PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT We seek continued funding for an interdisciplinary training program focused on Neurodevelopmental Disabilities (NDD). Based at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and University of Pennsylvania (Penn), this program is integrated into the CHOP/Penn Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center and broader CHOP/Penn neuroscience community. The goal of the Program is to train MD and PhD fellows in research focused on NDDs. There are three reasons for this focus. First, NDDs are common; ~10% of U.S. households live with an individual who has an NDD. These households bear significant and often lifelong financial cost and emotional impact. Second, NDDs have diverse causes — from genetic to acquired — that alter brain development, circuitry, and behavior. Understanding how these causes lead to the various NDDs will yield treatments for what are currently untreatable disorders. Third, the symptoms of the various NDDs are broad and impact all aspects of brain function, requiring interdisciplinary investigation. Training researchers to improve our understanding of NDDs and ultimately develop treatments will improve outcomes and quality of lives for individuals with NDDs and their families. Hence, we request continued support for 6 postdoctoral fellows/year who participate in a program designed to be three years in length. This number of trainees allows us to maintain a critical mass to support a diverse trainee pool that can learn from each other and is easily justified by the many outstanding applicants. In the labs of our 29 faculty mentors, trainees use state-of-the-art genetic, cellular/molecular, behavioral, physiologic, and structural/dynamic imaging techniques to pursue basic and translational research relevant to NDDs. While the main Program focus is this mentored research training, the trainees (and their mentors) also regularly meet for activities that develop oral and written communication skills and encourage exchange of scientific information. They also work with the Program Statistician to build a strong foundation in quantitative skills and fluency. The Program Directors help trainees develop customized plans to reach their research and career goals. Our past trainees are now leaders in NDD research across the country. In the last 15 years, 38 trainees came into the Program with a degree of MD (1), MD/PhD (5), DMV/PhD (1), or PhD (31). Twenty-four (63%) of these trainees are female and 10 (26%) of these trainees are from groups historically-excluded from biomedical science and research. Thirty-two different NDD T32 mentors have supervised these trainees. The 32 trainees who completed both T32 support and postdoc training since 2007 are now faculty members (14 Asst/Assoc Prof), scientists in academia (1 Instruct., 2 Res Assoc.), pharma/biotech (9), and at a non-profit (1), scientific writers (2) and clinicians (2), and one is the CHOP Assoc. Director of Diversity. This T32 combines the outstan...