TRAINING FUTURE GENERATIONS OF MENTAL HEALTH RESEARCHERS

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This R25 application is organized around two overall themes-building bridges between basic and clinical research and building bridges between science and clinical service. We plan to develop further the infrastructure needed to conduct clinical research training within the frameworks of both translational and public health models. A key premise of our program is the importance of forging links between neuroscience, neuroimaging, and genetics and their applications to interventions with psychiatric and physical illnesses throughout the lifespan. We also plan to build bridges between the tradition we have established of treatment outcome research done in controlled clinical trials and the current priority accorded by NIMH to intervention research with an increased public health orientation. Our specific aims include: (1) development of a Junior Faculty Scholars Program that will provide 25 percent salary support for two years to faculty members selected competitively by the Executive Committee of our Research Education and Training Center (RETC). The short-term goal is to facilitate the development of K-award career development applications by these faculty; the long-term goal is to ensure their success as independent investigators doing clinical research; (2) development of a curriculum with two tracks-one for translational research and a second for intervention research. Both tracks will involve one mini-course during the academic year (10 sessions) and two intensive summer workshops (one week each); (3) provision of four awards for pilot research studies by Junior Faculty Scholars collecting initial data in support of their K-award applications; and (4) hiring of one full-time statistician who will provide support to the Junior Faculty Scholars. Issues regarding recruitment of underrepresented minorities and women are addressed, and specific criteria for evaluating the success of the program (e.g., an increase in funded early career development awards and mid-career patient-oriented research awards) are also described.