Contact us

Join us

If you’re interested in joining the Mackay, Matthews or Kwan labs, you should just write to us and let us know why you’re interested in joining the lab and in what capacity. All applicants should include: (i) a full CV, (ii) academic transcripts (including information on your ranking in your cohort – e.g., I was 5th out of 75 students in my BSc and 2nd out of 40 in my MSc) and (iii) the contact details of 3 academic referees. You should also make it clear why you are writing to us in particular. Depending on what sort of position you’re looking for, there are other things you should send/know:

Prospective BSc(Hons) students
Honour students, who do a one-year research-focused course (typically as the fourth year of their undergraduate degree), can start either in Feb or in July. You need to fulfil certain requirements regarding your undergraduate record to be eligible for Honours.

Prospective PhD students
As a PhD student, you will need a scholarship to cover your living costs and your tuition fees. For local students, the APA provides these – the living costs provided are ~AUD26,000 per year (for 2016). This is roughly what it costs to live in Sydney in a shared house or similar. There is almost always the opportunity to earn a bit more (~AUD5,000 p.a.) by doing some undergraduate lab tutoring. For international students, the tuition fees are high – getting up towards AUD40,000 per year. There are a number of scholarships that you can apply for. They are listed here. The most common are the APA and Endeavour awards. These are *very* competitive, so you will need to have very high grades to have any chance of getting one – roughly in the top 10% or so of your cohort. You will also need to have completed a substantial research project and written a thesis in English (that has been graded) to be eligible. You should include information on your ranking in your cohort and your thesis topic and experimental skills in your application.

Prospective postdocs
Postdoc positions can either work if you can obtain a fellowship of your own or if we are able to pay your salary from grant funds. Generally, our funds are committed each year, but opportunities can arise as people come and go from the lab – or when grants come in. If you are an international applicant, you should explore the possibilities for fellowships from your own country. As a local applicant,the NHRMC CDF scheme and ARC DECRA scheme are the two main sources of fellowships, although some opportunities do exist from charitable organizations (such as cancer foundations). You should look these up. Im general, they are very competitive so you would need to have a strong track record relative to opportunity.

Find us

Address
Rooms 673-682, 6th floor
School of Life and Environmental Sciences
Cnr Butlin Ave and Maze Cres
Darlington Campus
University of Sydney
NSW 2006
Australia

Search for Molecular Bioscience on this map.

Note that we don’t really have a decent entrance to our building! Either come in at the loading dock level or on the level of the raised walkway. Both entrances are on the NE side of the building (the side facing the big lawn – that you can see in the photo – for the navigationally challenged). After hours, you’ll need to call someone to let you in…