Hi all. I’m an international student studying Pharmacy at University College London (UK) and am planning to have my graduate study in the USA. I’m interested to study chemistry ( especially organic chemistry) at grad school. I wonder if it is possible to get into top chemistry graduate program without a chemistry degree? I am confident to complete my degree with a high first class honour ( 75%) which is close to 4.0 of the US GPA system. However, I am concerned about that my pharmacy program doesn’t have enough advanced chemistry content and will be looked down by the admission committee. Actually, my personal goal is to be a scientist who works on drug discovery. Will it be better for me to apply to the pharmacology program instead of the chemistry provided that my undergraduate degree is pharmacy?
Note: Pharmacy is an undergraduate degree in the UK and it is a master degree.
You should probably first check the requirements to enter a strong chemistry program in the U.S. – they are usually listed on program websites. You may also consider contacting admissions or the D.G.S. (Director of Graduate Studies) of departments that may interest you. They could probably answer a few questions, and let you know if you would be eligible for admission to one of their programs.
If you have not completed requisite coursework, it may be a hard go. If you cover some of the coursework for chemistry in your pharmacology program, it may be possible. Or perhaps possible with the addition of a few extra courses needed.
I am not certain, but if you want to perform advanced pharmaceutical research, a doctorate in chemistry, or perhaps bio-chemistry would probably be advised. Hopefully there will be more information forthcoming on the forum. University College London is certainly respected; it may be more a question of your major. Unfortunately, I do not know much about pharmacology programs, or how they would sit with advanced chemistry work.
Thanks for your advice. I have checked the requirement of some of the programs, most of them don’t specify that applicants must have a chemistry degree but they do highly recommend applicants to take the GRE Chemistry. The biggest problem I’m facing now is that I have never come across some of the topics that will be tested in the GRE (quantum chemistry etc.) Maybe I should consider applying for pharmacology or medicinal chemistry program which will also likely to provide me an excellent foundation to do pharmaceutical research.
Btw, I’m majoring in pharmacy but not pharmacology. The degree that I will obtain is MPharm ( Master of Pharmacy) which is the UK version of PharmD in the USA.
What if I self-study those missing topics?? But probably it won’t work either… Passing the GRE chemistry with flying colours ( say 90 percentile) is hard for students who really major in chemistry, not to mention for me.
Sunny, I suggest that you strongly consider a graduate school in Medicinal or Pharmaceutical Chemistry. That’s the route I went a number of years ago to get my Ph.D. My first year class consisted of an equal mix of incoming students with either a pharmacy degree or a chemistry degree (my major). Depending upon what your undergraduate degree was in you would be required to take certain pre-requisite classes. As a chemistry major I needed to take classes in pharmacology, physiology, and medicinal chemistry whereas pharmacy majors usually needed to take a refresher class in organic chemistry. By the second year, pharmacy and chemistry undergraduates were pretty much on the same page and took the same graduate school courses. Since you stated that your personal goal is to be a scientist who works on drug discovery, I would suggest a Ph.D. in Medicinal Chemistry over Pharmacology. Both degree are usually offered through the School or Pharmacy vs Chemistry departments. All of my advanced chemistry classes (organic chemistry focus) during graduate school, however, were taught by faculty members of the Chemistry department
Graduate school builds on undergraduate preparation, so if you don’t have the appropriate undergraduate preparation, then you won’t succeed in the graduate courses and research. Thus if you don’t have the right classes and knowledge, PhD programs in straight chemistry are unlikely to admit you (and unlikely to trust self-studying unless you can otherwise prove that you know the material). I think that pharmacology or medicinal chemistry might be better options for you.
