# Training Program in Stem Cell Translational Medicine for Neurological Disorders

> **NIH NIH T32** · UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA-IRVINE · 2021 · $293,873

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY
Stem cell medicine promises to revolutionize the treatment of human diseases and injuries, and has captured
the hopes of the scientific community and the public alike. Perhaps nowhere is the potential of stem cells to
treat human disease and injury more promising than for neurologic disorders. Traveling a path from “bench to
bedside” is still a relatively new opportunity for researchers and provides novel challenges for training graduate
students. Historically, pre-doctoral neuroscience students were trained in understanding the basic biological
mechanisms underlying how the brain functions and guides behavior, learning and memory, movement, and to
identify the processes that become dysregulated and result in neurological disease. Indeed, the biological
mechanisms and causes for many neurological diseases have been identified, paving the way for the
generation of transgenic animals and model systems to study neurological disorders. Critically, these
advances, combined with the advent of stem cell biology, open a path to treat neurologic diseases with
transplantation of stem cell derived cell populations or to develop treatment strategies in stem-cell derived cell
models. This is a path that requires training beyond basic science. Accordingly, the goal of our Training
Program in Stem Cell Translational Medicine for Neurological Disorders is to provide opportunities for
pre-doctoral trainees to perform translational "bench" research that could treat human neurological disease
and injury, in the spirit of the NIH vision for translational medicine. Additionally however, to meet the challenges
presented by the advent of this new frontier, we provide opportunities for trainees in the clinical aspects of the
disease they are studying. These opportunities enable identification of therapeutic targets with the greatest
relevance to human disease, inform preclinical safety and efficacy testing, and define preclinical outcome
measures that parallel clinical metrics. Furthermore, this program familiarizes trainees with the complexities of
the regulatory processes required for human clinical trials and the business of taking research products to
patients. A novel, and highly successful, aspect of the training is coaching in communication, conflict
resolution, interpersonal and group interactions skills. These skills are important both for success in working in
interdisciplinary teams and for helping in the success and retention of underrepresented minority students.
Taken together, these opportunities will prepare students for careers inside and outside academia and will
advance the NIH goals of enhancing biomedical research in the context of health and human services as a
whole. The program we have implemented thus fills a significant training gap in the translational application of
stem cell biology to neurological disorders, not typically met by traditional neurobiology, stem cell or clinical
graduate programs.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10201753
- **Project number:** 5T32NS082174-09
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA-IRVINE
- **Principal Investigator:** PETER John DONOVAN
- **Activity code:** T32 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $293,873
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2013-07-01 → 2023-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10201753

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10201753, Training Program in Stem Cell Translational Medicine for Neurological Disorders (5T32NS082174-09). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10201753. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*