The Training Program in Immunity and Infection has been training predoctoral students in the area of immunology and microbial pathogenesis for the past decade. The University of Maryland School of Medicine has unusual depth and strength in the areas of microbiology, immunology and infectious diseases with well over 100 faculty members in these areas. The training faculty for this program are drawn from the Department of Microbiology and Immunology and three internationally renowned research institutes, the Center for Vaccine Development, the Institute of Human Virology, and the Institute for Genome Sciences (IGS). All faculty members are located within a three-block radius on the University of Maryland Baltimore campus. The mentors, resource faculty, and senior advisory faculty from these groups are highly interactive and well funded, with grants and contracts totaling over $60 million dollars in annual direct costs. Trainees will be drawn from the existing interdepartmental Molecular Microbiology &Immunology graduate program, which is a strong and established graduate doctoral program that includes a stong core curriculum in bacteriology, viriology, parasitology, immunology, elective courses, journal clubs, seminars, annual symposia, and graduate research presentation days. Academic work will be combined with rigorous laboratory training through laboratory roations and dissertation research under the direction of the Training Program faculty. Students are selected from a highly qualified and stable application pool and are trained in the responsible conduct of research. Specific efforts are in place to recruit trainees from underrepresented minorities. The program is guided by a well-qualified training Program Director, co-Director, Steering Committee, and Senior Advisory Committee of internationally recognized scientists. This is the only NIH- funded predoctoral training grant program in the area of microbiology/immunology/infectious diseases at the University of Maryland. With all the rich training opportunities provided by this extensive research community, the Immunity and Infection Training Program is the keystone of predoctoral trainee support at this institution.
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