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 March 7, 2003
Dear Friends,
Welcome to the virtual Marine Biological Laboratory. This is the first in a series of messages designed to update members of the MBL Community from around the world on activities happening on our Woods Hole campus.
Although the village of Woods Hole can be cold and a little sleepy this time of year, the MBL is, as usual, teeming with activity. Steve Hajduk, the newest member of the MBL research staff, has just moved his laboratory and a number of students, postdocs, and research support staff from the University of Alabama, Birmingham, to the MBL, where he is now a Senior Scientist and Director of our Global Infectious Diseases Program. The Program—a part of the Josephine Bay Paul Center for Molecular Biology and Evolution, directed by Mitchell Sogin—was established recently with a $5 million grant from the Ellison Medical Foundation. I’m also pleased to welcome Assistant Scientists Robert Sabatini and Andrew McArthur to the Global Infectious Diseases Program.
At The Ecosystems Center, Co-Director Jerry Melillo and Senior Scientist Bruce Peterson were each lead authors on papers focusing on global climate change. Both papers were published in the December 13th issue of Science magazine. Jerry was also recently honored by being elected president of the Ecological Society of America. His term will begin during the summer of 2004.
As many of you know, January and February are busy months of deadlines at the MBL.
Applications for summer research space and fellowships were due on January 15, and applications for the major summer courses were due in early February. I'm pleased to report that our educational program is as strong as ever. The number of applicants to the summer courses this year is comparable to—or higher than—last year. In addition, our courses continue to receive praise from the NIH peer review panels that evaluate our training grants. For example, the recent review of the competing renewal for our Neural Systems & Behavior course stated: "The program (course) is outstanding. No weaknesses were identified in the application and, consequently, the Panel was decidedly enthusiastic about the program." The grant was awarded a priority score of 102.
In other course news, I'm pleased to announce that two outstanding neurobiologists,
Bard Ermentrout of the University of Pittsburgh and John White of Boston University have accepted our invitation to serve as the new course directors of the short course, "Methods in Computational Neuroscience." Both are held in the highest regard by our strong computational community. The searches for new course directors for Microbial Diversity, Physiology, and Neurobiology are also well underway. These new directors will assume responsibility for their respective courses in 2004. We expect to complete our searches by this summer to facilitate a seamless transition from one group of directors to the next.
On the visiting research and fellowship front, I'm happy to report that the number of applications for fellowships has nearly doubled over last year. Thanks to a generous gift from the Grass Foundation, we will also be offering a few new, fully-funded mid-career research awards in neuroscience. Applications for summer research space have been strong as well. I have no doubt we'll be fully subscribed with outstanding investigators from around the world doing exciting and innovative science at the MBL again this summer.
I plan to use this forum to update you on the MBL's activities every other month or so.
I hope you'll check back often for news from Woods Hole. As always, I welcome your comments.
Best wishes,
Bill Speck
William T. Speck, Director and CEO
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