ecological, behavioral, and genetic aspects of hybridization in chickadees; ecology of the Florida scrub jay (collaboration at Archbold Biological Station); conservation ecology of insular Mimidae.
• Mary Desmond, Ph.D., Colorado at Boulder, 1973. Developmental biology, developmental genetics, and neuroembryology; basic cellular mechanisms underlying normal development of the brain and spinal cord, using chick and mouse embryos as experimental models; findings: brain growth requires occlusion of the spinal cord and intraluminal pressure generated from cerebrospinal fluid (CSF).
• Angela J. DiBenedetto, Ph.D., Cornell, 1989. Molecular and cellular biology; genetics; developmental neurobiology, especially programmed cell death.
• Norman R. Dollahon, Ph.D., Nebraska–Lincoln, 1971. Parasitology, protozoology, and electron microscopy.
• Russell M. Gardner, Ph.D., Indiana, 1975. Endocrinology; pharmacology; mechanisms of hormone action, development of hormone responses; hormonal control of uterine growth and differentiation.
• Vikram K. Iyengar, Ph.D., Cornell, 2001. Behavioral ecology; entomology; chemical ecology; sexual selection in insects and other arthropods; how the costs and benefits of mate choice shape mating systems.
• Todd Jackman, Ph.D., Berkeley, 1993. Evolutionary genetics of salamanders and lizards using DNA sequence data in combination with other data to provide a robust historical framework for examining evolutionary processes; population studies of wandering salamanders; speciation and biodiversity of the New Caledonian herpetofauna.
• Janice E. Knepper, Ph.D., Brown, 1979. Molecular biology; virology; molecular mechanisms of viral oncogenesis.
• John Olson, Ph.D., Michigan, 1990. Metabolic and muscle physiology; ecophysiology; functional and structural maturation of the effector tissues for thermogenesis and substrate mobilization in birds and mammals; mechanical performance of muscles during locomotion in both invertebrate and vertebrate species.
• Joseph A. Orkwiszewski, Ph.D., Bryn Mawr, 1971. Regulation of plant development; control mechanisms of plant growth and development.
• Michael Russell, Ph.D., Berkeley, 1990. Investigations at the intersection of marine ecology, population biology, and fisheries science; sustainable management and conservation of commercially important marine invertebrate fisheries.
• Louise A. Russo, Ph.D., Penn State Hershey Medical Center, 1987. Cell biology and physiology; understanding the establishment of the uterine receptive state and fertility; hormone-induced uterine growth and remodeling, using an in vivo model system in the rat; analysis of regulated expression of specific cell-surface adhesion receptor proteins and degradative enzymes.
• Philip J. Stephens, Ph.D., Aberdeen (Scotland), 1977. Physiology; use of computer technology and animations in traditional and asynchronous teaching, distance learning, animations, interactive, and student-centered learning.
• R. Kelman Wieder, Ph.D., West Virginia, 1982. Ecosystem ecology and biogeochemistry, wetland ecology, constructed wetland for mine drainage or stormwater treatment; biotic and abiotic factors influencing carbon cycling and accumulation/release in boreal peatland ecosystems, including continental bogs and fens, in the discontinuous permafrost region of western Canada.
• James Wilson, Ph.D., Columbia, 1998. Prokaryotic microbiology; changes of expression of genes affecting stress resistance and virulence of the facultative intracellular pathogen Salmonella typhimurium in response to low-fluid-shear and microgravity growth conditions.
• Dennis D. Wykoff, Ph.D., Stanford, 1999. Genetics, cell biology, and molecular biology of budding and fission yeast; regulation of phosphate metabolism in Ascomycetes.

Correspondence and Information

Villanova University
For information:
Director of the Graduate Program
Department of Biology
Villanova, Pennsylvania 19085
Email: gradbio@villanova.edu


Villanova University
For financial aid:
Office of Financial Aid
Kennedy Hall
Villanova, Pennsylvania 19085
Email: finaid@villanova.edu


Villanova University
For admissions and assistantships:
Dean of Graduate Studies
Villanova, Pennsylvania 19085
Email: gradinformation@villanova.edu