IMPRS-BAC Curriculum
The IMPRS-BAC offers an exciting and flexible curriculum, allowing you to gain both scientific and transferable skills. Browse this page to find out about requirements for IMPRS doctoral candidates and information about upcoming events.
Workshops and courses are open in priority to students and staff of the MPI for Molecular Genetics and the IMPRS-BAC.
- Please sign up only if you will be definitely able to participate (given no major unexpected events). Please write the dates in your calendar.
- Your registration is binding! This means cancellation is valid up to 30 days in advance without any reason given.
- Last minute cancellations due to illness are only acceptable with a medical certificate.
- Please be fair and cancel early to give people on the waiting list a chance to participate. 'No shows' and late sign-outs will have reduced priority of access in future workshops/nanocourses.
Upcoming Events
The Dahlem Research School also offers transferable skills workshops and courses in different categories: career orientation & development; funding, managing and completing research; research integrity & skills; speaking & presenting; writing & publishing. You can find the list of the upcoming workshops here.
All member universities of Berlin University Alliance offer an abundance of workshops, counselling, and events for doctoral researchers of all disciplines. Within the framework of Graduate Studies Support Program, these offers are open to all doctoral researchers of Freie Universität, Humboldt-Universität, Technische Universität, and Charité. More information are available here.
The Planck Academy offers workshops and webinars on career planning, networking, project management, and more. You can find upcoming workshops and webinars on MAX here (you first need to log in to MAX).
The following elements make up the curriculum of the IMPRS-BAC
- The Welcome week lays the groundwork and introduce the breadth of our research.
- University lectures in mathematics, computer science, bioinformatics, biochemistry and biology allow you to catch up with the areas unfamiliar to you.
- Nanocourses push your knowledge at the cutting edge of research in biology and computation.
- Otto Warburg Summer Schools provide an in-depth look at a current topic.
- Colloquia allow doctoral candidates to present their research to their peers and other local scientists. Invited guests complement these half-day events.
- Every two years, the student association of the MPIMG organises a doctoral candidate retreat where participants learn about each other's research, network and gain new perspectives on their own work.
- Transferable skills complement the academic curriculum by teaching you to write, lead, publish, network, manage, present and plan your future career. In addition to those listed below, the courses of the Dahlem Research School (DRS) are also accessible to IMPRS-BAC doctoral candidates.
Mandatory components of the IMPRS-BAC curriculum
Instead of accumulating a specific amount of credit points, IMPRS-BAC doctoral candidates have to participate in a few mandatory classes and create the rest of their curriculum according to their interests and needs. Mandatory components are:
The Welcome Week for new doctoral candidates is usually held in November each year. The IMPRS-BAC faculty members introduce their research focus and projects. General courses on research methodology relevant to all doctoral candidates are usually also included (Conducting responsible research, Statistical design of experiments). The week also includes presentations and guided tours of the different service facilities at the MPIMG. Moreover, this week aims to provide onboarding to new doctoral candidates. For this, several doctorate holders, mostly postdocs at the MPIMG and FUB, report on their own doctoral studies, give advice and answer questions. Alumni*ae are also invited to talk during a career session. The various support offers by the MPIMG and FUB are also presented in detail (International Office, short talk by the MPIMG ombudsperson, conflict guides, EMAP, gender equality officer, works council, support-points, mental health first aiders, ...). Networking is another important component of the Welcome Week: New IMPRS doctoral candidates are introduced to current doctoral candidates during several social events. A guided tour of Berlin or the Bundestag is usually included at the end of the week so that new doctoral candidates can socialise and learn more about the city and its history. The week is planned to create an open and welcoming environment for the new doctoral candidates, facilitate the onboarding process and strengthen the class feeling. In addition, it lays the groundwork for future collaborations and makes doctoral candidates aware of different approaches to questions in biology and computation.
IMPRS doctoral candidates have to attend at least two workshop days (corresponding to 1 credit point) on Good Scientific Practice throughout their doctorate. This is required by the Dahlem Research School as a prerequisite for an ethical research career. Doctoral candidates can attend workshops offered by the Dahlem Research School, the Berlin University Alliance or an eLearning course on "Good Academic Practice during Doctoral Studies" developed by GRADE, the graduate academy of Goethe University Frankfurt (Please contact the IMPRS coordinator to get an access key). These trainings cover among others the DFG guidelines on Good Scientific Practice, basic rules and recommendations, conflicts in academia, ethical aspects of academic research, research involving humans and derived data, appropriate documentation, plagiarism, authorship, data management, storage and transfer, as well as intellectual property. Doctoral candidates are strongly recommended to attend these courses already at the beginning of the doctorate, ideally during the first year.
The IMPRS-BAC organises once a year an online workshop series on statistical literacy, data analysis and data visualisation with the R programming language. Each course consists of four online sessions (2 hours each) spread over 3 weeks plus personal study time (approximately 2 hours per day for 3 weeks). Attending a course on statistical literacy is mandatory for doctoral candidates whose master’s degrees did not include advanced classes on statistics.
The IMPRS-BAC organises a 2-day workshop once a year to practice not only scientific English but also learn the structure and style of a scientific article. Participants get personal feedback on their writing exercises. Doctoral candidates can also attend another scientific writing course offered for instance by the DRS or BUA.
