Administrative Core

Brody, Carlos

Abstract

Core 1, Administration The Administrative Core will support the Team Director and the Internal Advisory Committee of this multi-component research project as they supervise budgets and scientific activities to enable the project to achieve its goal of determining how the brain produces working memory and decisions. The investigators in this proposal have a strong history of collaboration over the past three years. The research projects that they have developed are tightly integrated around shared conceptual questions and a closely related set of behavioral tasks. To ensure that the project continues as a well-coordinated collaboration, the team will hold monthly meetings that include all research personnel and weekly meetings of all project leaders to review results and plan upcoming experiments. Six of the project leaders are based at Princeton University and are part of a cohesive academic community that regularly interacts in scheduled meetings and spontaneous discussions. The seventh project leader (located at the University of California, Davis) participates in weekly team meetings via video link and will travel to Princeton as needed for formal meetings. The full team is already sharing documents, drafts, figures, talks, and posters and conducting frequent informal discussions on one dedicated Slack channel that is used by all research personnel and another channel for PIs only. The team will hold one formal meeting per year of all personnel. The Annual Meeting will include the project leaders, students, and postdocs, along with an External Advisory Board, to be appointed by the Team Director. The purpose of this meeting will be to document and evaluate the previous year?s progress. The administrator will coordinate the Annual Meeting and produce a monthly budget report for the Team Director to review. The administrator will also assist all investigators in scheduling interviews for job candidates, meeting reporting requirements, booking travel, and acquiring major supplies and equipment. Results from the proposed research will be disseminated through formal and informal mechanisms, and the administrator will assist in these efforts whenever possible. In addition, the Administrative Core will assist the Data Science Core in managing the dissemination and ongoing support of the prototype data science framework for the use of other researchers. The administrator will also design and implement public outreach activities. By managing these resources and activities, the Administrative Core will help the Team Director to coordinate the five Projects and the four Cores, while allowing the project leaders and other research personnel to concentrate on their strengths in research by spending less time and energy on administrative tasks.