PREDOCTORAL TRAINING IN MOLECULAR BIOLOGY

本申请提出了科罗拉多大学医学院分子生物学博士前培训计划。我们从广义上定义分子生物学。我们的33名培训教师代表了广泛的科学学科，包括细胞周期控制和信号传导、转录调控和剪接、蛋白质分选、DNA复制、大分子结构、核酸/染色质结构和功能、病毒学、细菌学、基因组学、神经生物学、发育生物学和细胞生物学。我们的教师采用从物理生物化学和机械酶学到重组DNA技术，遗传学和细胞生物学的方法。这些不同的学科和方法通过使用分子方法来解决生物学的基本问题而统一起来。拟议的培训计划建议在前两年的培训中支持特别有前途的学生-第一年致力于课程工作和研究轮转，第二年致力于第一年的论文研究，最终通过综合（博士候选人资格）考试。我们预计学生的总培训期为4-5年。该计划采取以学生为中心的方法，可适应个别学生的需求。我们认识到，整个经验的最重要的目标是准备我们的毕业生一个独立的，创造性的研究生涯。为了实现这一目标，我们强调让学生为终身学习做好准备的方法，使他们能够识别重要领域的相关问题，批判性地评估一个领域的文献，设计良好控制的实验，并能够批判性地评估结果。我们也认识到，除了知道如何做好科学研究之外，我们的毕业生还必须能够将他们的成果的兴奋和重要性传达给他人。因此，我们在训练中强调科学的沟通技巧。

This application proposes a pre-doctoral training program in Molecular Biology at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. We define Molecular Biology in a broad senses. Our 33 training faculty represent a broad range of scientific disciplines including cell cycle control and signaling, transcriptional regulation and splicing, protein sorting, DNA replication, macromolecular structure, nucleic acid/chromatin structure and function, virology, bacteriology, genomics, neurobiology, developmental biology and cell biology. Our faculty take approaches ranging from physical biochemistry and mechanistic enzymology to recombinant DNA technology, genetics and cell biology. These diverse disciplines and approaches are unified by use of molecular approaches to address fundamental questions of biology. The proposed training program proposes to support particularly promising students during the initial two years of training-the first year devoted to course work and research rotations and the second devoted to the first year of thesis research culminating in the comprehensive (PhD candidacy) exam. We expect the total training period for our students to be 4-5 years. The program takes a student-centered approach, being adaptable to meet individual student needs. We recognize that the most important goal of the entire experience is to prepare our graduates for an independent, creative research career. To accomplish this, we emphasize approaches that prepare students for lifelong learning, enabling them to be able to identify relevant questions in important areas, to critically assess the literature in a field, to design well-controlled experiments, and to be able to critically evaluate the results. We also recognize that, in addition to knowing how to perform good science, our graduates must be able to communicate the excitement and importance of their results to others. Thus, we emphasize scientific communication skills in our training.