Combined Adult and Pediatric Infectious Disease Postdoctoral Training Grant

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PROJECT SUMMARY This Institutional Training Grant (T32) is a competing renewal of a training program from the Pe- relman School of Medicine (PSOM) at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) and the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) to train MD and MD-PhD fellows pursuing careers in bench re- search in microbiology, microbial immunology, and the microbiome. Our program combines the talent and resources available at two independent but linked institutions, Penn and CHOP. Audrey Odom John MD PhD from the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Children’s Hospital of Phila- delphia will serve as Program Director (PD) and Harvey Friedman MD from the Division of Infec- tious Diseases at Penn will serve as Associate Program Director (APD). Our program addresses a critical public health need for a robust infectious diseases physician- scientific workforce. To address this need, our applicant pool will come primarily from the adult and pediatric infectious diseases postdoctoral sub-specialty training programs, but enrollment will be open to all divisions and departments at Penn and CHOP who have MD and MD PhD post- doctoral fellows interested in pursuing basic science research in infectious diseases. Twenty- seven mentors help support the careers of the trainees. There is a high degree of collaboration among the mentors and trainees with shared publications and grants. In addition to mentored research training, our curriculum emphasizes the following: 1) formal course work through Penn Graduate Studies Program; 2) training in responsible conduct of research; 3) training in biostatis- tics and rigor and reproducibility; 4) regular research presentations and feedback; and 5) forums that teach a variety of important career development skills, including scientific writing, public presentations, grant writing, laboratory management, mentoring skills, and becoming knowledge- able about career options. During our initial funding period, three trainees have completed train- ing: two of these have successfully acquired K08 funding and have research-intensive academic positions, and one is in an academic, research-related clinical faculty position. We request con- tinued support for three postdoctoral fellows/year who participate in a program that is designed to be three years in length. This program combines the outstanding CHOP/Penn training environ- ment, an exceptional cadre of trainees and mentors, and substantial institutional resources for research and training in infectious diseases research to promote trainee success.