This is a proposal for the continued training of predoctoral graduate students in the area of molecular and cell biology. The overall guiding principle is to support students from'Training Grant funds who are the most talented and productive. Our objective is to develop their skills as researchers in the general area of cell biology, but we aim to train them more broadly in all aspects of doing research (e.g.giving seminars, writing grants) so that they will go on to be successful in the academy or in research institutions. The program is comprised of 45 Trainer-directed research programs and 15 Trainee positions for graduate students, who will do their dissertation research in the Trainer labs. The graduate students are recruited primarily from four graduate programs (known as Graduate Groups), namely Biochemistry &Molecular Biology, Cell &Developmental Biology, Genetics and Microbiology, and are generally appointed to the Training Grant after their second year in the graduate program. The program is administered by a nine- person Executive Committee, including a student member. The Training faculty will provide research guidance and mentoring in their labs, will be actively involved in recruiting graduate students to the Davis campus, and will offer courses in molecular and cell biology. In the last five years, the Training faculty have placed particular emphasis on the recruitment of under-represented minority students to our program. Currently there is (andwill be) a highly successful training program external seminar series in which extramural speakers are selected and hosted by the Trainees;an Annual Research Retreat, which is held at Lake Tahoe and serves as a forum for presentation of research seminars by students, postdocs and faculty;brown-bag lunches for the Trainees with the Executive Committee to present and discuss their research;a required course in the responsible conduct of research;and quarterly workshops for all current and past trainees in various areas of career development, such as instruction in grant writing.
All of our students will be working in labs where fundamental cellularprocesses are studied at the molecular level, and where the ultimate goal is to understand these processes in the context of human disease. All trainees will take a course in translational research being developed in collaboration with two other training grants on campus in translational research.
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