We are actively looking to recruit PhD students from CS, AMSC, and BISI-BEES!
Current PhD students. If you are already a PhD student at UMD, I would be very happy to talk to you; please reach out to me via email.
To get a sense of the work we do, I recommend reading Chapters 1 and 2 of my dissertation and 1-2 papers from the last year (at least one where I am the last author).
The general process for joing the lab is taking CMSC 829A Algorithmic Evolutionary Biology and completing a semester-long rotation in the lab, often these are done in the same semester. The goal of taking CMSC 829A is learn the background necessary to conduct research in this area, while getting involved in research (a major part of the course grade is a final project). By the end, you should have a sense of whether you want to pursue PhD research in algorithmic evolutionary biology generally and whether you are interested in any of the projects in the lab with open positions. The goal of doing a rotation is to learn if the lab culture (and my advising style) is a good fit by attending weekly lab meetings and 1-1 research meetings. At the end of the rotation, we will discuss the past semester and moving forward. Note that it is generally a good idea to explore different labs/advisors at the beginning of grad school.
Prospective PhD students. If you are a prospective PhD student, please do not email me. Instead, list me as a faculty of interest when you apply to PhD programs at UMD. Identifying faculty of interest (as well as the appropriate research areas) in your application facilitates the review process, after which decisions are made by the admissions committee.
No undergrad positions are available at this time.
Undergrads are valued and active members of our lab, contributing to ongoing research projects and attending lab meetings as well as social events.
UMD students. We are excited to work with undergrads who have the goal of contributing to one of our ongoing research projects, on the order of writing an honors thesis (e.g., ), workshop/conference paper (e.g., ), and/or section in a longer journal paper. Achieving this goal requires a substantial time commitment from us and the student, so we require undergrads to register for (CMSC 498A or CMSC 499A) the same semester they join the lab. We also work with undergrads during the summer. These positions are filled by invitation (e.g., as follow-up to taking CMSC 498A/499A) or via the BRIDGE REU program.
If you are intersted in getting involved in research, we recommend you take our undergrad class (CMSC 498Y), as we recruit undergrads from this course. If there are open positions, you can also apply via email (subject line: "Undergrad interested in joining Molloy Lab"). This email should contain
Non-UMD students. We are excited to work with undergrads from other institutions during the summer via the CARR REU program (starting summer 2025). We encourage you to apply if you are eligible. Applications are typically due in late February / early March.
No post-doc positions are available at this time.
If you are interested in writing a postdoc fellowship proposal to work with us, I would be very happy to talk to you; please reach out to me via email.
We don't typically have MS students in the lab, but if you are interested in joining, please follow the instructions for PhD students above. If you are looking to write an MS scholarly paper, I recommend you take our grad class (CMSC 829A) and then use your final project as the basis for that paper.