Phillip Brantley, Ph.D.
Enrichment Director

OVERVIEW

The Enrichment Program supports the overall goals of the CNRU grant and performs several functions within the CNRU. The primary aim of this program is to conduct activities that promote integration of the cores that comprise the CNRU.

Specific goals of the Pennington CNRU Enrichment Program are to provide a framework to 1) improve communication among the CNRU researchers, 2) monitor the activities of investigators associated with the CRNU grant, 3) promote awareness and disseminate information about relevant findings from the CNRU to other scientists and to the community-at-large, and 4) attract distinguished clinical nutrition scientists to Pennington.  A variety of enrichment activities have been used in an attempt to accomplish these goals including:

Visiting Speaker Series 
Nearly every Thursday since the start of our CNRU, visiting scientists have presented one-hour presentations on topics of research interest to Pennington faculty and post-docs. Topics have varied, but a large number have related to some area of obesity and metabolic syndrome.

For this enrichment program, PBRC pledged to invite (at least four times a year or twice per semester) scientists whose research involves molecular and environmental interactions that relate to obesity.  A faculty committee, with input from the entire faculty, selects speakers who are prominent scientists from national and international universities and governmental and industrial laboratories.

All faculty and postdoctoral trainees are encouraged to attend these seminars. Faculty and postdocs have the opportunity to interact with visiting scientists during pre-seminar receptions or during meals. They may also request individual time with the visiting scientist. 

Faculty Work in Progress
Members of the CNRU and their postdoctoral trainees have attended Faculty Work in Progress Presentations each Tuesday afternoon (4:00 until 5:00 P.M.) since the establishment of our CNRU.  At each session, one or more faculty members have presented on their research activities. The setting has been rather informal to allow the audience to ask questions and comment on the research. Audience discussions frequently ensue during and after the hour-long session. Plans are for faculty associated with the CNRU to continue to attend and present their research progress (at least one time per year) at these meetings and receive feedback from their colleagues.

Mentoring Groups
Scientists involved in the CNRU have participated in Pennington’s five Mentoring Groups designed to assist in the training and career development of less experienced Pennington researchers. The Pennington Mentoring Groups include: the Genetics Mentoring Group and the Clinical Physiology Mentoring Group (led by the Executive Director, Dr Claude Bouchard); the Nutrition and Cancer Mentoring Group led by Dr. Andy Deutsch; the Clinical Mentoring Group led by the Associate Director for Clinical Research, Dr. Donna Ryan; and the Molecular and Cell Signaling Mentoring Group led by Dr. David York, Associate Director of Basic Research.

Each mentoring group is composed of 5 to 12 junior and senior level faculty. Dr. York has recently accepted another position to head another nutrition research center and his position will be filled by Dr Richard Rogers.  Groups have met at least once per quarter (some groups have met monthly) to focus group members on relevant research issues and funding sources. Care has been taken to address training needs of junior level investigators, particularly in the area of grant proposal writing.

Postdoctoral Training 
A fundamental goal of postdoctoral training at Pennington is to provide postdoctoral fellows with the knowledge and skills to enable them to perform high quality research and develop competitive research proposals for submission to external funding sources such as the National Institutes of Health.  We have one institutional training grant in place entitled “Obesity: from Genes to Man” funded by NIDDK.   The Director of the T-32 and nearly all its faculty are members of the CNRU.

There are approximately 45 postdoctoral fellows at PBRC, many of whom are mentored by CNRU faculty.  Along with working side by side in research activities with our faculty mentors, postdocs attend a two-semester graduate course entitled “Molecular and Clinical Nutrition”.  The course is offered each fall through the LSU School of Human Ecology and team taught by CNRU faculty and designed for postdocs and LSU advanced graduate students.

We are currently in the process of planning the Fall 2007 course and are considering allowing senior postdocs, who have previously taken the course, to teach two to three of the lectures in the upcoming course in order to acquire graduate teaching experience. 

Postdocs have also participated in seminars on grant writing. Pennington’s Division of Education recently encouraged and offered transportation for postdocs to attend a state sponsored workshop on the basics of grant writing.  Postdocs have participated in weekly Postdoc Journal Club and Data Presentation Seminars (during at least one of these each year, postdocs present their own research program). 

All postdocs and interested faculty have met one Wednesday each month for Research Ethics Seminars. This seminar series has included case studies and discussions on topics related to research ethics and professional issues. Topics have included: conflicts of interest in research, mentor/trainee relationships, issues in data acquisition and management, data sharing and ownership, authorship, responsibilities to the public, handling research misconduct and more. Kevin Elliot, Ph.D., who holds joint appointments at Pennington and the LSU Department of Philosophy, is the seminar leader. Dr Elliot has recently accepted another position at the University of South Carolina and plans are in the works to find a replacement for his services.

Pennington Scientific Symposium Series 
Pennington continues to organize two scientific symposia each year on topics of interest to Pennington scientists.  These two-day meetings allow top international scientists to visit Baton Rouge and the Pennington Center.  Upwards to thirty visiting scientists join together with Pennington scientists at each meeting to present data and develop conclusions and recommendations for future research in a targeted area.  Meeting proceedings and conclusions are published on the Pennington web site and in scientific journals.