(taken from application): This proposal for a Summer Experience in Biomedical Science (SEBS) is designed to promote entry of outstanding undergraduate physical science, engineering and mathematical science majors into research careers in biomedical science. The residential SEBS program represents an innovative approach that provides an exposure to biomedical concepts, modern biomedical research areas, and an intensive hands-on 10-week research experience. SEBS matches individual students with research faculty mentors, and the program couples the daily research experience with an ongoing series of mini-courses, workshops, roundtable discussions, and evening social events. The program will build on our past extensive experience in providing research opportunities to outstanding undergraduates, and it is designed to meet the goal of cross-fertilizing the scientific disciplines of biomedical science and of the physical, chemical and quantitative sciences. The specific objectives of the new program are to: 1) Foster an interest of undergraduate students majoring in physical sciences, engineering, and mathematics in pursuing additional research training in biomedical sciences; 2) Place the summer students with UTMB mentors where the marriage of their undergraduate science/mathematics training with cutting-edge biomedical research is obvious, intuitive, and exciting; 3) Develop targeted, intensive mini-courses to provide students with basic biomedical concepts and skills; 4) Recruit these talented undergraduates to Ph.D. or MD/Ph.D. programs at UTMB or other health sciences universities; and 5) Implement a program evaluation/student tracking system to evaluate the success of the program.
These aims will be met by using our existing network of undergraduate science and engineering advisors to identify and recruit these summer students, by giving them mini-courses to acquaint them with biomedical science, and by offering them an opportunity to experience biomedical research first-hand in laboratories where outstanding faculty mentors bring the excitement of scientific inquiry to life. The subsequent entry of these students into professional careers will be tracked to determine outcomes and evaluate success of the program.
