Junior Investigators
The Vocabulary of Clinical and Translational Science
Sponsored by the Research Education, Training and Career Development component of the UAB Center for Clinical and Translational Science (CCTS), the Vocabulary of Clinical and Translational Science is a two-week course designed to: (1) help attendees understand clinical and translational science in a way that better prepares them to read and interpret the medical literature through their understanding of types of research design, conduct, analysis, and interpretation; (2) prepare attendees to make informed decisions regarding whether or not to pursue clinical and translational science as part of their career path; and (3) provide a foundation for further clinical training for participants in UAB’s Clinical and Translational Science Training Program.
This course is mandatory for all School of Medicine Fellows who are beginning their fellowships in July of this year and are enrolled in fellowships of more than one year’s duration. For fellows who have completed training programs with similar content in the past, requests to opt out must be made in writing to Dr. Edward Hook at ehook@uab.edu.
The course will be held Monday-Friday, September 14-25, 2009 from 4-6pm in Finley Conference Center, located on the balcony of the Hugh Kaul Human Genetics Building. To receive more information about the course, please contact Audrey Wrenn at awrenn@uab.edu. To register for this course, click here http://cctsvocab2009.eventbrite.com/.
The Good, Bad and Ugly on Developing Scientific Presentations by Dale Benos
Dr. Dale Benos gave a seminar today on how to develop a good scientific presentations, speaking to an audience of over 150 people from across campus. A big Clint Eastwood fan, Benos used clips and references from some of Eastwood’s best movies to show the participants how to improve their presentation skills.
The Good: The outcome of good presentation according to Benos is stimulate further self-directed learning among the participants. The best thing your presentation can do is to motivate someone to go out and learn more on their own about your topic. A good presenter will be able to this while being enthusiastic, confident, and sincere.
The Bad: Benos recommends using simple, clear wording during a presentation and limit the use of jargon. If you know your topic well, you can describe it without complex words or techinical concepts. Someone who understands your topic well will not be offended, and someone who doesn’t know your topic well will be grateful. Also try not to be offensive, arrogant, or argumentative with audience members when giving a presentation. This will just offend people and ruin the impact of your presentation.
The Ugly: Be careful how you design your PowerPoint slides. Think about colors, fonts, and graphics when creating your slides. Benos suggests keeping your slides simple. If you add a lot of content on your slide, it will be distracting and will encourage your audience to ask questions about things you are not prepared to answer or are distracting to your talk. Remember to that some people are color- blind so never use red font.
To see the Dr. Benos’ PowerPoint Slides from the presentation, visit the CCTS website: http://www.ccts.uab.edu/pages/pres_dev.aspx
Fall 2009 course on Intellectual Property Management
Confused about Intellectual Property Management? The UAB School of Business is offering a course on Intellectual Property Management from inception to commercialization. The course will be offered Fall 2009 on Wednesday evenings from 7:15 – 9:45 pm at the Innovation Depot in downtown Birmingham. Click here for a description of the course. For more information contact, Christy Manning at (205) 934-8815 or cmanning@uab.edu.
Save the Date – First Annual UAB CCTS Scientific Symposium, Oct 1, 2009
The UAB CCTS will be sponsoring its first ever Scientitic Symposium on October 1, 2009. The tentative schedule for the day includes an one-hour presentation by a plenary speaker, four 30 minute presentations by UAB investigators, lunch, and then a poster/discussion session including pilot and drug discovery pilot recipients. To stay informed about the CCTS’s events and happenings, consider becoming a member of the Center: http://www.ccts.uab.edu/pages/join/joinccts.aspx.
Define the word “advantage”
–noun
1. any state, circumstance, opportunity, or means specially favorable to success, interest, or any desired end: the advantage of a good education.
2. benefit; gain; profit: It will be to his advantage to learn Chinese before going to China.
3. superiority or ascendancy (often fol. by over or of): His height gave him an advantage over his opponent.
4. a position of superiority (often fol. by over or of): their advantage in experienced players.
5. Tennis. the first point scored after deuce.
Unfortunately, we can’t help with your tennis game. However, peruse some K award program announcements (and many other RFA or program announcements from the NIH) and note the importance of pointing out the existence of a Clinical and Translational Science Award (known here at UAB as the Center for Clinical and Translational Science or CCTS for short). For example, the following bullet points came from the latest K23 program announcement (which you can access quickly on the NIH website – see The Career Award Wizard post for information on the K kiosk):
• Describe the resources and facilities that will be available to the candidate, including any resources that are within a General Clinical Research Center (GCRC) or Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA).
• Candidates who will be using the resources within a General Clinical Research Center (GCRC) or Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) during the course of the award are requested to include a letter of agreement from either the GCRC or CTSA program director or the principal investigator as part of the application.
So the take-home message of this post: It may be an advantage to your NIH award application to note your access to the CCTS and to include a letter from the CCTS fearless leader, Dr. Lisa Guay-Woodford. Contact Melissa McBrayer for more information on how to proceed with a letter-writing request.
