These courses include not only lectures but also interactive participation with faculty members in a small-group setting. Seminars and elective courses broaden the exposure to clinically relevant areas of research. Opportunities are provided for the student to become acquainted with the diverse research interests of the faculty and to obtain hands-on experience in selected techniques. In the second year, students select advanced courses in several areas of anatomy and cell biology and choose an adviser to assist in the development and implementation of a dissertation research project. The graduate program is flexible and allows for continuing interdisciplinary training.
Emphasis is placed on designing a program that is tailored to the student's specific goals.
In addition to developing research competence, individuals interested in pursuing teaching as part of a career are able to achieve competence in neuroscience, embryology, and microscopic or gross anatomy. The Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology is located in the Gordon H. Scott Hall of Basic Medical Sciences and the adjoining Lande Medical Research Building. These are part of the 230-acre Detroit Medical Center, one of the largest in the country, which contains six major hospitals as well as the C. S. Mott Center for Human Growth and Development, the Kresge Eye Institute, and the Karmanos Cancer Institute. The department possesses scanning and transmission electron microscopes, phase contrast and fluorescence microscopes, computer-based morphometric and image analysis facilities, environmental chambers, photographic facilities, animal rooms, operating rooms for animal surgery, and facilities for neurophysiology, stereotaxic neurosurgery, autoradiography, protein chemistry, immunocytochemistry, immunology, and human dissection. The Shiffman Medical Library adjacent to Scott Hall contains more than 100,000 volumes and receives more than 700 scientific periodicals annually.