UNC MSTAR Application Process
Submitting your MSTAR Application
Applications for 2026 are now CLOSED.
Please read through the following instructions before beginning the application (see blue button below).
Preview the 2026 MSTAR Application
Contact MSTAR@med.unc.edu for all information
Application Preparation
The application contains essay questions. As a result, you may wish to prepare these before completing the Qualtrics survey and submitting your final application. Please use the PDF below to prepare your application for submission.
MSTAR Application Instruction Page
Additional Attachments
IMPORTANT: Please note the following attachments are required.
- Your Resume or CV
- UNC Faculty Mentor Forms
- If you have matched with a UNC research mentor, please have your mentor fill out the Faculty Mentor Form and upload with your application.
- Please also submit your mentor’s UNC MSTAR NIH-style biosketch and upload with your application.
- Home Institution Letters
- Please provide a letter of recommendation from a faculty member at your home institution. This can be from a first-year advisor or other faculty mentor. The letter should include a commitment to provide ongoing advising and accountability for your scholarly work following the 8-week summer research program.
- Please provide a letter of from the Dean of Student Affairs at your institution that addresses the points included in this Letter of Good Standing template.
Application Submission
Once you have collected everything you need and are ready to submit, please use the Qualtrics link below to fill in your responses. This Qualtrics tool allows you to navigate back and forth between items. If you exit and return later, then your responses will be saved.
However, we strongly recommend you prepare all materials in advance and complete the entire application in one sitting. Once you have submitted the following application, you cannot make further changes.
Mentor Availability
NOTE: Mentor availability varies year to year. As such, we request that you do not directly contact UNC MSTAR mentors before speaking with the MSTAR manager or advisors.
UNC-Chapel Hill ranks 6th among universities for federally-funded health sciences research. Consequently, we have many research faculty spanning five Health Affairs Schools and the College of Art & Sciences in five campus hospitals and 46 research centers and institutes. This includes 846 research faculty in the School of Medicine alone. Thus the necessity for applicants to speak with a program advisor before applying.
Available mentors have funded research in either active data collection or data analysis phase. Also, available mentors will be moved to unavailable once pre-matched with an applicant. Unavailable mentors may also be in a passive research phase—writing manuscripts, submitting for publication, writing a new research grant, or waiting on research proposal funding.
Questions?
For questions about your application, please contact UNC-CH MSTAR.