Los Angeles Basin Bridges to the PhD Program

描述（由申请人提供）：尽管洛杉矶大都市区是数百万非洲裔美国人、西班牙裔美国人、美洲印第安人和太平洋岛民的家园，但很少有人在广泛的生物医学科学领域攻读研究生课程，从而获得博士学位。这种对国家生物医学研究企业的参与不足，意味着大量人才的流失，而这些人才并没有被用于解决许多生物医学问题。

DESCRIPTION (provided by the applicant): Although the Los Angeles metropolitan area is home to millions of African Americans, Hispanics, American Indians and Pacific Islanders, few are enrolled in graduate programs leading to the Ph.D. in the broad range of biomedical sciences. This under-participation in the nation's biomedical research enterprise represents the loss of a large talent pool that has not been applied towards the solution of the many biomedical problems. As a partial solution to this situation, four institutions in the Los Angeles basin propose to continue the collaborative Los Angeles Basin Bridges to the Ph.D. Program to increase the number of talented minority students in Ph.D. programs in the biomedical sciences. This would be done by increasing the transfer of minority students in strong terminal Master of Science (M.S.) programs at a minority institution by vertical integration into Ph.D. programs at major research universities. These institutions are California State University, Los Angeles (Cal State LA), a minority institution, which awards the M.S. as its highest science degree, and three Ph.D.-granting major research institutions: the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), the University of California at Irvine (UCI), and the University of Southern California (USC). We propose to train each year a group of six minority students pursuing the M.S. degree at Cal State LA in a program designed to enhance their academic and research achievement; integrate them into the broader Southern California biomedical research community; expose them to a broad range of biomedical sciences and scientists; enhance their transfer rate to Ph.D. programs; and establish the foundation for their eventual successful research careers in the biomedical sciences. On entry into the program the students would be simultaneously admitted to Cal State LA Master of Science programs, and conditionally accepted into Ph.D. programs in the participating doctoral institutions, with guaranteed admission on successful completion of the M.S. degree.