Katherine M. Sharkey, Ph.D. - US grants

This is the 2?nd renewal application of the Alpert Medical School Summer Research Program (AMSSRP). The ?overall goal of the AMSSRP is to provide ?12 ?medical students with the opportunity to have a mentored research experience annually under the guidance of Brown University faculty. Designated faculty trainers are the principal investigators for research programs focused on the molecular basis and pathology of cardiovascular, pulmonary, and blood diseases and/or disease outcomes and prevention. The current program offers 8 medical students, who have just completed their 1? year of medical school, a 9 week summer research st experience that includes a collaborative, multidisciplinary, mentored research project, didactic training, and career development activities to enhance their understanding, and give them the hands-on experience of a career as a physician-scientist. The AMSSRP is geared to expose students to the critical role played by physician-scientists in translational research and to inspire these students to embark on this career path of exploration and discovery. NIH has consistently made translational and ?bench-to-bedside? research a priority. However, the increase in NIH support of biomedical basic research has not correlated with an increase in the discovery of efficacious therapies or diagnostics to battle human diseases. This disparity may be due in part to the decrease in the number of physicians who pursue research careers, a decline that may result from a lack of mentorship, rising costs of medical school education, the length of time of MD-PhD programs, and a perception that physician-scientists are not as highly regarded as clinicians in the hospital setting. In addition, developing knowledge base and research skill competencies for clinically trained physicians is time consuming and often learned outside of medical school didactics. The AMSSRP serves to dispel this trend by partnering medical students with successful and active mentors engaged in cutting edge research and exposing them to the excitement of biomedical research discoveries related to cardiovascular, pulmonary and blood health and diseases during their medical school years. By engaging medical students early in their training, we hope to stimulate a lifelong drive of scientific inquiry and a successful research career.