NIH-Oxford-Cambridge Biomedical Scholars Program

Dear Colleague,

We would like to bring to your attention to the NIH-Oxford-Cambridge Biomedical Scholars Program, an interdisciplinary, accelerated training program with some innovative features that may appeal to your top students. Since 2001, scientists at NIH have collaborated with colleagues in Oxford and Cambridge to create a partnership PhD training program spanning the full breadth of research in these institutions. Every student admitted to the program is fully funded for the length of training.

When compared with traditional U.S. PhD programs, the NIH-Oxford-Cambridge partnership is designed to significantly reduce the time it takes to earn the doctoral degree. Our partnership students generally earn their degrees in four years, and graduates are easily obtaining excellent post-doc positions, faculty appointments, and positions with biotech companies, to name a few of the opportunities awaiting these highly qualified individuals.

As we work to recruit the Class of 2010, we will be searching for highly self-directed students with significant research experience who are ready to focus on a particular dimension of biomedical research in their chosen fields of study. Each year, we receive applications from the nation’s top science students. Additionally, the NIH has cultivated agreements with the Rhodes Trust, the Marshall Commission, and the Churchill and Gates Cambridge scholarships, enabling these talented scholars to extend their master’s degree programs into a PhD with a U.S. lab component. The program is also compatible with the NIH MD/PhD Partnership Training Program, which offers funding for combined M.D./Ph.D. training in collaboration with over twenty U.S. medical schools participating in the Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP). We have admitted numerous HHMI Scholars into the M.D./Ph.D. Program via the program’s Track 2 admissions pathway. For details about the M.D./Ph.D. options and training tracks, please consult http://gpp.nih.gov/Prospective/InstitutionalPartnerships/MSTPatNIH/ .

Students admitted to the program choose a research project from a pre-existing list of collaborations (see our web site for the list) or are free to design their own project, often bridging different disciplines. They write a detailed research proposal during their first summer in the program and begin their thesis research immediately. We require that Scholars spend two years at the NIH and two years in the UK, working in the labs of their chosen mentors. They earn the doctoral degree from whichever UK institution they select for their doctoral work.

The application deadline for 2010 is January 4^th, so please forward the email below and enclosed flyers to interested students. We would also greatly appreciate it if you would post the flyers at appropriate locations on campus.

If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact me. More information can be found at the program website (http://oxcam.gpp.nih.gov)

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Dear Prospective Student,

I am writing to tell you about a groundbreaking biomedical research doctoral program—the National Institutes of Health-Oxford-Cambridge Scholars Program. This innovative program grew from the realization that the next generation of research scientists will increasingly need to adopt interdisciplinary approaches as they strive to produce high impact research outcomes whether basic or clinical.

This is an accelerated program, and students typically receive a doctoral degree in approximately four years. There is no standard curriculum or required coursework. Rather, each student pursues an individualized course of study in which thesis work is initiated at the beginning of the first year. The thesis project is carried out as a collaboration between two labs, with half the research undertaken at NIH and half at one of the UK universities and each student being mentored by a senior scientist at each location. The program takes advantage of the superb resources and training environments at Oxford, Cambridge, and the NIH, the world’s largest biomedical research facility, the main campus of which is located in Bethesda, Maryland where a diverse community of scientists conduct their research in over 1000 laboratories and the world’s largest clinical research center conducts more than 1000 clinical research protocols.

>From its first class that matriculated in 2001, NIH-Oxford-Cambridge Scholars have achieved at the highest levels of biomedical research, publishing first-author papers in journals such as Nature, Nature Medicine, Nature Immunology, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and The Journal of Experimental Medicine. Graduates have gone on to do post-doctoral training in top academic institutions and industry labs, and a few have gone directly to faculty positions.

All students are fully funded by the NIH for the duration of their doctoral work at both research sites and receive a stipend, health insurance, and travel assistance. Through the NIH M.D./Ph.D Partnership Training Program, we also offer funding for combined M.D./Ph.D. training in collaboration with over twenty U.S. medical schools participating in the Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP). This option may be of interest to those of you already enrolled in medical school point or applying to traditional MD/PhD programs this year. For details about the M.D./Ph.D. options and training tracks please consult http://gpp.nih.gov/Prospective/InstitutionalPartnerships/MSTPatNIH/ .

The application deadline for Ph.D. and M.D./Ph.D. candidates is January 4th, 2010. The free application is available online through the program website at http://oxcam.gpp.nih.gov via the “Apply Now” button. On our web site you will find additional program details, FAQs, student biographies, descriptions of some of the exciting research projects underway, and more. We would also like to invite you to participate in a teleconference call to learn more about our programs. Please email us at oxcam@mail.nih.gov or mdphd@mail.nih.gov if you would like more information or would like to participate in a conference call.

