The training program in Hemoglobin and Blood Protein Chemistry provides training to chemists, biochemists, biophysicists, and biologists in hemoproteins, blood proteins, and circulating proteins concentrating on chemical studies. The faculty that has been assembled to provide the training are actively engaged in studies of electron transfer within proteins, oxygen binding to hemoproteins, the structure of membrane-embedded proteins, the structure of proteins involved in regulatory processes, cellular immunology, transcriptional regulation, and coagulation processes. They provide training in electron spin resonance, ultra fast kinetics, X-ray crystallography, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, fluorescence energy transfer, protein chemistry, site-directed mutation, cell culture, gene regulation, immunochemistry, the cloning of genes, the expression of cloned proteins; and regulatory post-translational modifications of blood proteins. The trainees have the opportunity to receive training in a wide array of techniques as they are applied to specific problems in biomedical research. In order to offer such a diverse and multidisciplinary approach, faculty for the program have been assembled from the departments of Chemistry and Biochemistry (10), Biology (3), Physics (2), Medicine (2) and Pharmacology (2). Historically, the emphasis of the program has been the application of biophysical chemistry to hemoproteins and blood proteins, which explains the larger contribution made by the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. The five predoctoral trainees supported each year by the program have been selected on the basis of their interests and abilities in research from among the large pool of graduate students enrolled in the graduate programs of the participating departments. The five postdoctoral fellows supported each year have been selected on the basis of their former training and the appropriateness of their abilities in research from among candidates who have applied to the individual members of the faculty to join their research programs. Training is provided through laboratory research under the direction of the participating faculty, through formal lecture courses in the participating departments, through regularly scheduled departmental and small group seminars, and through individual training in the use of complex instruments. The duration of the predoctoral training is about three years and the duration of the postdoctoral training is from one to three years with a two-year period being usual.
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