SCORE Program at New Mexico State University, Las Cruces

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This is an application for supplemental funding for a SCORE Program at New Mexico State University (NMSU) at Las Cruces. A goal of NMSU is to expand research at the institution for participation by ethnic minority students who desire to pursue careers in the biomedical science disciplines. The proposed SCORE Program has as its goals: (1) To significantly improve the capabilities of NMSU to conduct biomedically relevant research by increasing the numbers of faculty who conduct biomedical research, increasing the numbers of trained research personnel, increasing the inventory of specialized single-user research instrumentation, and improving the capacity to maintain research instrumentation; (2) To significantly improve the quantity and quality of biomedical research conducted at NMSU by broadening grantsmanship efforts of faculty participants and increasing the numbers and quality of research publications; (3) To integrate the activities of the SCORE Program with an anticipated RISE Program to maximize resources for training minority scientists in the biomedical sciences by engaging students in SCORE Program research projects; (4) To increase the capacity of NMSU to self-evaluate, assess, and monitor its multi-component research programs by engaging trained personnel in the SCORE Program's evaluation plan and subjecting the Program to annual review by an external evaluation committee. This application contains research proposals for four research subprojects and two pilot subprojects. Disciplines represented among the project proposals are diverse. They include bioinorganic chemistry (Smith), physical/synthetic organic chemistry (Starnes), neuro-cognitive psychology (Kroger), whole-animal endocrinology (Hawkins), modern cell biology (Curtiss), and pathogenic microbiology (Oshima). Specific areas proposed for investigation include: fMRI and EEC imaging methodologies to investigate the distribution of dynamic functions across the frontal cortex of the brain; applications of immunofluorescent probes and confocal microscopy to identify and assign functionality to new genes for head and eye patterning in Drosophila; development of porphyrin-based receptor molecules for the selective recognition of nitrite anion and other biologically relevant anions that can be used as biosensors; synthesis of model iron oxo-complexes that mimic enzyme-catalyzed reaction intermediates of nonheme dioxygenases; investigations of the ecology and transmission of the pathogen, Cryptosporidium parvum that will lead to the development of various Cryptosporidium diagnostic tools at species, genotype, and subgenotype levels; and studies of the role of polyamines, putrescine, spermidine, and spermine, produced by the agmatine pathway in the functions of the corpus luteum. NMSU has an existing SCORE Program which was initiated on June 1, 2000, and renewed on June 1, 2004. This Program currently funds eleven regular subprojects and no pilot subprojects. The existing SCORE Program succeeded a 25-year-old associate MBRS Program which produced 71 minority Ph.D. scientists in the period from 1974-2004.