MBRS IMSD at the University of Missouri-Columbia (MBRTI)

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This is a renewal funding proposal for our program, the Minority Biomedical Researchers Training Initiative (MBRTI), implemented during the past 3 years with an undergraduate component added a year ago. This proposal contains changes that respond to our experiences with implementing MBRTI and a desire to focus our efforts to develop a pre-college through doctoral level pipeline of underrepresented minority students being trained for biomedical research careers. With this submission, we propose to recruit and provide (a) research experiences for a total of 160-200 undergraduate freshmen and sophomore minority students (40- 50/year) through our EXPRESS Program, and (b) research training with five years of support--one year from MBRS, 4 years from MU departments and fellowships--for at least 32 doctoral level minority students (8/year) in our GRA doctoral program. Our objectives are to ensure that these students, from new freshmen to doctoral-level students, complete their degrees in the biomedical sciences, and that the undergraduates continue with their education to obtain a doctoral degree. Based upon what we learned with our current programs (undergraduate EXPRESS, and the graduate/master's level GRA program) we expect that we will succeed in achieving our objectives with the variety of networking and career development activities (workshops and conferences), and the substantial support they will receive. The departments participating are Animal Science, Biochemistry, Biological Science, Chemistry, Food Science & Nutrition, Molecular Microbiology & Immunology, Physiology, Veterinary Biomedical Science and Veterinary Pathobiology. All of the faculty mentors who have extensive experience with mentoring underrepresented minority students in research experiences, and nearly all have exciting research, some funded through NIH. The administrative structure is streamlined, with the GRA component administered by College of Veterinary Medicine; the EXPRESS Program by the Co-Program Director located in Biological Sciences.