If the student has been told at the time of being offered admission that he/she must take one or more courses to strengthen his/her undergraduate background in Biochemistry, he/she has to complete the specified course(s) in the first year of the program. These courses are to fulfill the student’s admission conditions and do not count towards the courses that must be completed to fulfill the degree requirements.

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Course Requirements for the M.Sc. Degree and for Transfer into the Ph.D. Program

The course requirements for an M.Sc. degree and for a Transfer Exam are the same. These are:

i) One Half-Credit in Selected Topics in Biochemistry or BCH2024H

The student must take one half-credit in Selected Topics in Biochemistry or BCH2024H (Focused Topics in Biochemistry). The upcoming topics are announced one to two years in advance.

Occasionally another graduate half-course that is not cross-listed as an undergraduate course may be substituted for this course provided that permission has been obtained from the Graduate Coordinator prior to registration in the course. With the permission of his/her supervisor, the student may take additional courses (see box below). Performance in all courses taken will appear on the student’s transcript.

ii) Continuous Enrolment in BCH2020L

BCH2020L is the Wednesday afternoon (4:00 pm) student seminar series. Attendance at, and participation in, this course is mandatory. Attendance is monitored by a sign-up sheet. The student is expected to attend every seminar with the exception of the occasional absence due to a conflict or other commitment. The student will, however, be penalized if he/she has a poor attendance record. The penalty will be an essay assignment(s) on seminar topics that were missed.

A student in the M.Sc. program, or a student scheduling a Transfer Exam, must give at least one 20-minute seminar before the end of his/her second year in the program. No formal grade is assigned to BCH2020L as it is a credit/non-credit course. However, the student will receive feedback on his/her seminar from faculty immediately following the presentations of the day.

The student will also receive a summary of evaluation forms completed by the faculty. The student remains registered in this course until he/she completes the M.Sc. degree or transfers into the Ph.D. program, at which time he/she is assigned credit for the course.

Seminar Format

Seminars are given as PowerPoint presentations that should include sufficient background information on the goals of the project and the experimental approaches used for the diverse expertise of the members of the audience.

The student is strongly encouraged to rehearse his/her seminar presentation and to think about how he/she might answer questions that may be posed. The student is advised to keep PowerPoint animations to a minimum as the audience generally finds these distracting rather than instructive. The student must be aware of colour choices, such as avoiding red on a black background! The student must keep to the 30-minute time limit (including questions).

Seminar Sign-up

Sign-up for a seminar slot is done mid-summer through the Graduate Program Administrator. Students will receive an email with instructions on how to sign up. When the student signs up for a seminar he/she must inform his/her supervisor and committee members of the scheduled date as they are expected to be present at the seminar.

Two weeks before the presentation date, the student should remind them that the seminar is coming up. At the same time, the title of the seminar must be given to Carrie, the Graduate Program Administrator (carrie.harber@utoronto.ca), and to Rob (rob.reedijk@utoronto.ca) for inclusion on Cette Semaine, the departmental seminar listings site.

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Course Requirements for the Ph.D. Program

i) Completion of THREE half-courses

ONE of these courses must be a half-course from either the Selected Topics in Biochemistry series or the BCH2024H series (Focused Topics in Biochemistry). The upcoming topics are announced one to two years in advance.

If the student entered the Ph.D. program either directly on completion of a B.Sc. degree (direct entry) or after completion of an M.Sc. degree, then he/she must complete one half-credit in either Selected Topics in Biochemistry or BCH2024H prior to his/her Qualifying Exam.

If the student transferred into the Ph.D. program, all appropriate courses taken while registered in the M.Sc. program will be credited towards the Ph.D. degree course requirements.

If the student completed an M.Sc. degree and then registered in the Ph.D. program, the Selected Topics in Biochemistry course and other courses taken to fulfill the requirements for the M.Sc. degree cannot be credited towards the Ph.D. course requirements.

