Applying Experiential Learning to Career Development Training for Biomedical Graduate Students and Postdocs: Perspectives on Program Development and Design.

Experiential learning is an effective educational tool across many academic disciplines, including career development. Nine different institutions bridged by the National Institutes of Health Broadening Experiences in Scientific Training Consortium compared their experiments in rethinking and expanding training of predoctoral graduate students and postdoctoral scholars in the biomedical sciences to include experiential learning opportunities. In this article, we provide an overview of the four types of experiential learning approaches our institutions offer and compare the learning objectives and evaluation strategies employed for each type.

Internship Experiences Contribute to Confident Career Decision Making for Doctoral Students in the Life Sciences.

The Graduate Student Internships for Career Exploration (GSICE) program at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), offers structured training and hands-on experience through internships for a broad range of PhD-level careers. The GSICE program model was successfully replicated at the University of California, Davis (UC Davis). Here, we present outcome data for a total of 217 PhD students participating in the UCSF and UC Davis programs from 2010 to 2015 and 2014 to 2015, respectively.

The origin and implementation of the Broadening Experiences in Scientific Training programs: an NIH common fund initiative.

Recent national reports and commentaries on the current status and needs of the U.S. biomedical research workforce have highlighted the limited career development opportunities for predoctoral and postdoctoral trainees in academia, yet little attention is paid to preparation for career pathways outside of the traditional faculty path.

Precision medicine: Beyond the inflection point.

A confluence of biological, physical, engineering, computer, and health sciences is setting the stage for a transformative leap toward data-driven, mechanism-based health and health care for each individual.

A parasite cysteine protease is key to host protein degradation and iron acquisition.

Cysteine proteases of the Clan CA (papain) family are the predominant protease group in primitive invertebrates. Cysteine protease inhibitors arrest infection by the protozoan parasite, Trypanosoma brucei. RNA interference studies implicated a cathepsin B-like protease, tbcatB, as a key inhibitor target.

Genetic composition of the Bacillus subtilis SOS system.

The SOS response in bacteria includes a global transcriptional response to DNA damage. DNA damage is sensed by the highly conserved recombination protein RecA, which facilitates inactivation of the transcriptional repressor LexA. Inactivation of LexA causes induction (derepression) of genes of the LexA regulon, many of which are involved in DNA repair and survival after DNA damage.

A cathepsin B-like protease is required for host protein degradation in Trypanosoma brucei.

Identification and analysis of Clan CA (papain) cysteine proteases in primitive protozoa and metazoa have suggested that this enzyme family is more diverse and biologically important than originally thought. The protozoan parasite Trypanosoma brucei is the etiological agent of African sleeping sickness. The cysteine protease activity of this organism is a validated drug target as first recognized by the killing of the parasite with the diazomethane inhibitor Z-Phe-Ala-CHN(2) (where Z is benzyloxycarbonyl).

Synthesis of 4-hydroxysphinganine and characterization of sphinganine hydroxylase activity in corn.

Sphinganine and 4-hydroxysphinganine (phytosphingosine) are the predominant free long-chain bases in lipid extracts of plant tissues. While the synthesis of sphinganine in plants has been investigated, the metabolic origin of 4-hydroxysphinganine is not known. Three different approaches utilizing fumonisin B(1), an inhibitor of sphinganine acylation, alone or in combination with beta-chloroalanine, an inhibitor of sphinganine synthesis, were used to establish that free 4-hydroxysphinganine is produced in excised corn shoots by the direct hydroxylation of sphinganine and not from the breakdown of complex sphingolipids.