This is a competitive renewal of my five year grant, K24 DA00412. I have progressed in the three key areas for the K24 award including mentorship, especially of patient-oriented research, research development, and career development. I have had the privilege of mentoring both physicians and basic scientists, working in the area of patient-oriented research from fields such as psychiatry, radiology, and neurology. This has been formalized in my role as Vice Chair for Research Administration and Training, where I maintain a website for grant information and routinely assist young investigators in their grant submissions and research issues. My laboratory has grown and I have expanded NIDA related research from drug development and cocaine craving to also include alcoholism, Tourette Syndrome and Restless Legs Syndrome. I obtained a second NCRR funded Shared Instrumentation Grant for the HRRT (high resolution research tomograph), supported by thirty NIH grants and several investigators from multiple universities. In the next five years, I plan to develop a training grant designed for Radiology residents eventually expanding to collaborations including Psychiatry for training young physicians in translational research. I plan to become a collaborator with the brain PET user group with the focus of the new HRRT technology as a resource for training and research expansion. This will allow the opportunity to train with other imaging experts, such as in MRI and fMRI, e.g., NIDA Intramural Program and the KKI Brain Center to expand my knowledge of brain imaging and substance abuse research. Mini-sabbaticals, including the University of Pittsburg and the University of Pennsylvania, will add to my basic neuroscience and drug abuse training. It is my strong belief that this progress will be maintained, even accelerated, in my additional five years.
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