IRES Track I: A U.S.-Ireland Partnership for an International Graduate Research Experience in Biopharmaceutical Processing

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The U.S. economy is faced with unprecedented challenges in numerous industry sectors. These challenges underscore a compelling opportunity to prepare the next generation of biopharmaceutical scientists who are specially trained in a field that our world desperately needs. Despite the fact that international partnerships between U.S. and non-U.S.-based sites are often challenging to arrange, especially in the area of biomanufacturing, we have a unique opportunity to execute a Track 1 International Research Experience (IRES) that capitalizes on our existing collaboration between Thomas Jefferson University and Ireland’s National Institute for Bioprocessing Research and Training (NIBRT), a non-academic research enterprise. The program will provide a unique training and educational research experience in a world class facility, engage underrepresented minorities, and provide assistance to transition the participants to industry or advanced degree programs.Thomas Jefferson University proposes to engage its international training partner, the National Institute for Bioprocessing Research and Training (NIBRT) to enable global research in methodologies of bioanalytics and biomonitoring with the following goals: (1) Offer a specially selected cohort of students (N=6 each year) the opportunity to develop agile, analytical skills in biopharmaceutical process engineering with a prominent global leader so that they emerge as distinctively prepared. (2) Increase the inclusion of underrepresented minorities (URMs) in the life sciences and engineering through participation in biopharmaceutical process engineering and recruitment efforts. (3) Train and transition exceptionally prepared, highly competitive students into industry positions or advanced degree programs. Our long-term goals are to increase the workforce pipeline for the biopharmaceutical and vaccine industries, and foster U.S. manufacturing competitiveness in an area critically important to human health and national security. The biopharmaceutical industry is highly regulated and research and training opportunities at relevant sites are both difficult and costly. The meaningful relationship already in place between Philadelphia/Jefferson and NIBRT offers a powerful convergence of two thought leaders in establishing a novel and potentially transformative research training experience that capitalizes on our international exchange, existing curriculum, and world-class researchers and capabilities unmatched anywhere else on the globe. Furthermore, continued targeted efforts to engage URMs are critical to the evolution of the U.S.’s STEM workforce as the diversity of U.S. populations increase and we attempt to remain competitive in STEM fields. Finally, we intend to build this nascent international opportunity into a sustainable and long-term exchange in which U.S. and NIBRT trainees have global opportunities on either continent. In return, by securing this type of training and experiential learning, we will contribute significantly to a workforce that is desperately needed in the biomanufacturing industry and our findings will bolster the existing literature on the advantages of international STEM student training opportunities.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.