Tropical Medicine Research Centers: TMRC Coordinating Center

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PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)-funded Tropical Medicine Research Center (TMRC) Program supports neglected tropical disease (NTD) research specifically for the development of prevention and therapeutic strategies while increasing in-country capacity, scientific collaboration, research opportunities for junior and early-stage investigators, and data and specimen sharing. The TMRC Program has a long history of funding scientifically productive research projects, but enhanced collaboration, coordination, and information sharing within and external to the TMRCs would increase the scientific value and public health impact of the scientific knowledge and resources developed within these research projects. Accordingly, as the TMRC Coordinating Center (CC), RTI International will provide administrative, communication, logistical, and operational support to the TMRC Program to achieve the following specific aims: (1) augment external stakeholder awareness of and alliance with TMRC Program expertise and resources by providing a conduit between the TMRC Program and the broader NTD research community; (2) enhance the TMRC Program’s collaborative and coordinated scientific impact by providing centralized administrative, communications, logistical, and operational support; (3) increase the utility of scientific TMRC resources, including data and specimens collected within the TMRC Program, by increasing data harmonization and developing and supporting a virtual repository; and (4) support the next generation of investigators and in-country scientists by implementing and managing the TMRC Program Opportunity Fund. Successful completion of these aims will include innovative implementation of technological communication and collaboration tools through a TMRC Program web presence that includes access to critical Program virtual resources, such as the virtual repository, the Opportunity Fund Gateway, and a Knowledge and Mentoring Network, to facilitate knowledge transfer and establish mentoring relationships. As the TMRC CC, we will use our team’s broad experience leading, managing, and providing administrative and data and specimen sharing support as the CC to numerous complex research consortiums. The team will use existing relationships with key stakeholders, established procedures and processes that can be easily adapted, and proven informatics technology to ramp up quickly as the TMRC CC and help advance the work being completed in support of the TMRC Program objective.