The Massachusetts General Hospital for Children (MGHfC) seeks to establish the MGHfC Digestive Disease Summer Research Program in order to provide short-term support for 10 students at the undergraduate or medical school level of training. Each student will perform an independent research project focused on digestive diseases over a ten week period during the summer months within a laboratory or collaborating laboratory of the MGHfC. Collaborating laboratories of the MGHfC are laboratories within the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) community that possess unique expertise in engineering and computational sciences currently being leveraged to support various projects centered on digestive disease research. In addition to conducting an independent project to be formally presented at a summer's end symposium, each student will participate in a peer-driven molecular cell biology course as well as a panel discussion on careers in biomedicine involving faculty and outside professionals. Currently 15 MGH independent investigators with interest in digestive diseases have agreed to serve as mentors and host students in their laboratories during the summer. An advisory board of six MGHfC faculty members including the program director and associate director will be responsible for overseeing the program as well as recruiting and selecting participating students each summer. Special efforts will be made to attract individuals that are underrepresented in the biomedical sciences to participate in the summer program.
The objective of this grant proposal is to establish a National Institute of Health funded summer research program at the Massachusetts General Hospital for Children (MGHfC) to engage students in projects that explore various aspects of digestive disease. Both undergraduate and medical school students will be considered for participation in a 10 week program each summer that will involve both mentor supervised independent research as well as presentations on current concepts of molecular and cellular biology as they pertain to digestive diseases. Such efforts are geared towards providing a biomedical laboratory research experience for students at an early stage of their training to foster a strong interest an appreciation for basic science as they move forward in their careers.
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