During the past budget period, the Birmingham CFAR has played a major role in the development of newprogrammatic areas both in basic and clinical AIDS research at UAB. Under the direction of Dr. BeatriceHahn, the Developmental Core will:1. Organize and foster a competitive Developmental Grant Program in AIDS research that focuses on juniorinvestigators and multidisciplinary interactions.2. Mentor young investigators in AIDS research.3. Recruit high caliber AIDS scientists from other institutions.Developmental Grant Pro.qram: Developmental moneys ($522,875) were used to competitively fund 10 NewInvestigator Awards, 8 Pilot Projects, and 7 Multidisciplinary Programs. These were selected from a total of59 applications submitted to the CFAR Developmental Grant Program. Applications were preparedaccording to NIH guidelines, reviewed by an internal review committee, and funded solely based on scientificmerit. Of the 25 competitive applications, 16 were subsequently submitted to national funding agencies, and12 received extramural funding with Total Costs exceeding $12 million (3 applications are in preparation and2 applications are still pending review). Of the 34 non-funded proposals, 6 were submitted to alternativefunding agencies, and five of these received extramural funds exceeding $2 million. The Developmentalgrant program has thus been extremely successful in facilitating new as well as nationally competitiveresearch efforts.Recruitment: Developmental moneys ($120,000) were used to assist in the recruitment of 3 new faculty: (1)Jalie Tucker, Ph.D., M.P.H. from Auburn University who is a senior investigator with expertise related tosubstance abuse; (2) Patricia Lee, Ph.D., who recently completed her post-doctoral training with Drs. Dolciniand Catania at the UCSF California HIV & STD Prevention Training Center and the Center for AIDS Studies;and (3) Allan Zajac, Ph.D. who recently completed post-doctoral training with Raft Ahmed at EmoryUniversity. Drs. Tucker and Lee broaden the Prevention Sciences Program within the CFAR, while Dr. Zajaccontributes new expertise in T cell immunity studies within Microbiology. To continue these developmentalefforts, funds are requested to support meritorious Developmental Award Applications - with emphasis onsupporting junior investigators and stimulating program project development - at the level of $150,000.Applications will be solicited, reviewed and funded as in the past. In addition, recruitment moneys in theamount of $40,000 are requested to further facilitate recruitment of outstanding outside investigators to theAIDS effort. These recruitment moneys will be matched one-to-one with state funds available to the Center.
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