REU Site: Research Experiences for Undergraduates in Plant Science at the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center

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This REU Site award to Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, located in St. Louis, MO, will support the training of 10 students for 11 weeks during the summers of 2021- 2022. It is anticipated that a total of 20 students, primarily from schools with limited research opportunities or from an under-represented group, will be trained in the program. Fostering the next generation of plant scientists is critical to solving some of the planet’s biggest challenges. The Danforth Center is an independent, non-profit private research institute with state-of-the art research facilities and is dedicated to fundamental as well as applied research in plant biology. In addition to presenting research findings at a final program symposium, many interns will present their work at scientific conferences and will have their work included in scientific publications. Assessment of the program will be done through on-site interviews and through the online SALG URSSA tool. Students will be tracked after the program in order to determine their career paths.The mission of the Danforth Center is to improve human conditions through plant science, a field that has become exceedingly important with growing human population and changing environmental conditions. Interns will conduct 11-week research projects under the guidance of Danforth Center scientists. Research covers many areas such as abiotic stress, bioenergy, genomics, bioremediation, cellular signaling, translational plant sciences and others. The research component will be supplemented with additional educational activities, including workshops from Danforth Center core facilities, including Advanced Bioimaging Laboratory, Proteomics & Mass Spectrometry, Bioinformatics, Phenotyping, Maker and Tissue Culture and Transformation facilities. Interns will also participate in workshops/training sessions in Equity Diversity and Inclusivity, implicit bias, and sexual harassment. Other program components include weekly meetings, a scientific retreat, educational field trips and a career panel which will expose interns to current research topics in the plant sciences, ethics in research, and career path alternatives. Interns will have ample networking opportunities with Danforth Center scientists as well as those from other local institutions. Applications are available online and are due each February. The program runs each summer from May through August. More information about the program is available by visiting http://www.danforthcenter.org/internship or by contacting internship@danforthcenter.org.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.