This grant proposal seeks funding for a unique program in academic urology in which clinicians are placed in a multi-disciplinary basic research environment and are provided with the necessary protected time to pursue a course of laboratory investigation on a full time basis. The overall goal of this program is to produce future leaders for academic urology who are exemplary clinicians and have a first hand understanding of the research process. As basic science research grows more complicated it is difficult even for the full time researcher to maintain a broad base of knowledge. For a busy clinician the additional burden of maintaining scientific proficiency is nearly impossible. There is a need to train motivated future academic urologists to interact and collaborate with the full time scientific staff who will mn the urology research labs of the future. This proposed program will have clinically trained urologists and young PhDs working together with the supervision of an experienced research staff. The quality of training these fellows will receive is highly dependent upon the experience of the teaching staff. The teaching staff (mentors) is composed of members of the University of Pennsylvania staff who are very experienced with the proven ability to publish and obtain independent funding for their work. The PhD mentors who will participate in the program are all working in diverse areas, but the common theme of the urology basic research program is the study. of bladder smooth muscle physiology. The trainees will have the opportunity to select from projects that are ongoing from within this multidisciplinary group. For example a trainee may start by studying the physiology of the bladder in response to a variety of hormonal changes for 1 year. The next 2 years may be spent looking at how the extracellular matrix changes in response to these hormonal signals using a variety of modern molecular techniques. At each step the trainees will be advised by experienced investigators. It is expected that in return the clinician's will offer to the laboratory insight into the fundamental clinical problems facing the specialty of urology.
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