Program Goals: The goal of the training program is to prepare highly qualified students for research careers in cellular and molecular biology. The program offers its trainees a large and diverse group of faculty mentors (73). It is organized to provide students with the collegiality and support of a departmental environment but also the flexibility to move easily across department lines and to choose research mentors from among all program faculty. Students: The training program has proved to be an extremely valuable recruiting tool in attracting a highly qualified and geographically diverse group of students. We have significantly improved the representation of minority students in the program through a number of efforts associated with the training grant. For example, several minority trainees have founded a new organization, OURS, the Organization for Under-Represented Scientists. Faculty: The core discipline of cellular and molecular biology has been reorganized, since the last renewal, into a new School of Molecular and Cellular Biology (MCB). MCB is home to the Departments of Biochemistry, Cell and Structural Biology, Microbiology, and Molecular and Integrative Physiology. In addition to maintaining strength in the areas that we have been strong traditionally, this new alignment has provided the resources to build areas that need to be strengthened (cell biology, developmental biology, structural biology, and immunology). In addition, the University has enhanced its presence at the interface of biology and chemistry through new hires in this area. Together, these efforts have yielded an outstanding group of new faculty that have been added to the program since the last renewal. We project continued faculty growth in cell and molecular biology due to a strong University commitment to hiring in these areas, thereby requiring a scaled increase in the requested number of stipends.
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