Application): This application requests continuation of support for the MBL Physiology course. The Physiology course is an intensive six-week lecture/laboratory course where students spend six days/week (14-16 hr/day) in the laboratory. This course, which has undergone change in the past year with the appointment of David Garbers and Randall Reed as co-directors, has shifted to a broad focus of cell signaling, an area with many implications for biomedical research. The course philosophy is to introduce modern approaches of molecular biology with particular emphasis on the study of cell signaling. It is expected that many laboratory sections will change each year, reflecting changes in the field. The course now consists of two three-week periods, with four of the following topics in the first period and the remaining four in the second period: (1) Discovering orphan receptor ligands; (2) Defining cell heterogeneity; (3) Defining partner molecules in signaling networks; (4) Homology cloning; (5) Defining membrane proteins and secreted polypeptides; (6) Signaling in plants; (7) Gene expression in transgenic C. elegans; and (8) Adenovirus-mediated protein expression. Each student selects two topics for study and participates in extensive discussions of the remainder. These laboratory exercises are designed to address research questions in cell signaling. Unexpected results help kindle discussion and learning. The laboratory training is facilitated by an array of state-of-the art equipment (valued in excess of $2 million dollar last year) on loan from vendors that far exceeds the scope of equipment available at most institutions for most of the students. The laboratory is augmented by lectures as well as through journal clubs and discussion groups. Extensive recruitment and screening of applicants results in the overall high quality of students, as compared with university-based long-term training programs as judged by course directors, faculty, lecturers, and MBL visiting scientists. In addition the MBL has developed an effective program for recruitment of students from underrepresented minority groups. Enrollment of students in Physiology remains the highest of all MBL summer courses. Drs. Garbers and Reed feel that the current class size is optional for the new laboratory schedule. The intensity, resources, faculty, and overall intellectual climate of the MBL, enables students in the Physiology course to broaden their horizons in a unique way that would be difficult to duplicate in a university setting. The MBL Physiology course has influenced the careers of many distinguished biologists. There is every reason to believe that this will continue.
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