Continuation of support is requested for three (3) graduate trainee fellowships in the Molecular Biophysics Program at Wesleyan University. Molecular Biophysics at Wesleyan is an interdisciplinary, interdepartmental program in the Graduate Division of the University in which students pursue doctoral studies via graduate courses, a weekly journal club, an annual retreat, workshops, group meetings, seminars, dissertation research and teaching apprenticeships. The emphasizes collaborative projects among faculty research groups where feasible and interactions between experimentalists and theoreticians. Scientific ethics and the historical and intellectual foundations science figure significantly in the curriculum. The current and proposed program involves faculty of the Departments of Chemistry, Molecular Biology and Biochemistry (MBB), and Physics, with consultation and potential future participation of the Biology department. The participating faculty from Chemistry are Anne M. Baranger (Biological and BiD-organic Chemistry; RNA Folding and RNA-Protein Complex Formation), David L. Beveridge (Theoretical and Computational Bio-physics), Philip H. Bolton (NMR Spectroscopy; Proteins and Nucleic Acids), Rex F. Pratt (Chemistry of Enzymes; Enzymes in Synthesis), and [rina Russu (NMR Spectroscopy, DNA dynamics and Protein-DNA Interactions). The participating faculty from MBB are Ishita Mukerji (UV Resonance Raman Spectroscopy; Protein-DNA Interactions; Protein-Protein Interactions) and Manju Hingorani (Rate Processes and Enzymology of DNA Enzymes). The participating faculty member from the Physics Department is Roderick V. Jensen (Non-linear Dynamics, Computational Neuroscience, Bio-informatics). Participating faculty all have significant independent support for their research programs from extramural funding sources or proposals pending. Wesleyan University is a small, highly selective university emphasizing the liberal arts and sciences at the undergraduate level with Ph.D. programs in the sciences. An undergraduate concentration in Molecular Biophysics has been developed as a complement to our graduate program. Curricular and pedagogical initiatives in this third renewal period will produce a new version of a core course, Introduction to Molecular Biophysics and new courses in Chemical Biology, Advanced Biochemistry, and Kinetic mechanisms and Structural Biology of DNA metabolic enzymes. ? ?
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