This is an application for a continuation of the Population-Research Infrastructure Award to the Center for Social and Demographic Analysis (CSDA) at the University at Albany, SUNY. CSDA was founded in 1981 and began its period of infrastructural support with a P30 award in 1997 and renewed it with an R24 award in 2004. A five-year award will allow the Center to: advance a multi-pronged research agenda in population science that bears its signature themes of vulnerable populations and spatial inequalities;foster the intellectual and professional development of its many young researchers;and continue to support and strengthen population-research activities and intellectual community among its associates. Past awards, in combination with high levels of support from the University, have enabled CSDA to provide an intellectual home to a productive group of 40 population researchers, drawn from a diverse set of disciplines, including anthropology, criminology, economics, geography and planning, history, public administration, public health, social work, and sociology. The research of CSDA's associates advances population knowledge and public health by addressing critical questions about health and health disparities, immigration, life-course transitions, families, neighborhood and community inequalities, and geographical mobility. Our associates also add to knowledge through their data-collection efforts and methodological innovations. During the recent funding period, CSDA has undergone revitalization, building on existing strengths while taking advantage of new opportunities to extend them. This revitalization is evident in the influx and maturation of a substantial cadre of junior associates and in the development of innovative research initiatives. The proposed infrastructure award will allow us to reorganize our research-support cores to better serve our associates. In particular, we plan to elevate the developmental and public infrastructure initiatives to full-fledged cores, with significantly expanded leadership and resources as well as additional tasks. Our cores are well-conceived and designed to provide our associates with the highest-quality services in a cost- effective manner;and the new cores will benefit from additional support extended by the University at Albany. The prior R24 award has had a very positive impact on the research productivity of CSDA associates. The current external grant portfolio represents a 50 percent increase in funding per associate over the portfolio at the time of the last application, three years ago. Other indicators of research productivity, such as citations, publications and proposal submissions, also track upwards.
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