This renewal for years 41-45 of the Program in ?Multidisciplinary Training in Pulmonary Diseases? at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill supports six postdoctoral trainees with M.D., M.D./Ph.D. or Ph.D. degrees for research training in Respiratory Medicine, emphasizing a joint training program for Medicine and Pediatric trainees. The Program provides multidisciplinary training in basic, translation and clinical research within the pulmonary divisions of the Departments of Medicine and Pediatrics and our three Centers devoted to understanding lung health and disease. The breadth of training provided by the Program is expanded by faculty from 12 clinical (3) and basic science (9) departments in the Schools of Medicine and Public Health and the College of Arts and Sciences. M.D. trainees will enter a 3-5 year clinical and research training experience designed to provide them with skills required for a career in academic pulmonary medicine. Ph.D. trainees will typically enter in the second year of their post-doctoral fellowship, and they will be well integrated into the translational and clinical research components, as well as the basic science. Each trainee will have a scholarly oversight committee that includes trainers from varying disciplines who will facilitate their scientific growth. Each area of lung research offered by the Program is multidisciplinary in nature and emphasizes a knowledge of the basic, translational, clinical and impact implications for each trainee's question, even though a trainee's research focuses on one aspect. Areas of research include the genetic basis of airways diseases, particularly cystic fibrosis, primary ciliary dyskinesia, and idiopathic bronchiectasis, cell and molecular biology of airway epithelia in health and disease, inflammatory and innate immune responses during bacterial and viral infections, endothelial cell biology and vascular permeability in infection and ARDS, outcomes research and clinical trials in critical care, the control of airway inflammation, basic and translational proteomics of airways, the airway microbiome in health and in cystic fibrosis and COPD, airway function and leukocyte kinetics in COPD, comparative effectiveness research in COPD, the responses to injury by physical, chemical, and microbial environmental agents, and clinical and basic studies in asthma. Novel programs that exemplify the multi- disciplinary nature include the Virtual Lung Project, ARDS and Critical Care Research, and the COPD-Lung Cancer Working Group, each of which require cross-disciplinary interactions amongst a very wide range of expertise to accomplish their goals. Clinical studies will be integrated with basic observations using translational physiologic, biochemical, molecular and genetic technologies and Omics approaches and will provide training in state-of-the-art bioinformatics, database design, use and analyses, and statistical interpretation. Emphasis is on mechanisms underlying common and rare lung diseases in pediatric and adult populations and development of novel therapeutic strategies. Our Program provides an opportunity for trainees to develop as scientists and become independent investigators within the national community.
Our Program will provide young M.D., M.D./Ph.D. and Ph.D. investigators with state-of-the-art research training in common and rare lung diseases affecting the pediatric and adult populations. Lung diseases such as lung infections including pneumonia, cigarette smoke- associated lung diseases, acute respiratory distress syndrome, genetic diseases of the airways including cystic fibrosis and primary ciliary dyskinesia, and lung diseases with an environmental component such as asthma and other allergic lung diseases are common and are associated with devastating morbidity, mortality and use of health care dollars. Our Program includes 52 faculty serving as mentors and co-mentors for our trainees and provides a highly multidisciplinary pulmonary scientific community that creates an outstanding opportunity for trainees to develop their technical and intellectual abilities as scientists and become independent investigators within the national community, pursuing important questions about the pathogenesis and course of lung diseases in pediatric and adult populations and developing novel pharmacologic and gene therapy treatments.
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