Biology Degrees
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Salaries For Degrees in Biology
People with a degree in Biology can be employed in a variety of occupations. While no one can say with certainty what you personally will do with a degree in Biology, our survey panel picked the following jobs as likely options:
- Biological technicians
- Zoologists and wildlife biologists
- Environmental scientists and specialists, including health
- Environmental science and protection technicians, including health
- Fish and game wardens
- Natural sciences managers (Best salary!)
- Conservation scientists
- Occupational health and safety specialists
- Medical and clinical laboratory technologists
- Veterinary technologists and technicians
- Forest and conservation technicians
- Massage therapists
- Actuaries
- Registered nurses
- Farm, ranch, and other agricultural managers
- Foresters
- Soil and plant scientists
- Epidemiologists
- Environmental engineering technicians
Salaries are highly dependent on how skilled one is at negotiation, experience, policies at your employer, area, and a host of other factors. The estimates we show on these pages are just that: estimates. Your individual experience will likely vary.
Where does this come from?
The Bureau of Labor Statistics, a unit of the US government, classifies all workers into some 800-odd occupational categories. We paid a team of freelancers to get their opinion on what type of degree a holder of each type of job would likely have majored in. For pairs which had a high degree of consensus, we created a link between the degree and the job.
From this, we calculated the average salary for Biology degrees and converted it into a lifetime value. We then compared it against other degrees at the same level of schooling (such as associate's, bachelor's, or master's), so that you can make informed educational and employment decisions.
What do Biology Students Learn?
Biology is a part of natural science dealing with various kinds of living organisms, their life processes and interrelationships. The basic idea of studying biological sciences is to know about the living creatures, including the human beings, which form a major component of the earth’s surface. Biology as a subject includes various subdivisions, like botany for the study of plants, zoology for knowing about the animal world and physiology, for studying human beings. Biology is classified into various applied groups that researches several aspects of living organisms and helps in real time application of biology in lives of human beings and other organisms:
- Molecular biology: deals with the molecular framework of the living organisms, like the structures and functions of DNA,RNA etc.
- Cell biology: study of the basic unit or building block of every living thing, the cell
- Genetics: study of genes and the inheritance of characters through generations
- Taxonomy: the naming and classification of living organisms
- Physiology: study of the physical and chemical characteristics of the living tissues and organs, and functioning of their life processes, like reproduction, respiration, digestion, etc.
- Biochemistry: deals with the basic chemical reactions that occurs in the life of organisms.
- Ecology: study of the interrelationship of living organisms with their environment.
- Microbiology: study of microscopic organisms like bacteria, virus, protozoa and the likes, together known as microbes.
The importance of studying biology lies in the basic fact that you become more aware of the life processes of the various organisms that dwell the earth’s surface. The fundamental knowledge of life science gives you an idea of the interaction between living things and creates awareness regarding the living world. The various applied fields of biology, as mentioned above gives you a deeper picture of the different realms of understanding living organisms. Detailed study of the biochemistry, genetics and molecular biology has benefited medical science to a large extent. Pioneering research and development is being made in the fields of agriculture through the application of biotechnology and genetic engineering, which can be described as the study of genes, their variation and manipulation for human benefit like production of high yielding crops, cure of severe genetic diseases, investigation of criminals, uses in forensic science, etc.
Another vital aspect of studying biological science is that it gives you an idea of the disease causing germs from the study of microbiology and thus helps in inventing drugs and medicines which prevents human body from the attack of those harmful microorganisms. Many of these microbes are beneficial too, helping in bio-degradation of waste materials, as bio-fertilisers in agriculture, and in production of various food products. The study of ecology equips you with the knowledge of environment and its components. The modern world is growing with a vast awareness of environmental aspects and that can be known from studying this part of biology.
Thus, to sum it up, it may well be said that from biology and its subgroups, you, as a student of the subject can know a vast range of things about the living organisms and contribute in the extensive research and studies going on in this realm of natural science.
The students with an interest to know about nature and living organisms, biology can be a good field of study for them. The study of biology is exciting and resourceful with a real field of application of the acquired knowledge. A degree in biology can be the stepping stone of success for students interested in this field and can earn their degrees from several well known schools.
Online Schools Offering Accredited Biology Degree Programs
Students who want to further their academics but are already in a profession or want it with the convenience of studying from home at their own set of schedules, can go for online degrees in biology. Various schools offer certificate, associate, bachelor’s or master’s degrees online to suit your needs and aspirations. The name of some accredited schools offering degrees in life sciences, as biology is often known, are listed herein:
- University of Phoenix
- De Vry University
- Strayer University
- Kaplan University
- South University online
Campus-based Colleges & Universities Offering Biology Degrees
Students who will just begin to pursue higher studies in biology after graduating from high schools can go for undergraduate biology degrees offered in various acclaimed universities.
Some of the well known universities are:
- MIT Department of Biology [ http://web.mit.edu/biology/www/undergrad/index.html ]
- University of California Riverside - Department of Biology [ http://www.biology.ucr.edu/courses/UGcourses.html ]
- Sul Ross State University [ http://www.sulross.edu/pages/4083.asp ]
- Boston University Metropolitan College [http://www.bu.edu/met/courses/undergraduate/biology/]
- Cornell University - Office of Undergraduate Biology [ http://biology.cornell.edu/ ]
Famous World-renowned Biologists
Louis Agassiz: Swiss-born American biologist, founder of Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology
David Baltimore: American biologist. Shared the 1975 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine with Howard Temin for discovery of reverse transcriptase enzyme.
George Beadle: American geneticist. Developed ‘one gene one enzyme’ hypothesis with Edward Tatum and shared the 1958 Nobel Prize in medicine or Physiology with him.
Charles Darwin: English naturalist. Created the concept of evolutionary biology. Renowned for the theory of natural selection. (Pictured to the right at age 7).
Barbara McClintock: American cytogeneticist, received the 1983 Nobel Prize in medicine for the discovery of transposition.
Gregor Johann Mendel: Austrian scientist/monk. Regarded as the father of heredity, the science of inheritance.
James Watson: American biologist. Discovered the double helix structure of DNA along with Francis Crick in 1953 by x-ray diffraction method and shared the Nobel Prize in medicine with him in 1962.