Please take a look at the flyers through the links below and feel free to contact me if you have any questions. We hope to hear from you soon!

http://oxcam.gpp.nih.gov/prospectiveStudents/documents/OXCAM2010Flyerwdeadline.pdf
http://oxcam.gpp.nih.gov/prospectiveStudents/documents/MSTPflyer2010.pdf

All the best,


Michael Lenardo, M.D.

Program Director

NIH-Oxford Cambridge Scholars Program

Richard Siegel, M.D., Ph.D.

Program Director

NIH M.D./Ph.D. Partnership Training Program

Bridget Lampert, M.S. Ed

Managing Director
NIH-Oxford-Cambridge Scholars Program
NIH M.D./Ph.D. Partnership Training Program
(301) 496-6083

7th BI-ANNUAL

2009 MINNESOTA WORKSHOPS

on

HIGH FIELD MR IMAGING AND SPECTROSCOPY

and MR IMAGING of BRAIN FUNCTION

OCTOBER 9-11, 2009

http://www.cmrr.umn.edu/workshops/Workshop_09/

CONFERENCE GOALS

The goal is to provide a forum to introduce and discuss the technical issues and applications of MRI/MRS conducted with high magnetic fields (>= 3 T). Presentations from experts in the major areas of high field MR research will discuss fundamental principles, methodology, and applications. After attending this workshop, individuals can expect to be well informed of the advantages and limitations of high field MR and will have acquired much of the basic knowledge necessary to undertake high field MR investigations.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has evolved into a widely used method for studying brain function and high magnetic fields continue to play an important role in obtaining improved functional maps. By bringing a group of recognized experts who are in the forefront of the field, this workshop will provide an in-depth overview of fMRI, including basic principles, underlying physiology, new developments and various applications. Designed as both an educational program and a scientific forum for the presentation of the state-of-the-art research, the workshop is intended for a wide spectrum of basic and clinical scientists including cognitive scientists, physicists, radiologists, neurologists, neuropsychologists, psychiatrists and others interested in the technical development and applications of fMRI.

TRAINING WORKSHOPS

The training courses are designed to provide attendees with hands-on experience. The courses are mainly targeted for individuals who are new to the field. Attendees participate in lab sessions designed to illustrate each topic covered in lectures. For trainees that will also attend the workshop, lectures are scheduled to provide an overview of the topics covered by workshop speakers.

fMRI TRAINING COURSE

Hands-on Training, October 6-8, 2009

fMRI Data Acquisition

1. Block-design fMRI data collection
2. Event-related experiments
3. Perfusion contrast
4. fMRI Data Processing
5. Data pre-processing
6. General Linear Model and Model-Free analyses
7. Analysis in commercially available packages

MULTI-CHANNEL TRANSMIT B1 MANIUPULATION AT HIGH

Hands-on Training, October 7-8, 2009

The following topics will be covered in lectures (morning sessions) and in-vivo demonstration at the scanner (afternoon sessions):

1. Fast multi-channel B1 mapping
2. Static B1 shim in small targets
3. Static B1 shim in large targets
4. Excitation k-space trajectories measurement
5. B1 homogenization within an axial slice ("spoke excitation k-space trajectories")
6. 2D parallel excitation ("Transmit SENSE")

A human 7 T Siemens system capable of static B1 shim on 16 channels (one transmitter RF shaping board) will be used to demonstrate topics 1, 2 and 3.

A human 9.4 T Varian system capable of independent parallel transmission on 8 channels (8 transmitter RF shaping boards) will be used to demonstrate topics 4, 5, and 6.

SPECTROSCOPY TRAINING COURSE Hands-on Training, October 7-8, 2009

The following topics will be covered in lectures, hands-on sessions, and demonstrations:

1. pulse sequences
2. shimming
3. data acquisition using Varian and Siemens scanners
4. processing
5. data analysis focusing on using LCModel

POSTER PRESENTATIONS

Limited number of posters will be accepted for presentation, and the authors of selected posters will be additionally provided with an opportunity to give a short oral presentation. If you would like to present a poster at the workshop, please submit a one-page abstract via e-mail to deb@cmrr.umn.edu or mail to Deb Morgan, CMRR, 2021 6th ST SE, Minneapolis, MN 55455. The abstract must be received by September 1, 2009.

