Project Summary Abstract This proposal is a resubmission of a renewal application that has been supported by NHLBI for nearly four decades. Support for eight postdoctoral trainee positions is requested in this renewal application, as has been present during the current funding period. The overriding goal of our program remains to provide the highest caliber training of postdoctoral trainee scientists and physician-scientists, to build the pipeline of tomorrow’s cardiovascular researchers. Our trainees are instilled with expertise so that they can solve cardiovascular problems using multidisciplinary approaches, as they are mentored by the excellent faculty at University of California, San Diego (UCSD), one of the top research institutions in the world. The postdoctoral fellows emerging from our rich academic environment are imbued with the ultimate goal to seek long term success in academia, industry, government, or non-profit sectors. There is clear continued need for this program since cardiovascular disease remains the leading cause of death globally, according to the W.H.O., and is also among the top causes of mortality and morbidity in the U.S. This obligates our program, our institution, and the United States, to train investigators who will advance the forefront of cardiovascular biomedicine. No other training mechanisms exist at UCSD that provide support and training of postdoctoral trainees in the unique and specific cardiovascular disciplines of this grant. The Guiding Principles for the program are embedded in the rich history of this program and propelled us to maintain our original title of the grant - “Training in Cardiovascular Physiology and Pharmacology.” Yet, we highlight that this T32 program continuously evolves and seeks improvement. It provides broad exposure to the study of cardiovascular basic biology, physiology, disease pathobiology, and related translational pursuits. Primary areas that the program focuses on are 1) cardiac signaling, 2) cardiac development, regeneration, and stem cell biology, 3) cardiac genetics and epigenetics, 4) cardiac bioengineering, and 5) cardiac clinical and translational focused biology. Within these areas of focus we foster exposure of the trainees to the most modern, innovative, and emerging technologies to accelerate their hypothesis driven discoveries. This might include use of human stem cell-based model systems, omics-based approaches, computational sciences, and big data informatics, and how best to translate from bench to the bedside. During the success of this T32 program over the last forty years of continuous support, it has been instrumental in training many of the leaders in cardiovascular biology at UCSD, and also has had broad impact on producing leaders throughout the country in both academia and industry.