How Oxford marks biochemistry interviews and how to prepare
Updated: Oct 9
Preparing for an Oxford interview can be stressful. You read and re-read your personal statement. You watch some examples of 'Oxford interview questions' on YouTube, but ultimately know that they can ask you anything relevant to your subject. Maybe you think it's like a job interview or an interrogation. Then you remember that the WiFi has always been a bit dodgy in your room, and you start to worry. Put all this together, and you start doubting yourself and getting nervous. In this article, I'm going to break down exactly how Oxford marks biochemistry interviews, using sources directly from the university itself.
I'm going to analyse each of the marking criteria and give you tips on how to prepare for each of them, as well as my own final recommendations based on my 5 years of experience helping students get into Oxbridge, so that you have the best chance of success.
Don't panic - the interview is not an interrogation
Taken directly from the official website, I cannot emphasise this enough - the interview is a conversation, not an interrogation. It's a preview of what the tutorials are like at Oxford. If anything, it could even be fun, because ultimately, you're a biochemistry nerd and you get to chat with other biochemistry nerds.
A conversation also means that you are also expected to participate actively. Sometimes you will have to give short answers, other times you will have to go into longer explanations, and yes, you may even ask your own questions - either at the end of the interview or during the problem-solving sections - more on that later.
Finally, give yourself a chance to start your interview off well. Remember the basics: there's a good chance you'll be asked 'why biochemistry' or 'what is biochemistry' (get some ideas on how to answer this one here) - these are questions that you can personalise and prepare for.
The marking criteria
Again, this is taken directly from the biochemistry department's website.
Essentially, these criteria are used to look for: 1) Do you actually like biochemistry and would participate actively in tutorials?
2) Do you actually understand the supercurriculars and projects on your personal statement?
3) Can you respond to new advanced material and make a good attempt at solving a problem, talking the interviewer through the problem in a step-by-step manner.
Let's look at each of the criteria in detail.
Interest in/enthusiasm for biochemistry.
This one is relatively straightforward. As I mentioned earlier, you should want to take part in the interview. You want to bring a positive attitude and talk about your extracurricular reading/experiences with passion and conviction.
How can you show interest/enthusiasm?
Speaking with a good tone, reasonable speed and using gestures to support explanations of molecular processes is a good start.
More importantly, you want to avoid responding to difficult questions with phrases like 'I don't know' or 'we haven't studied that yet'. You should see the questions as a fun challenge that you want to get as close as possible to solving.
You can make passing reference to recent innovations or news relating to biochemistry - this shows you're actually paying attention and care about the subject deeply, not just because you're preparing for an Oxford interview.
Description/discussion of a topic of mutual choice.
This essentially refers to the subject-specific extracurriculars included in your personal statement. The admissions tutors may wish to spark a conversation from anything on your personal statement which brings me to 'the golden rule': if it is on your personal statement, you must understand it fully and be prepared to talk about it.
You may have done a lab project involving fluorescent microscopy to observe GFP-tagged protein in a model organism, before which you used PCR to check that the fusion-protein gene was successfully inserted. Be prepared to be asked about any or all of how fluorescent microscopy works, what a GFP-fusion protein is and how you got into the model organism and how PCR works. If you mention mitochondrial genomes, be prepared to talk about energy production. Like the first criterion, this one is also very much under your control. Take revising the content from your personal statement very seriously!
How can I prepare for discussing a topic of mutual choice?
Circle/highlight all the key words in your personal statement, e.g 'personalised medicine', 'PCR', 'GFP', 'conformational change'
For each of these, write down two or three adjacent topics and use your biology and chemistry curricula to help you - revise the basics from A-Level / IB and so some further reading if time allows.
