First-year students engage in lab research as soon as their course of study begins. Each student rotates through different labs to experience different areas of research, techniques and lab environments. As a result of this experience, students often discover new interests in terms of what they’d like to study.

The school is dedicated to learning, through innovative, groundbreaking basic science research that addresses fundamental yet significant questions in biology, as well as translational research that brings these new findings into patient care.

Research at RFUMS encompasses an in-depth concentration of researchers in the areas of Structural Biology/Biochemistry, Neurosciences, and Molecular Cellular Processes. This includes studying the underlying mechanisms of protein structure and function, fundamental mechanisms of drug dependency and neurodegenerative diseases (such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease), as well as the mechanisms of viral-induced cancers. Because cancer and many other diseases are caused by a dysfunction of cellular and developmental processes, many of our researchers study problems of cellular and developmental biology.