SBP’s Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences is now accepting applications for fall 2016 admission to the PhD degree program in biomedical sciences.
Continue reading “SBP’s Graduate School is now accepting applications for fall 2016”
Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute (SBP) is proud to announce that its Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences has received accreditation by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC). This is an important milestone for the Graduate School, a distinction that assures the public that our school has the resources, policies, and practices in place to achieve its educational goals.
The SBP Graduate Program began in 2006. Today, we have 25 students with a unique opportunity to carry out their studies in an environment of collaborative research, with access to the most-sophisticated minds and technologies in biomedical sciences. The Program gives graduate students fluency in biology, chemistry, bioinformatics, and engineering to integrate research into meaningful applications that will advance medicine. Their education comes at a time when research has never been more intellectually exciting and critically important to society.
The effort was led by Guy Salvesen, PhD, dean of the Graduate School, who has been dedicated to providing the best learning opportunities for SBP students to become the next-generation of pioneers in biomedical research. Dr. Salveson has overseen the recruitment of talented students from around the world—Europe, Asia, Australia and the United States—and engaged our faculty to teach, train and mentor. He has been accountable to WASC during an eight year systematic process of scrutiny that left no stone unturned. At the same time, he has managed his own research laboratory of staff scientists, postdocs, graduate students and interns, exploring the principles of proteolysis in humans.
In addition to Dr. Salveson, Malene Hansen, PhD, associate dean of Student Affairs; Alessandra Sacco, PhD, associate dean of Curriculum; Robert Rickert, PhD, associate dean of Admissions, and Stacey Smith, manager of the Graduate Program, have helped achieve the goal through their passion for education, and creating an environment that supports the highest-quality learning in biomedical research.
Many congratulations to everyone at SBP that works to support the Graduate School, including the faculty, staff, and the students, for creating and fostering a program that is now officially recognized for its excellence.
On May 13-18, Sanford-Burnham’s Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences held its sixth annual retreat in San Marcos, Calif.
This year’s theme, “Effectively Communicating Scientific Research to a Broad Audience,” gave the students an opportunity to share their research and practice explaining their work in simple terms—simple enough for non-scientists.
Organized by Francesca Boscolo Sesillo, Mirco Guigli, and Gianluigi Lichinchi, all graduate students at the Institute, the presenters were encouraged to address questions such as:
As a very grateful invited guest, I was dazzled by the presentations. Many of the students included analogies and graphics that made some very complex information—structured illumination resolution, haploinsuffient photoreceptors, SWI/SNF BRAHMA chromatin remodeling, just to name a few—clear enough for this “arm-chair” scientist to be dangerous.
For many reasons, effectively communicating science to non-scientists and scientists within other disciplines is critical. Like it or not, when you explain science you are selling. You may be selling your ideas to seek funding and grants, convincing others of your findings, or recruiting people to work on your project.
The students took it seriously, not only because many of their mentors and advisors were in the audience, but also because they were scored on a scale of 1-5 for quality, content, and clarity of the presentations. When the score cards were tallied the winner was… (drum roll, please)
Francesca Boscolo Sesillo (Sacco Lab)
Francesca, a third year student, presented her research on the role of p21 during skeletal muscle regeneration. Her findings show that p21, a cell cycle inhibitor, plays a key role in the activation and differentiation of muscle stem cells. Understanding the mechanisms that lead to muscle regeneration has important implications for future interventions that can improve muscle health in the elderly as well people with degenerative disorders such as muscular dystrophy.
Many congratulations to all the fabulous students, and to Guy Salvesen, Ph.D., Dean of the Graduate School, for providing leadership and education opportunities for the students.
And a special thanks to:
High-school graduate Christina Lee has spent the last three and half months learning firsthand what it’s like to work at the lab bench in a major medical research institution. After graduating from Canyon Crest Academy in June of this year, Christina has spent this summer – before packing for college – interning in our NCI-designated Cancer Center with Jorge Moscat, PhD, and Maria Diaz-Meco, Ph.D., of the Cell Death and Survival Networks Program.
We asked Christina to share a little about herself and her time at the Institute—and she had plenty of fascinating things to say! Continue reading “The intern life: Meet Christina Lee”