fMRI TRAINING COURSE

OCTOBER 6-8, 2009

SPECTROSCOPY TRAINING COURSE

OCTOBER 7-8, 2009

MULTI-CHANNEL TRANSMIT B1 MAINIPULATION AT HIGH FIELD TRAINING COURSE

OCTOBER 7-8, 2009

CANMRDG Program
2009 Meeting
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Baxter International Inc., Deerfield, IL
http://www.chem.purdue.edu/canmrdg/

Dear NMR Colleagues,

This year’s final program for the CANMRDG on November 7 at the Baxter Campus in Deerfield Illinois is now posted on our website http://www.chem.purdue.edu/canmrdg/.
The meeting will be held in the Conference Center and begins at 8:15 am (The first Saturday on Central Standard Time!). Please note that prior Registration is required to enter the Baxter Campus. Directions, parking and hotel information are available as links on the website.

Once again we are delighted to welcome two outstanding NMR scientists as our keynote speakers:- Professor Cindy Larive (University of California Riverside) and Professor Jim Prestegard (University of Georgia; Director of the Complex Carbohydrate Research Center). In addition, we have had an overwhelming number of papers submitted by our community and this has produced a very full program – please note we will start at 8:15 and run until 5:30 with cooperation from the speakers.

Please thank our faithful sponsors for their continued support for the meeting – Bruker, Cambridge Isotopes Lab, ISOTEC-Sigma-Aldrich, Protasis, and Varian. Links to our sponsors’ web-sites are found on our home page. Without their support we could not hear from our fine keynote speakers.
A very special thank-you is also due to Joe Ray and Christina Szabo and the staff at Baxter for all their support and efforts in arranging the meeting details, and finding speakers. They have done a superb job.
Your attention is called to the following items so that the meeting can run smoothly.

1.Registration: The registration form on the web MUST be completed by Friday, October 30. for admission to the Baxter site. Their Security Guards require a list of attendees in advance. It will also assist the folks at Baxter to plan the meeting space and breaks.

2.Lunch: We will have a buffet style lunch on the Baxter site this year. The price is $20 per person. A special discount rate of $10 per person is available for students courtesy of a generous donation by a sponsor. Advance registration for lunch is essential for catering purposes. Please click the “Yes” button on the registration form on our website by Noon Friday, October 30 to guarantee your lunch. The lunch list will be updated each day on the CANMRDG web site between 4:30 and 5:00pm so you can check your lunch status. No registration means no food! Once again no shows will be requested to pay for unused meals.

3.Maps, Lodging & Parking Information: These can be found under the links on the web-site http://www.chem.purdue.edu/canmrdg/.

I look forward to seeing you on November 7. Don’t forget to register on the web by Oct 30
Any questions or comments, please feel free to contact me by email at grutzner@purdue.edu or call 765-494-5247 (afternoons).
Last-minute details and information regarding the Baxter site can be provided by Christina Szabo, christina_szabo@baxter.com.

