Clinician Scientist School Lübeck: Connecting Brain, Metabolism, and Inflammation (BMI) – Mechanisms and Disease Expression

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The University of Lübeck (UzL) is a faculty boundary-free Life Science University featuring the seamless, side-by-side collaboration between clinicians and basic scientists dedicated to translational research. The UzL prioritizes the training and integration of clinician scientists (CS) in its research. It has rigorously been pursuing the integration of research rotation positions in all of its extramurally funded research consortia. It has also established an intramural research rotation program. Obtaining one of these rotation positions is highly competitive, and the demand is significantly higher than the positions available.In collaboration with the Board of Physicians in Schleswig-Holstein, the UzL has developed a curriculum integrating clinical training and protected research time for the Board certification in Dermatology and Internal Medicine. This Board-approved curriculum nationwide is the first such program officially operating and has become a blueprint for integrated training curricula in Germany, propagated by the task force CS of the Medizinischer Fakultätentag as the Lübeck Model.To further improve the training of CS at the UzL and beyond, the establishment of centralized bodies, institution-wide orchestrating and monitoring the training of CS according to clearly defined rules and standards is imperative. Such a body, enforcing rules and training standards, is a prerequisite to implement long-lasting, Board-approved curricula through all specialties. We therefore propose to establish the Clinician Scientist School Lübeck (CSSL). The CSSL will be a UzL-wide, central infrastructure. It will coordinate, unify and monitor the training of CS. The training will be conducted according to the combined clinical/research curriculum and through a transferable skills training program. The research training of CS trainees (CST) will be interdisciplinary and conducted by mentor groups combining clinician and basic scientists. This will facilitate the training of physicians in medicine and science to lay the foundation to run both a clinic and a multidisciplinary research group. The CSSL program will also enable residents in training in scientifically emerging clinical departments to obtain training by well-established scientists outside of their department. By this, the CSSL will spread nuclei of high-quality research throughout all clinical Departments on campus.The CSTs on the requested rotation positions will conduct projects bridging the UzL research foci Brain, Behavior, and Metabolism and Infection and Inflammation. They will investigate the bidirectional crosstalk between brain, metabolism, and immune system and the mutually promoting effects of neurodegenerative, metabolic, and autoimmune disorders with genetics and omics approaches serving as an important link across projects. The specific projects and rotation positions will assigned through a competitive process including external reviewers and an internal CSSL supervisory board.