Lenwood S. Heath
Prospective Graduate Students

I am happy to consider new students who wish to pursue research in bioinformatics or in theoretical computer science. However, I am unable to advise any prospective student who has not applied for graduate admission (typically into the Department of Computer Science) and been offered admission. Furthermore, I am unable to discuss any possibility of graduate research funding with anyone who is not enrolled for graduate study at Virginia Tech.
ADMISSION TO GRADUATE STUDY IN COMPUTER SCIENCE Find information on applying for admission to our graduate program in Computer Science. Request an application for admission and financial aid with an email to gradprog@cs.vt.edu. I expect a resume containing concrete evidence of prior research accomplishments from any prospective student asking for my advice! Please do not contact me for advice until you have secured admission to graduate study.
BIOINFORMATICS Virginia Tech is close to establishing an interdisciplinary Ph.D. Program in Genetics, Bioinformatics, and Computational Biology. This will be a degree program separate from any academic department that will allow the student to have advisors in a number of departments, including computer science, biology, and biochemistry. You can apply for this degree now, if you wish; find out how. The Department of Computer Science, along with many departments in the life sciences and the Statistics Department, offer a graduate option in bioinformatics. Any CS graduate student may decide to pursue the option, and that decision can be made after an admitted student actually enrolls. Such a student is required to take two life sciences courses that are specifically for the bioinformatics option: PPWS 5984, Biological Paradigms for Bioinformatics BCHM 5024, Computational Biochemistry for Bioinformatics Also see some bioinformatics courses taught during Fall Semester, 2001.	THEORETICAL COMPUTER SCIENCE My research interests in the past have primarily centered around algorithms for discrete problems, graph theory, and symbolic computation. See my abbreviated vita. I am happy to supervise the research of a student in theoretical computer science. I concentrate on hard algorithmic questions that require mathematical sophistication. In theoretical computer science, I prefer to supervise PhD students to Masters students. While I will be happy to talk to you about research in theory, we need to realize that research funding for a student is much harder to obtain in theory than in most other research areas, such as bioinformatics. On the other hand, a graduate student doing research in theory is very likely to be able to support herself/himself on a teaching assistantship in the Department of Computer Science. This has been my primary means of supporting theory students in the past, and I have graduated 5 PhD students and 3 Masters students in theory.