However, if the student took an additional course(s) he/she may request that this course be credited towards the Ph.D. course requirements (see box above regarding course credits following transfer).

The TWO additional half-courses can be chosen from the following list:

• Selected Topics in Biochemistry (all three of the required half-courses can be from this series)

• BCH2024H (Focused Topics in Biochemistry; all three of the required half-courses can be from this series)

• JBB2025H (Protein Crystallography)

• JBB2026H (Protein Structure, Folding, and Design)

• JBL1507H (Biochemistry of Inherited Disease)

• CHM1456H (NMR Spectroscopy II: Advanced Theory and Application)

• CHM1478H (Quantum Mechanics for Physical Chemists; core course)

• CHM1479H (Thermodynamics; core course)

• MBP1011H (Foundations of Bioinformatics)

• MMG1012H (Topics in Molecular and Medical Genetics I)

• a graduate level course offered by a cognate department (e.g., CHM, IMM, MBP, MMG) that is not listed above, providing that approval from the Graduate Coordinator is obtained prior to registration

• one (but not both) of JTB2010H (Proteomics and Functional Genomics) and JTB2020H (Applied Bioinformatics)

• one (but not more than one) course from the BCH/JBB/JBI/JBZ/JNR 1400 series of courses (these are graduate courses which are also listed in the Faculty of Arts and Science Undergraduate Calendar).

Although JNR1444Y is a full-year course, this course will count only as a half-course towards the degree requirements.

Note that some CHM 1400 series courses are listed only in the SGS Calendar and some are listed in both the SGS Calendar and in the Faculty of Arts and Science Undergraduate Calendar. CHM1456H, CHM1478H, and CHM1479H are not cross-listed in the Undergraduate Calendar.

ii) Collaborative Programs

If the student is enrolled in a collaborative program, then the course requirements of the program will substitute on an equivalent credit basis for the three half-course requirements outlined in (i) above.

iii) Continuous Enrolment in BCH2022L

In addition to the course requirements as described in (i) or (ii) above, the student must obtain credit in the Wednesday afternoon (4:00 pm) student seminar series BCH2022L. This is the same course as BCH2020L (the student seminar course for M.Sc. students) but for Ph.D. candidates, the course is called BCH2022L.

Attendance at, and participation in, this course is mandatory. The student is expected to attend every seminar with the exception of the occasional absence due to a conflict or other commitment. The student will, however, be penalized if he/she has a poor attendance record. The penalty will be an essay assignment(s) on seminar topics that were missed.

The student must present at least three 20-minute seminars to obtain credit in this course. The first, second and third seminars, respectively, must be given before the end of year two, three and four-and-a-half of the program.

If the student entered the Ph.D. program via transfer from the M.Sc. program, he/she will be given credit for one seminar given in the BCH2020L series and will only be required to give two additional seminars.

If the student entered the Ph.D. program after completion of an M.Sc. degree, he/she must present three seminars. The student remains registered in this course until he/she completes the Ph.D. program, at which time he/she is assigned credit for the course.

For more information on this seminar course, including seminar format and sign-up, please see the comments given under BCH2020L.

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Candidacy

All doctoral students are subject to the requirements for Good Academic Standing, including candidacy. To achieve candidacy, the student must complete all requirements for the degree exclusive of thesis research and courses such as ongoing research seminars that run continuously through the program.

The student must also have an approved thesis topic, supervisor and supervisory committee. Upon achieving candidacy, completion is noted on the student’s transcript.

Candidacy is achieved as noted on the following chart:

Students who do not achieve candidacy by these deadlines will be denied further registration in their program and will have their eligibility terminated.

If the student needs an extension, he/she must complete the Extension to Achieve Candidacy Form and submit it to the Biochemistry department for review. The student must present to the Biochemistry department the causes for the delay and evidence that the remaining candidacy requirements will be completed within the period of the extension requested.

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