UND will compete for $30 million research program; your assistance requested A research infrastructure planning opportunity may be of interest to you. The University competed and was selected to plan a NIH funded Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) grant application. If funded, the CTSA will provide up to $30 million over five years toward an academic home at UND for a multi-disciplinary, fully integrated program of clinical and translational health research and research training. Our proposal was approved and funded by the NIH to plan for a Northern Plains Center for Research Translation (NPCRT). This center will create an infrastructure to support a multidisciplinary program of clinical and translational research that serves at-risk rural populations across the region, for example American Indian, migrant workers, and rural white elderly populations. NPCRT will enable researchers from all interested departments at UND to build research teams, comprised of different levels of investigators that will move UND’s research from the basic science realm into focused clinical and translational venues. Collaboration with a wide base of stakeholders including communities, families, education, practice, industry, and government will be a core focus of this center. All members of the UND faculty can play a key role in the CTSA endeavor. We value your current contributions to research science, education, and practice. The CTSA provides investigators the opportunity to highlight and expand current work. You each possess critical elements that can contribute to the structural core around which UND can construct a successful CTSA. We challenge and invite you to consider how your research does or could fit into the CTSA vision. A survey has been developed to (a) gather information, (b) assess interest, (c) inventory researchers’ current engagement in clinical or translational research, (d) define investigators’ individual needs for infrastructure support and (e) assist in setting core research goals for the CTSA full proposal. Further information about the CTSA project follows. Please click on the following link to access the survey. You will be asked to provide a 200-300 word abstract regarding your current/potential research area(s). (You may want to prepare the narrative prior to entering the survey and then cut/paste). Survey link: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.asp?u=582823224233 Survey available: Jan. 30 to Feb. 14, 2007 -- Tom Petros, profess of psychology, Thomas_petros@und.nodak.edu and Glenda Lindseth, professor of nursing, glendalindseth@mail.und.edu General CTSA information What is CTSA and translational research all about? Translational research has been defined and envisioned in many ways. Below is a sampling of perspectives. NIH Director, Elias Zerhouni, M.D. “The CTSAs will advance the assembly of institutional academic ‘homes’ that can provide integrated intellectual and physical resources for the conduct of original clinical and translation science. We anticipate that the creative installation and development of these environments will, over time, enhance the theoretical underpinnings of the discipline, provide much-needed educational programs, contribute to the growth of well-structured and well-recognized career pathways, and provide a research environment that is more nimble, conducive to, and responsive to the demands of modern translational and clinical research” (Zerhouni, E., 2005, Translational and Clinical Science--Time for a New Vision. The New England Journal of Medicine, 353, 1621-1623. Retrieved January 18, 2007 from http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/353/15/1621). Afaf Meleis, University of Pennsylvania “From bench to bedside, from Petri dish to people, from animal to human. This is what has been typically meant by translational research. Scientists work at the molecular, then cellular level to test ‘basic research,’ then proceed to applications for animals, and onto humans. The work is translated into practice in order to improve human health as its lasting legacy” (p. 8). [Afaf Meleis, University of Pennsylvania: Penn Nursing. (September, 2006) Upfront: A Publication of Penn Nursing--Where Science Leads]. How would the CSTA fit with the UND Mission? The UND’s mission is to “serve the state, the country, and the world community through teaching research, creative activities, clinical practice and service; and to share a distinctive responsibility for the discovery, development, preservation, and dissemination of knowledge.” Clinical and translational research will be a key component in fulfilling this mission. What can the Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) provide? A funded CTSA will support laboratory, clinical, animal, behavioral, educational, and community researchers as well as practitioners and community leaders. Our vision of the proposed CTSA will provide resources to create: * The development of translational and clinical science as an independent discipline at UND. * A research education center featuring a graduate degree program in translational and clinical science. * A program of clinical and translational research that will develop and disseminate interventions and best practices to prevent or reduce the impact of diseases of interest. * A dedicated clinical and translational research quadrant that will not only house investigators, laboratories and clinics, but also the administrative, governance, regulatory, and evaluation cores of the CTSA. * A seed grant program to promote multidisciplinary clinical and translational research. * A data sharing and resource center to develop intra-institutional and national collaboration, sharing, and dissemination of interventions and best practices resulting from CTSA sponsored research and research methodologies. * Additional research-intensive faculty lines and seed grant funding that relates to the UND CTSA research priorities. What kinds of research will the CTSA facilitate? The overarching goal of the national CTSA program is to bring about significant reductions in the morbidity and mortality of the major diseases by doing a better job of bringing discoveries in the laboratory to benefit patients “at the bedside.” The UND CTSA program is designed to do this by developing clinical and translational science as an independent discipline (to accelerate discovery) and by supporting a wide range of behavioral research related to three disease clusters: 1) mental disorders such as depression and suicide; 2) metabolic disorders such as diabetes and obesity, and 3) neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease. What are some examples of currently funded CTSA research? As of Oct. 1, 2006, there are currently 12 funded CTSA academic centers in the country. A link describing these centers follows. http://www.ncrr.nih.gov/ncrrprog/roadmap/CTSA_9-2006.asp How could my research fit into the CTSA vision? The following statements may help stimulate your imagination of innovative research! * How could you create and maintain an innovative and integrated program that could contribute to the development of a Clinical and Translational Research Center or other entity that fosters an environment in which basic, clinical, and translational research and researchers flourish? * Does your work support the development of novel clinical and translational methodologies? * How could biomedical informatics standards be developed and used to maximize interoperability between internal systems and systems in outside organizations? * How could your research involve the community in setting research priorities that directly affect patients, innovative ways to engage community members in mentoring processes, partnerships in clinical and translation research, and collaboration to enhance research perspectives (e.g., health disparity research), public trust, and recruitment for clinical and translational research? * How could your research include outreach plans for community practitioners including means of engagement, possible incentives, application of research results (dissemination) and plans for training CTSA researchers, trainees and scholars in community outreach, cultural sensitivity, and population and community-based research methods? * How could your research contribute to changing needs of clinical and translational research communities? * How could your research or expertise contribute to the development of new educational programs in clinical and translational science or develop novel concepts, methodologies, and approaches that integrate the education, training, and career development environments? -- Nursing and Psychology.