My name is Dr. Roya Zandi, I am the new director of the Biophysics Department at UCR and we're here to help you succeed. We welcome you to the interdisciplinary graduate program in Biophysics at the University of California, Riverside.  Here at UCR we offer an innovative and flexible program of study leading to advanced degrees in Biophysics.  The biophysics community here consists of over 30 faculty (in seven departments spread across three colleges) whose research interests span the breadth of biophysics as broadly defined.  The research programs of the participating faculty can be loosely grouped into four broad areas that overlap extensively with one another.  From the smallest to the largest scales, these are:

• Molecular biophysics – including physical methods for elucidation of biomolecular structure at atomic resolution by means of X-ray crystallography, nuclear magnetic resonance and cryoelectron microscopy; the application of single-molecule methods to study the behavior of individual biomolecules; the use of a variety of spectroscopic methods (electron paramagnetic resonance, mass spectrometry, infrared and resonance Raman spectroscopy) to study the behavior of biological molecules; computational modeling of molecular behavior; biological electron transfer, including photosynthesis; protein-protein and protein-ligand interactions; and biomolecular dynamics.
• Cellular biophysics – including studies of cell signaling, and visualization same; computer modeling and simulation of biomolecular recognition; cell-cell interactions involved in fertilization and body plan development; membrane biosynthesis and trafficking; folding and assembly of lipoproteins; the biophysics of cell division; development and application of biosensors; functional proteomics; single-cell bioanalytical methods, including imaging; high-throughput detection of biomolecules; virus assembly; dynamics of microbe/immune system interactions; synaptic protein interactions and exocytosis; theoretical modeling of biological systems; and bio-computation.
• Organismal biophysics – including whole-animal bioenergetics and metabolism; imaging; exercise physiology and the biophysics of locomotion; stress response; dynamics of temperature regulation; circadian clock studies; imaging methodologies; and neural networks and sensory response.
• Systems biophysics – including studies of community ecology; energy input/output/distribution in ecosystems; response of individual organisms and populations to changes in energy flux into and out of their environments and among one another; biogeochemical cycling of water and nutrients; the physics of biodefense mechanisms; species distribution along environmental gradients; and computer modeling of energy flux and stress response in ecosystems.

In the course of your studies, you will have the opportunity to interact with many faculty members in a supportive mentoring environment that emphasizes professional development.  You will also have the opportunity to contribute original research in cutting-edge applications of physical methods to understanding life processes over a range of scales.  All of our Ph.D. students are fully supported financially through a combination of fellowships, research assistantships and teaching assistantships.

The city of Riverside (population ~325,000) lies 60 miles east of Los Angeles in southern California's Inland Empire.  40 miles to the north, the San Bernardino mountains offer hiking and skiing, and Palm Springs and the high desert (Joshua Tree National Park) are 60 miles to the east. Several southern California beach communities are some 50 miles to the southwest. The university occupies a spacious 1,200-acre campus on the eastern outskirts of Riverside, near the Box Spring Mountains.

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