***The Spring 2025 Course Directory is available now***
The Course Directory is a list of all the courses being offered in Spring 2025 that satisfy NE major requirements. The Directory also contains suggested BU Hub courses being offered in Spring 2025 that are relevant for NE majors.

Boston University’s Undergraduate Program in Neuroscience offers an interdisciplinary major leading to a Bachelor of Arts in Neuroscience. Our major takes advantage of the unparalleled wealth of neuroscience resources in our area, spanning multiple departments and campuses at Boston University and the broader neuroscience research community of Greater Boston. As a field, neuroscience has grown considerably over the last few decades through its integration of multiple disciplines. A modern understanding of neuroscience now requires training in traditional approaches combined with exposure to novel technologies and new computational methods that make the study of the nervous system possible in ever more exquisite detail. The Neuroscience major at BU combines breadth of exposure to the field as a whole with the opportunity for in-depth of experience in one of three central domains of neuroscience: Neurobiology, Cognitive and Behavioral Neuroscience, or Computational Neuroscience. Our program also contributes to the Department of Philosophy’s joint major in Philosophy & Neuroscience.

Program Learning Goals

Students who complete the Major in Neuroscience will:

  1. master the fundamentals of neuroscience spanning the breadth of the field, from the theoretical to the experimental, and across multiple levels of analysis;
  2. write effectively for a scientific audience, which entails synthesizing and citing the scientific literature, writing clearly, concisely, logically, and objectively, and adhering to the conventions of the most common formats in the field (such as grant proposals and research articles).
  3. demonstrate competency in the scientific method, evidence-based reasoning, and experimental design, for example, by crafting testable hypotheses, identifying manipulated and measured variables, understanding experimental controls, and differentiating correlational from experimental research.

Neuroscience Major Requirements

A total of seventeen (17) courses are required for the Neuroscience major. These courses are offered in multiple departments and colleges including Neuroscience, Biology, Psychology, Computer Science, and Math. A grade of “C” or higher is required in most courses to receive credit toward the major (“C-” grades are acceptable for courses in the General Chemistry sequence). Students must earn a total of 128 credits prior to graduation.

Neuroscience students have access to the extensive resources and expertise of affiliated faculty across multiple departments and colleges throughout the university. A wide array of courses are offered through the departments of Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Mathematics & Statistics, Physics, Psychological & Brain  Sciences, and Health Sciences in Sargent College. Together more than 40 upper level neuroscience electives are offered, including laboratory courses and seminars.

Undergraduate Research in Neuroscience

Opportunities for independent laboratory research are available through multiple departments on the Charles River Campus in the Colleges of Arts and Sciences, Engineering, and Sargent College; at Boston University’s School of Medicine, including labs in the departments of Anatomy and Neurobiology, Biochemistry, Neurology, Pathology, Pharmacology & Experimental Therapeutics, Physiology and Biophysics, and Psychiatry; and in neuroscience laboratories at hospitals and research institutes throughout the Boston area, including Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham & Women’s Hospital, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School, Dana Farber Cancer Institute, and Boston Children’s Hospital. Find more information about these opportunities on the Undergraduate Research page.

Neuroscience Faculty

Learn more about all the Neuroscience faculty working on both BU campuses here.

Boston University Undergraduate Bulletin

Find important information about the College of Arts and Science’s practices and procedures in the undergraduate bulletin, including the official requirements for the BA in Neuroscience.