Yours resonantly,
John B. Grutzner

Meeting Program

Chair: John Grutzner (Purdue University)
8:15 ‐ 8:30 Welcome: Norbert Riedel (Chief Scientific Officer, Baxter)
8:30 ‐ 8:50 Progress Toward Automatic Structure Verification Assisted by
Connectivity in Dual Microcoil NMR Ke Ruan (Pfizer Inc.)
8:50 ‐ 9:10 rNMR - Open Source Software for NMR Data Analysis
Seth Schommer (University of Wisconsin Madison)
9:10 ‐ 9:30 Universal Quantitations by NMR: Solvent Concentration Reference
and Receiving Efficiency Hauping Mo (Purdue University)
9:30 ‐ 9:50 Photodimerization of A-Trans-Cinnamic Acid: Domain Sizes in Irradiated
Single Crystals Sarah Mattler (Washington University St. Louis)
9:50 ‐ 10:05 Contribution of Long-Range Interactions to the Secondary Structure
of an Unfolded Globin Daria Fedyukina (University of Wisconsin Madison)
10:05 Coffee
Chair: Christina Szabo (Baxter)
10:30 ‐ 10:50 The Use of In Vitro Chemoselective Isotopic Tagging to Enhance
NMR-Based Metabolic Profiling Tao Ye (Purdue University)
10:50 ‐ 11:10 Global Metabolomics of Breast Cancer Cells Quincy Teng (US EPA)
11:10 ‐ 12:10 Keynote Lecture: Adventures in Mixture Analysis by NMR
Cynthia Larive (University of California Riverside)
12:15 Lunch
Chair: Joe Ray (Baxter)
1:30 ‐ 1:50 Enhancing NMR's Sensitivity by Photochemically-Enhanced Dynamic
Nuclear Polarization Silvia Cavagnero (University of Wisconsin Madison)
1:50 ‐ 2:10 NMR Studies of Substrate Conformation Upon Binding the Hsp70
Chaperone Protein Nese Kurt Yilmaz (University of Wisconsin Madison)
2:10 ‐ 3:10 Keynote Lecture: New Assignment Strategies for Large and Glycosylated
Proteins James H. Prestegard (University of Georgia)
3:10 Coffee
Chair: John Grutzner (Purdue University)
3:30 ‐ 3:50 Chemical Shift Perturbations Reveal Disrupted "Hot Spot" Binding in the
Src SH2 Domain Joshua Ward (Purdue University)
3:50 ‐ 4:10 Application of REDOR SSNMR to Understand Early Steps in HIV Infection
Kelly Sackett (Michigan State University)
4:10 ‐ 4:30 Cu2+ Binding Studies to Alzheimer s B Amyloid Fibrils by Solid state
Alzheimer’s B-Amyloid Solid-state
NMR Sudhakar Parthasarathy (University of Illinois Chicago)
4:30 ‐ 4:50 Magic-Angle Spinning Solid-state NMR Studies of a 41 kDa DsbA-DsbB
Membrane Protein Complex Lindsay Sperling (University of Illinois Urbana-
Champaign)
4:50 ‐ 5:10 Proton Detection Methods for Rapid Structural Analysis of Membrane
Proteins and Fibrils Chad Nieuwkoop (University of Illinois Urbana-
Champaign)
5:10 ‐ 5:30 Chemical Shift Assignments of Alpha-Synuclein Fibrils
Gemma Comellas (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign)

The Institute Of Cancer Research

(University of London)

Sutton, Surrey, UK

The Section of Magnetic Resonance

The Cancer Research UK and EPSRC Centre for Cancer Imaging

Team Leader - Novel Biomarkers and Probes

Project Leader (Staff Scientist)

Magnetic Resonance in Translational Cancer Research

The Institute of Cancer Research (a College of the University of London) is a world-class cancer research organization with nationally leading HEFCE RAE ratings. In partnership with The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, we form the largest comprehensive cancer centre in Europe, dedicated to research that extends from epidemiology, genetics and molecular biology, through drug discovery and development, to cancer diagnosis and patient treatment. This makes us uniquely placed to work towards our vision that people may live their lives free from the fear of cancer as a life threatening disease.

The Cancer Research UK and EPSRC Centre for Cancer Imaging focuses on translating preclinical applications of magnetic resonance and other imaging techniques to clinical tools for detection, diagnosis and assessment of cancer and combines expertise from scientists and clinicians based at both the Institute of Cancer Research and Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust. Both posts are concerned with developing our programme in 3 areas: identifying MR biomarkers of cancer response to novel therapeutics, developing applications of hyperpolarization in cancer, and developing novel imaging probes and approaches to recognize and report on cellular processes important in cancer. There are excellent opportunities to collaborate with other Sections in the Institute, including the CR-UK Centre for Cancer Therapeutics.

Team Leader

As a Team Leader you will take responsibility for developing aspects of our Cancer Research UK funded programme, and will be expected to develop and lead new research in the areas outlined above. The candidate will have a strong record and post doctoral experience in biochemistry and in MR techniques, with their application to cellular and preclinical models. Team leaders are expected to win substantial competitive grants, publish extensively, supervise PhD students and contribute to all areas of the Section’s academic function.

The post will be at Career Development Faculty level (i.e. tenure track) with a starting salary from £42,230 p.a. to £46,964 p.a. Job no. A326

Project Leader (Staff Scientist)

As a Staff Scientist you will bring skills relevant to the research programme, taking responsibility for projects within our programme, and equipment in the Group. A PhD in an appropriate discipline (biological, physical, chemical, physiological science), significant post doctoral experience, an ability to co-ordinate, plan and execute research and routine studies to a high standard and advanced knowledge of NMR are therefore essential.

Appointment will be to the Staff Scientist scale, depending on skills and experience, (from £37,477 p.a. to £44,336 p.a.). Job no. A325

To discuss the posts further you may contact Professor Martin Leach on +44 (0)20 8661 3338 (martin.leach@icr.ac.uk).

Both posts benefit from generous annual leave entitlements and a final salary pension scheme.

For a full job description, person specification and details of how to apply please see our website at http://www.icr.ac.uk/jobs/current_vacancies/index.shtml or phone our recruitment line on +44 (0)20 7153 5475.

Closing date: 30^th October 2009