Administrative Component We plan to continue the administrative arrangements that have served us well in the past funding period. Overall supervision of the Core is under the direction of the PI and the Core Center Executive Committee. This committee consists of the PI as chair, the six Module directors and co-director, and Peter Hitchcock, Ph.D., chair of the Research Committee in the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences and director of our T32 program. Bret A. Hughes, Ph.D., a long-standing NEI R01 holder, has served as Principal Investigator of this Core Center for Vision Research for the past thirteen years and is intimately involved with the overall and day-to-day direction of the Core Center. The Core Center Executive Committee meets quarterly and reviews the activities of each Module. In particular, the meetings emphasize enhancement of the overall research environment, the success of the Core Center in attracting new investigators and projects into vision research, and the success of collaborative efforts. Time logs of the Modules are reviewed and issues regarding access to each facility are examined. The Executive Committee also considers how the impact of Modules might be enhanced by changing or adding services. Such deliberations resulted in the decisions to modify the services provided by the Molecular Biology Module and to establish the Functional Assessment Module. NEI-R01 funded investigators have priority in use of the facilities. Other researchers, especially those with other NEI research awards and those collaborating with NEI-funded researchers are next in order of priority. Time permitting, the Modules can be used by other individuals involved in vision research, and through such usage, new investigators are encouraged to pursue vision-related research and develop pilot data to support NEI grant submissions. These procedures and priorities have worked well, with no major problems or disputes. Several minor issues related to access or personnel matters were rapidly resolved to everyone's satisfaction by the PI and Executive Committee. Thus, the PI and the Core Center Executive Committee share responsibility to ensure that the Core Modules and facilities are effectively and efficiently utilized by all University of Michigan vision scientists. In addition, we actively strive to ensure that all members of the vision research community are aware of these resources and use them to benefit their research projects. Three mechanisms are in place to inform participating investigators and potential users of the resources and services provided by the Core Center Modules. First, we maintain a Vision Core Center website within the Kellogg Eye Center website (www.kelloqq.umich.edu/research/facilities.html). This website includes links to the Core Modules and their capabilities, our vision research training program, vision research seminars, and the areas of basic and clinical research of our faculty. Second, once a year, the PI, Module Directors, and Module staff present an overview of the Core Center Modules to the vision research community during the regular time slot for the vision research seminar. Third, the availability of new Core Module instrumentation and services is announced by e-mail to the entire vision research community. Finally, in advance of the preparation of this proposal, a series of discussions with participating investigators was conducted to determine the resources and services that best fit the research needs of the vision community, particularly members with existing and pending NEI R01 research projects. As a result of this feedback, the Core Center Executive Committee made changes to the services provided by the Molecular Biology Module and the new Functional Assessment Module was established.
Showing the most recent 10 out of 214 publications
