This Integrative Graduate Education and Research Training (IGERT) award supports the establishment of a multidisciplinary graduate training program of education and research in Minerals, Metals, Metalloids, and Toxicity (3MT) at Stony Brook University. The 3MT program will train a new generation of scientists who will work at the interface of environmental and life sciences to understand how minerals, metals and metalloids affect biological processes that ultimately impact on the health of human and animals. Interdisciplinary research teams, advised by faculty drawn from the departments of Geosciences, Pharmacological Sciences, Physics, Chemistry, Marine Sciences, Biochemistry, Pathology, and Medicine, will address specific research questions related to the theme. In addition, the 3MT program will collaborate with a team of USGS scientists leading the agencys new, nation-wide and decade-long initiative to assess the interaction between humans and their surficial environment. Through this collaboration, students will conduct their research in the context of a nation-wide environmental program. The 3MT Program will offer new modular courses and workshops. The workshops will provide training in practical skills in support of research projects and prepare students for careers as interdisciplinary scientists. 3MT students will organize an annual regional gathering for graduate scholars from related training programs in the greater New York Metropolitan area. IGERT is an NSF-wide program intended to meet the challenges of educating U.S. Ph.D. scientists and engineers with the interdisciplinary background, deep knowledge in a chosen discipline, and the technical, professional, and personal skills needed for the career demands of the future. The program is intended to catalyze a cultural change in graduate education by establishing innovative new models for graduate education and training in a fertile environment for collaborative research that transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries.
", was established to address problems at the interface of environmental health and environmental science. Exposure to earth materials (minerals, soils, coal, aerosols, etc) as well as metals (e.g., iron, zinc, mercury) and metalloids (e.g, arsenic and selenium) associated with earth materials can have profound adverse effects on animal and human health. The fundamental mechanisms by which earth materials and associated metals/metalloids interfere with the normal functioning of organisms at the molecular, cellular, and organism level is not understood and few individual scientists are equipped to study this. The mission of the 3MT program was to train a new generation of scientists who work at the interface of environmental and life sciences to understand how minerals, metals and metalloids affect biological processes that ultimately impact health. The 3MT program supported a total of 18 different students, 7 trainees have graduated with a Ph.D. A total of 3 minority students participated in the IGERT, which is equivalent to 16.7% of the trainees. Nearly three-quarters of the trainees were or are women (72%). Both URM participation and women participation in the 3MT program are above the national average based on the most recent available data. The trainees published more than 25 papers and made numerous presentations at national meetings. Students involved in the program were drawn from both the physical and natural sciences as well as biomedical sciences. Several students performed research at Brookhaven National Laboratory and Argonne National Laboratory. Several of the studies undertaken by the graduate students involved in the program benefitted from close collaboration with the US Geological Survey. Students studied a wide range of topics from uptake of mercury into the marine food web, inhalation toxicity of coal, to role of metal in neurological diseases. Several students were also involved in a study of the possible role of dust in the development of lung ailments among Army personnel stationed in Iraq. This study was conducted in collaboration with faculty associated with the VA and some of the analyses were conducted at Brookhaven National Laboratory.
