News & Views
The ASU-RIMI program at Alabama State University (ASU) was funded 4.2 million dollars in September 2003. This was the largest biomedical grant in the history of Alabama State University. The overall goal of the grant is to enhance Alabama State University’s biomedical research infrastructure and to provide expanded opportunities for minorities in biomedical research. Briefly, the goal of the grant is to enhance ASU’s biomedical research infrastructure by:
Renovating and upgrading research laboratories and core facilities
Purchasing new state of the art research equipment
Supporting faculty development activities such as workshops, seminars and institutional research awards
Supporting four different research subprojects.
During the past three years, the Office of Research Development has been very successful in implementing and achieving the goals set forth by the ASU RIMI program.
Core facilities: The ASU-RIMI program renovated and fully equipped six core facilities in the science building (Tissue Culture Room, Darkroom/Microscopy room, Animal room, Radiation room, Equipment Room and the Bioinformatics Laboratory). These new Core facilities are up and running and are currently being extensively used by faculty and students. These facilities are also used to teach courses such as biological techniques or other courses that use the equipment in the core facility, further maximizing faculty and student training benefits.
Seminar series/Symposium: The program has supported several scientists from all over the nation to come and present their research to ASU faculty and students. The seminar series has been vital in stimulating the interest of students and faculty in biomedical research by providing a unique opportunity for students and faculty to be exposed to the current topics and to meet and interact with eminent scientists. Thus maintaining and enhancing the overall scientific and intellectual environment of the science disciplines at Alabama State University. The symposium has been beneficial in providing a platform for students and faculty to present their findings to the ASU community.
Travel awards: have enabled several of our faculty and students to attend national and local scientific meetings. This has enabled our faculty to present their research findings to the scientific community and to network with leaders in their respective fields. Apart from networking, these meetings provide an opportunity for faculty members to directly meet with representatives from funding agencies who provide updates on funding opportunities relevant to their respective fields.
Internal research awards: have been very successful and we have been able to fund an average of three pilot projects a year. Some of the initial awardees of the internal awards have been able to generate enough pilot data that has lead to the generation of research proposals that have been submitted to other funding agencies. All the previous awardees have also been able to generate data that has been presented to different scientific organizations.
Overall, the last three years of the RIMI grant have been very successful and we plan on using this as a stimulus to motivate us to accomplish more in the years to come.
-Editorial comments by K.S. Wekesa