Nanocourses are based on the format established by Harvard Medical School in 2008, and are usually two full-day interdisciplinary courses taught by our faculty, mixing theory and practice on newly arising topics of interest in both biology and computation. The goal of nanocourses is to bring all doctoral candidates to a similar level of knowledge.
Attending at least three nanocourses is required in the IMPRS-BAC curriculum. Some other external courses and workshops may also be recognised as a nanocourse on a case-by-case basis, provided that they are interdisciplinary in nature and combine both theory and practice.
Science communication is an integral and crucial part of science, whether that means communicating research and findings through social media, to journalists or to the public. IMPRS doctoral candidates have to contribute actively to one activity dealing with science communication and public engagement throughout their doctorate, e.g., giving a demonstration during the Long Night of the Sciences, tutoring during the annual Girls’ and Boys’ Day, writing a press release, contributing to the monthly MPIMG newsletter, giving a presentation during school or undergraduate class visits, contributing to print, radio or TV media as well as science slams or pitching videos on social media.
The MPIMG has for many years organised a biennial summer school on recent advances in topics in bioinformatics, the International Otto Warburg Summer School and Research Symposium (OWS). Since 2019, the IMPRS-BAC has incorporated the OWS into its curriculum, with a changing focus on current topics in biology and computation. Traditionally, the OWS has had a similar format to the nanocourses on a larger scale: several days of lectures by invited speakers and practical sessions. In addition, doctoral candidates present their research in poster sessions and talks.
The goal of the IMPRS Colloquia is to strengthen cohesion, collaboration and networking among doctoral candidates and their identification with the IMPRS-BAC. Every few months, IMPRS Colloquia are held, at which two or three doctoral candidates in their last year present their doctoral work (30 minutes each). Another presentation (one hour) is given by a guest, usually a new group leader at the MPIMG, FUB or a new IMPRS faculty member. Doctoral candidates are invited to suggest speakers. Attending IMPRS colloquia throughout the doctorate is mandatory for all IMPRS doctoral candidates. In addition, each doctoral candidate has to present at one of these colloquia near the end of her*his time at the IMPRS-BAC, providing a near-finished story of her*his research activities to date.
The goal of this lecture series is to bring all doctoral candidates up to a similar level of knowledge and broaden their knowledge in fields relevant to the IMPRS-BAC, including epigenetics, gene regulation, RNA biology, developmental biology, structural biology, protein biochemistry, molecular evolution, sequence analysis, bioinformatics, and statistics. The IMPRS faculty members teach monthly 1-hour lectures in rotation. Each lecture consists of a solid introduction to the field to allow the attendees, especially those from the other end of the experimental-computational spectrum, to follow the talk, detailed research results, and methodological explanations that may be relevant for future collaborations. These interdisciplinary lectures are intended to contribute significantly to providing doctoral candidates from different backgrounds with the same level of knowledge, to foster interdisciplinary discussion and collaboration. Attending these lectures is mandatory for first-year doctoral candidates and strongly recommended but still optional for more advanced doctoral candidates.
Having regular TAC meetings until the submission of the doctoral thesis is mandatory.
Optional components of the IMPRS-BAC curriculum
Doctoral candidates are encouraged to attend courses and seminars at both the Department of Biology, Chemistry, Pharmacy and the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at Freie Universität Berlin where they have agreed with their supervisor that it would fill a gap in their knowledge, such as courses on bioinformatics, statistics and machine learning.
The IMPRS-BAC organises several soft/transferable-skills workshops per year, based on previous experience and doctoral candidates’ needs and suggestions. Some of them aim at developing skills directly needed during the doctorate (proposal writing, peer review, programming with R, data analysis and visualisation, didactics and teaching, presentation skills, time and project management, deep reading, mental health strategies, networking, intercultural competencies). The IMPRS-BAC also aims to prepare its graduates not only for scientific careers but also for careers in the biotechnology industry, research management, scientific spin-off companies, data science, science communication, and many others. For that, soft-skills workshops on various other topics (career planning, developing leadership skills, business, science communication, ...) are offered in-house and by the Planck Academy, the learning management system of the MPG. In addition, IMPRS doctoral candidates have access to free of charge workshops and events offered by the DRS for 6 full workshop days per academic year, and they can also attend workshops and events organised by the other members of the Berlin University Alliance.
A wealth of high-profile scientific symposia is regularly taking place in Berlin, which IMPRS-BAC doctoral candidates are encouraged to attend:
- MPIMG Institute seminars (MPIMG)
- RNA Biology club Berlin (several RNA research groups in Berlin)
- Berlin Stem Cell Club (Berlin Institut of Health and GermanStemCellNetwork)
- Current Topics in Bioinformatics (MPIMG, Bayer AG, Max Delbrück Center, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
- Lecture series "Scientific workflows: Tools and tips" (FU-BCP)
- Seminars in Evolution and Ecology (FU-BCP)
- Seminars of the Dahlem Centre of Plant Sciences (FU-BCP)
- Mathematische Forschung verstehen (FU-MCS)
- Career Perspectives with a PhD in Natural & Life Sciences (several graduate programmes in Berlin)