Molecular Epidemiology in Children's Environmental Health Training Program

描述(由申请人提供) 儿童环境健康分子流行病学(MECEH)培训计划于2001年7月开始，目前已进入第十个培训年头。MECEH的定义是在流行病学研究中使用生物学、分子和统计方法来确定环境暴露如何在生理、行为、细胞和分子水平上影响儿童的健康。作为流行病学、医学、统计遗传学、分子生物学和分子遗传学的产物，分子流行病学为遗传学和生物标志物流行病学的重点研究提供了保护伞。MECEH有3个参与部门：环境卫生、儿科医学和分子遗传学。MECEH连续招收了13名博士后和24名博士后研究员，其中包括19名医学博士/博士研究生、1名DDS和1名环境工程师。学员们在专业方面取得了很大的进步，他们在国家报告、大量出版物、拨款申请和获得学术研究职位方面取得了巨大的进步。本申请要求在2011-2016年间每年提供4个博士后和6个博士后职位的支持，这将使该项目保持现有规模。 MECEH的长期目标是继续增加受过交叉培训的流行病学家、内科流行病学家和分子生物学家的数量，他们调查与环境暴露和复杂的儿童疾病有关的高影响问题。这一培训计划的基本原理已在诸如2000年《儿童健康法》(H.R.4365)等联邦倡议中得到阐述，该法案强调“对未来的儿科研究人员进行投资”(第1002节)。MECEH有3个主要目标：1)为流行病学、统计学和干湿实验室分子方法提供坚实的基础；2)为NIH路线图中所述的跨学科研究培训和“加强临床研究人员培训”做好准备；3)与Francis Collins的机遇和挑战方向一致，研究人员寻求扩大受训人员在统计基因组学、表观遗传学和设计社区参与性研究方面的专业知识的增长领域。这些目标是通过招募高质量的申请者来实现的，包括代表性不足的少数族裔，由世界知名的教师和科学家组成的核心指导，由研究密集型环境卫生、儿科和分子遗传学系支持，资金充足的科学项目和中心，以及热情的外部顾问委员会的建议。 MECEH计划的公共卫生意义与国民对糖尿病、肥胖症、哮喘、神经发育障碍和早产等环境相关疾病数量不断增加的日益增长的认识直接相关。因此，

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant) The Molecular Epidemiology in Children's Environmental Health (MECEH) training program began July, 2001 and is in its tenth training year. MECEH is defined as the use of biological, molecular and statistical measures in epidemiological research to determine how environmental exposures impact children's health at the physiologic, behavioral, cellular, and molecular levels. As the offspring of epidemiology, medicine, statistical genetics, molecular biology, and molecular genetics, molecular epidemiology serves as an umbrella for focused research in genetic and biomarker epidemiology. MECEH has 3 participating departments: Environmental Health, Pediatric Medicine and Molecular Genetics. MECEH has had continuous full enrollment with 13 pre-doctoral and 24 postdoctoral fellows trained or in training, including 19 M.D./D.O fellows, one DDS, and one environmental engineer. Trainees have made great professional strides with national presentations, numerous publications, grant submissions and obtaining academic research positions. This application requests support for four pre-doctoral and six postdoctoral positions each year for 2011-2016, which will maintain this program at its current size. The MECEH's long term objective is to continue increasing the number of cross-trained epidemiologists, physician epidemiologists and molecular biologists who investigate high impact issues related to environmental exposures and complex childhood diseases. The overarching rationale for this training program has been stated in such federal initiatives as the Children's Health Act of 2000 (H.R.4365) which stressed "investment in tomorrow's pediatric researchers" (sec 1002). The MECEH has 3 primary goals: 1) provide a strong grounding in epidemiologic, statistical and wet and dry laboratory molecular methods, 2) prepare students for interdisciplinary research training and "enhance clinical research workforce training" as stated in the NIH roadmap, and 3) in concert with Francis Collins' direction for opportunities and challenges the investigators seek to expand growth areas for trainee expertise in statistical genomics, epigenetic epidemiology, and design of community based participatory research. These goals are achieved through the recruitment of high quality applicants, including underrepresented minorities, mentorship by a core of world-renowned teacher-scientists, support by research-intensive environmental health, pediatric and molecular genetics departments, well-funded scientific programs and Centers, and advice from an enthusiastic External Advisory Board. The public health significance of the MECEH program is directly correlated to the increasing national awareness of the rising number of environmentally related disease such as diabetes, obesity, asthma, neurodevelopmental disorders, and prematurity, among others. Thus, the