Biological Sciences with Placement Year

Choose what you study from a range of bioscience topics to build a degree that matches your interests. Combining a placement year with our MBiolSci allows you to gain work experience in industry, before adding an extra year of research training back in the lab in your fourth year.

Why study this course?

• Top 100 in the world for life sciences (THE World University Rankings by Subject 2025)

• Close links with the NHS: Complete research on cancer and ageing in partnership with the Sheffield Teaching Hospitals.

• Five-year course: The ultimate kick-start to your career. Gain real-word experience with a placement year, and graduate with a masters degree.

Our five-year MBiolsci Biological Sciences with Placement Year course offers you the flexibility to discover what kind of biologist you want to be. Kick-start your career by spending a year on placement, and then complete a major research project in your final year (known as an integrated masters).

You'll start by studying a broad foundation in biological science. This will allow you to explore the subject and discover what excites you most. You can then choose to focus on areas including biodiversity and conservation, the anatomy or biochemistry of plants and animals, or the molecular basis of human health.

At Sheffield, you’ll be encouraged to be creative, think independently, and express your ideas. Depending on what modules you choose, you could be carrying out fieldwork in the Peak District, studying life at the atomic level, modelling the gene networks that resulted in speciation, or even working with scientists from Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust to diagnose cancer samples.

No matter what areas of biological science you choose to study at Sheffield, you'll develop practical laboratory and transferable skills - such as project management, problem-solving, communication skills and data analysis - that make our graduates attractive to employers.

Your placement year will give you the chance to test out a career path that you're considering. This will take place in year three. Our students have found placements in science and non-science-based roles with a range of organisations including GSK, P&G, Kew Gardens and Sydney Environmental Group. Some students have even been offered graduate-level jobs at the end of their placement.

All this experience will prepare you for your research project in year four where you could be laboratory-based, field-based, focus on computer modelling, or even science communication.

Your final year is designed to equip you with advanced laboratory or field research skills, ready for a rewarding career in science. You'll spend the bulk of this year focused on a major research project in an area of biological sciences of your choice, and graduate with a masters degree.