Don't forget to actually make sure you understand the specific details about your niche supercurriculars. For example, if you mentioned the methodology of your EPQ in your personal statement, be prepared to talk about its conclusion in the interview
Description/analysis of novel information and extrapolation from novel information
This is where you are presented with new information. This may be a concept, a graph depicting biochemical data, or a scientific article sent to you a few hours/days before your (online) interview. Whatever it may be, you must remain calm and use the rational scientific brain that led you onto the path that took you to the interview! When asked questions about the material, it is natural to feel unsure, but start first by commenting on the basics, using phrases like: 'based on what I know from my A-Level studies, I would suggest'. If it is a graph, you want to try and spot a correlation and understand what any underlying variables may be. Think out loud and work with the interviewers by using phrases like: 'I think X could be important here based on Y, is it a relevant factor?'. This kind of language shows you are coming up with new ideas based on existing knowledge i.e. you are behaving like a scientist. The admissions tutors will see this and appreciate your intellectual curiosity. To give an example of all the various factors that could be relevant to a discussion about proteins: shapes, sizes (molecular weight), surface charge (R groups can be +ve or -ve), co-factors (haem group), multiple or single peptides, location in the cell (extracellular or intracellular).
The interpretation part would be something like this. Let's say you learnt about a new experimental technique using a graph or an article; you might then be expected to comment on the advantages or disadvantages of the technique or how it is a solution to a longstanding biochemical problem. In scientific papers, the implications are usually addressed in the discussion section. You might have been talking about personalised cancer vaccines - you might then be asked to compare this with current targeted immunotherapies and how it may or may not change treatment in cancer.
How can you prepare?
Even though biochemistry doesn't require the ESAT, have a look at some of the graphical questions on the mock papers - you can use this to help your brain to quickly analyse data.
Expose yourself to scientific papers - both review articles and original research. Go to the Figures and, if needed, ask ChatGPT, Gemini or Claude to help you explain what the data shows (some of the material may be well beyond the A-Level/IB specification).
Problem-solving ability.
This will be tested throughout the interview process, with particular emphasis on the novel information questions. While getting close to the right answer is important, equally important is your thinking process. A student who articulates a step-by-step process, breaking down a bigger question, will do well here. For example, the question 'why do cells become cancerous?', can be easily broken down by starting with the source of cancer as genetic mutations, which can be inherited or acquired mutations from UV or carcinogens. You would then talk about which types of genes would need to have these mutations for the cell to become cancerous e.g. tumour suppressor genes or oncogenes and explain what each of them is. This is a much better approach than responding in a panic, going straight to the final answer and saying something like: cells are cancerous when they have lost control of the cell cycle. Another example would be something like - why does DNA have 4 bases, not 2, 3 or 6. A good student first explains the structure of DNA, then discards 2, 3 and 6 bases individually.
How can you prepare?
Practice speaking out loud in the mirror, or even better on a Teams call with yourself or a friend, to replicate the online format. See if you can get access to Miro online whiteboards which Oxford use for biochemistry interviews. At least get comfortable with screen sharing and drawing on the online videoconferencing tool that you regularly use.
Repeat until your structure of an answer to a question like 'explain how proteins fold and what determines how a protein folds' gets clearer.
Bonus interview marking criterion.
Best and worst things said during the interview - I had to find this through an old freedom of information request - check it out for yourself here!
This might put some students in a panic, thinking that they are under scrutiny at the single-word level, but really you should flip it the other way around: a single insightful phrase, or great, detailed and clear explanation of a process or technique could be enough to make your interview stand out from the rest of the candidates. Given that each applicant will have unique personal statement with different interests in biochemistry, you have the potential to be the 'student expert' (relative to what could be expected of an average curriculum student) in the topics you include on your personal statement. This is why it is so important to thoroughly revise your personal statement and really go into detail to understand everything in it. Revising your personal statement thoroughly significantly reduces the chances of having the admissions tutors note something down in the worst thing said during interview box. There is nothing worse than not being able to explain a reasonably simple technique like PCR if you've mentioned it in your personal statement. Fail that, and it will definitely be noted down.
Final tips
Get your online interview set-up well prepared in advance - buy good headphones if you have to, request that you take the day off from school (or just take it off anyway), make sure Teams loads properly on your laptop
Consider getting outside support - schools will often have non-subject specialists use the default questions on the Oxford website and not appropriately do the follow-up interrogation because it is not their area of expertise.
There is nothing wrong with doing a lot of preparation for your interview - most of it will just be continuing to expand your knowledge of your supercurriculars. After all you actually like biochemistry, right?
Remember, the interview is fun. Not an interrogation. See it as an opportunity to learn something new.
If you want to discuss personalised mock interview support, please get in touch; we will have an initial consultation to understand the colleges you are being interviewed at, what preparation you've recieved so far and what most concerns you about the interview.
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