Thanks for your interest in our lab and work! The CPL (combining both principal investigators) usually includes 1-3 technical staff, 1-4 postdocs, 3-6 graduate students, and 10-20 undergraduate students.
Prospective Postdocs
WE ARE HIRING for most of our ongoing projects!
Please contact one or both of the principal investigators directly by email, enclosing a CV and other relevant information and describing why you are interested in working with our group in particular and how you envision your career arc. We are friendly to postdocs with other demands on their time (e.g., children).
Please don’t spam us with a form letter praising our work in RNA catalysis or RF engineering. That never works, and we won’t even reply.
Prospective Graduate Students
Please apply via one of the graduate fields listed on our main page. Usually the fields of Neurobiology & Behavior or Psychology are your best bets for admission (both fields include concentrations in neuroscience), but any of the graduate fields listed are valid options.
It is always wise to contact us ahead of time to discuss your interests and plans. We look forward to hearing from you.
It is even wiser for you to apply for an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship *before* you start graduate school (i.e., during your last year of college, or your gap year, or whatever you are doing in the year before you seek to attend graduate school). You won’t be directly competing with applicants who are already in graduate school (less competition!), and if you receive a fellowship then you are very likely to get into the graduate school that you want to get into. If you’re interested in our lab, we are happy to help you figure it out. Start by reading the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship website.
Undergraduate Students
Please contact one of the principal investigators at your leisure by email. Be sure to enclose a CV (resume) and describe to us what you are most interested in and why you would like to work in the lab. Gentle reminders are OK (indeed helpful) if you have not heard back from us within a week or so.
Please make contact well before the semester in which you would like to start in the lab. There is a university certification process to go through prior to starting any lab work that will require some time and effort to complete. You can receive academic credit for lab work via BIOG 2990/4990 or PSYCH 4700/4710.
Most undergraduate work comprises behavioral analysis (including behavioral pharmacology) or computational neuroscience. Experienced undergraduate researchers may participate in electrophysiology or other technical projects, become team leaders, or write honors theses.
High School Students
Cornell administers several precollege programs through which high school students can come to Cornell for a summer and work in a research lab. Historically, these have included the Research Apprenticeship in Biological Sciences (RABS) and the Cornell Engineering Experience, but check the link for the current offerings for precollege students (local and remote).
We also have hosted students from externally managed summer programs, such as the Summer Research – Early Identification Program of the Leadership Alliance.
This list is not exhaustive – there certainly are other programs and possibilities for summer internships – and we welcome high school students in the lab. That said, it is not usually possible for us to host high school students in the lab outside of a formal summer program.